Tensas gazette. [volume] (St. Joseph, La.) 1886-current, 1910-12-02

(Pomeroy's mother kept a small
store.) The little girl-Katie-
came back. She disappeared like a
Whit Of cigar smoke in a stormy mid
Atlantic. Her mother was frantic
with grief. Everybody became a de-
tective. The months rolled away One
rainy day little deaf-mute pulled at
a policeman's coat, and by signs in
dicated that he wished the policeman
to go along with him, which he did.
Murderer Apprehended.
They went out of the highways
and byways until they came to the
Dorchester marshes, which were as
gloomy In those days as the marshes
of Abel Magwitch and Pip. The lit
tie fellow was In a terrible state Of
excitement. and soon the officer was
when they came to murdered and mu-
tilated little Horace MILAN, lying in
the mud and grass. They carried the
body to the station house, and then
had plaster of paris casts taken Of
the footprints in the mud near where
the boys body was found. They then
went to Mrs. Pomeroy's house. Jesse
was In bed.
His shoes exactly fitted the casts.
He was arrested. While he was in
Jail his mother moved away from the
old home on Broadway for obvious
reasons. Then the house was torn
down to make room for a better one.
While the workmen were digging in
the cellar they unearthed the little
corpse of Katie Curran. Then Jesse
confessed that he had murdered her
and little MILAN.
"She had come into the store for
the thread her mother had sent her
for. Jesse was alone In the store.
He told her to go back and get 1t
to turn to the right.
Fate Of Little Victim.
'Tn the meantime he had turned
the key in the front door. leading to
the street, returned, followed the lit
tie girl, and as she started back from
the cellarway he sprang upon her,
pushed her down the cellar stairs.
mutilated, then killed her. He then
dug a grave in the cellar, buried her,
came upstairs, washed his hands and
face, unlocked the front door, had his
dinner, and went to bed. He was the
only one in the world who knew Of
that little corpse in his mothers eel
lar"
When Pomeroy was tried a petition
signed by thousands of mothers was
sent to the governor praying him to
hang Jesse. Because Of his youth,
however, the sentence was commuted
One governor, years afterward, WIS.,
tied him in his cell to hear his prayer
for liberty. why. man." said the
governor. after listening to him, "if
should pardon you. you would be
strung up to the nearest lamp post
outside" ,r.
1t shocked and startled Pomeroy
He hadn't thought Of that. But all he
said was. would that be justice?"
Justice" Is Pomeroy's hobby.
Many efforts have been made to Sc.
cure his release. On one occasion a
number of Virginia women appealed
to a Massachusetts, governor to set
Pomeroy free. The governor wrote
back:
IF Pomeroy had committed his
crimes In your state he would have
been burned alive at the stake, and
there would be no necessity for
pardon"
Yet it is probably true, as has often
been asserted. that If science in 1876
had progressed as far as 1t has In
1910 In explaining the pathological
causes for such crimes as Pomeroy's.
he would have been sent. not to soli-
tary confinement IN a state prison.
but to an asylum for the criminal in
sane.
Pomeroy was arrested in 1874. The
MILAN boy, for whose murder he was
tried. was only four years old. In
1876 Pomeroy began his life in
Charlestown prison.