The Farmville herald. [volume] (Farmville, Va.) 1890-1934, 1907-11-22
Oils TaYlOF 10 HAM.

/ ne lIlNl illllllltl fdrN AhhNh ~
Moud ~ in the Circuit Court for trial
was that Of Otis Taylor, charged with
the brutal murder Of Cecilia Banks on
the night Of January 18th, 1907. Both
the accused and the woman murdered
were cclored.
The trial Of Taylor required only
part Of the day, the verdict being
murder i'm the first degree. The pris-
oner's counsel, Mr.. William Lancaster
moved TO set aside the verdict as con
trary TO the law and the evidence, and
this being denied Judge Hundley
Immediately sentenced the condemn
ed man TO be hanged on Friday, Jan
uary 3rd, 1905.
During the deeply solemn moments
when the Judge was passing sentence
Of death Otis Taylor was apparently
the most least concerned person in the
court room, and on his way back to
the Jail, he remarked to the officers in
charge that he was perfectly willing
to die. Judge Hundley in sentencing
Taylor spoke as follows:
Otis Taylor, you have been tried and
convicted of the cOldblOOded and plac-
ticaliy unprovoked murder Of de-
| ienseless woman. Theevidence shows
that upon her complaining Of you and
/ threatening to have you arrested for
/ beating her little son, you first assault
/ ed her and then deliberately loaded
/ your pistol and followed her into the
public road and shot her down whilst
| her back was turned and she was 90
ing away from you, and fired another
shot at her after she fell. The only
I defense made for you by your counsel
was that you were so drunk at the
/ time as not TO know what you were
doing, but the evidence utterly failed
/ % establish even this despicable plea.
Ii was proven that you had taken a
/ drink, but that you were not even in
| tOXicated You had taken, perhaps
Just enough TO make you vicious and
/ dangerous. You are mere youth,
not over twenty-years, or at most
twenty-five years of age, and the sad
dest thing about your case is that you
were able TO establish a previous Z cd
character, but not TO offer a single
eXtenuating circumstance in cOnnec-
ton with your crime. 1t is a sad re-
/ Election for me that within the last two
years.l have had to pass sentence Of
death upon four men, and you are the
fifth. a painful duty under any
circumstances, it is especially so IN
your case, for i'm you / see the sudden
| wreck and ruin of a youth Of previous
good character, going down To death
I'm the first blush Of manhood without
another ray of kindly light to relieve
the darkness OF his doom. The evil
dence is that a few years ago you left
your home in the county and went
North, and returning went to work
on % railroad under construction.
What YOU learned in the North, ] do
not know, but / can readily under
stand that YOU learned nothing good
i'm the railroad camps. Like many OF
the youths Of your race, your ambition
seems 10 have been first to secure a
pistol, or "gun, az you all call it, and
then you were ready for any dark and
desperate deed Men, both white aud
black. are too much given to carrying
deadly weapons, but this is the pecu-
liar vice Of the youths Of your race.
If you and they were content to live
upon the farms where your simple old
ancestors lived and worked for mode
rate wages, innocent, harmless and
happy lives might be your lot, but
you needs must hurry into the cities
and raj road camps and lose both char
acter and life, as you have now done.
] can but hope that your death will
prove a warning TO others of your race
who may have entered upon the
same road which leads only To disgrace
or death, and sometimes TO both.
The Judge was visibly moved as he
pronounced the sentence Of death.