The herald and news. [volume] (Newberry S.C.) 1903-1937, 1913-05-23

What he did with the waste will never
be known.
He was placed in another cell, high
er up and stronger. Jesse began on
his good behavior again, writing, writ
ing always writing never turning his
head to see or look at q. passerby.
Years, yes, ten Of them rolled by
when at midnight, the prison officials
and inmates were startled by a deaf
ening explosion. The guards and war
den ran everywhere, seeking the
escaping gas, that all, so distinctly
smelled. At Jesse cell they found the
whole wall next the corridor blown
out and Jesse standing with a great
club in his hand in one corner in a
dazed condition.
1t seems that large iron gas pipe
ran along inside the wall, near the top
of the cell, next the + corridor. By
some means, perhaps by calculation,
if not by intuition, Jesse discovered
it's locality. Then painstaking and de-
liberately he began ten years of toll,
in piercing the granite wall, then the
iron pipe This he accomplished, with
his discarded steel pir.s and few old
nails he had gotten out of his bed
stead. When at last his work was
done, his idea was tc food the room
with gas, then ignite it, hoping thus
to blow out the wall to the carridor
and trust to luck and circumstances
for his chance to freedom. All this he
carried out as planned. When the
room was sufficiently flooded, he
crawled far back under his bed, hav-
ing wrenched off one of it's legs, as
a weapon, ignited the dangerous ele-
ment by striking spark with pen
on the granite floor. The expected
explosion took place, but with far
greater effect than was anticipated.
Not only the opposite wall went, but
Jesse's bed and Jesse, himself, were
blown against the wall, stunning him
so he could not take advantage of the
ci~c11ms tances he had created.
The terrific explosion reused and
excited inmates and keeper to a great
pitch, not knowing what would take
place next. The smell of suffocating
gas was soon in every room for the
whole main of the building was blown
out and the building was flooding fast
where the. least spark would blow the
prison to atoms. But the gas was
the first thing shut off, before attend
ing to Jesse. No doubt bad ne not
been SO stunned with the iron leg of
his bedstead he would have given the
keepers the fight of their lives. When
upbraided by the chief warden, who
had been exceedingly kind to the
boy, he only grinned and said, "You
think I am going to be penned up
all my life and not try to make my
escape%
A special cell was made for him
of the heaviest granite blocks, lined
outside and in with the hardest steel.
In front of his grated door, sits day
to watch Jesse and whenever tread
and night, sentinel whose only duty
is heard coming a screen is pushed
across the opening. For more than
twenty years no one has seen or
spoken to him except the guard and
this only on matters of duty.
The case of Jesse Pomeroy has
been the object of study and research
of every alienist, psychologist and
scientist in this country. Time and
again, he has been examined by ex-
perts by order of the court, but all
declare him normal in every respect.
Those who believe il hereditary and
claim that certain traits in distant
ancestors may skip for a thousand
generations when suddenly it crops
out in some descendant, say Jesse
may have inherited this murderous
trait, from some distant forebear,
among those who came out of the.
great plains of Iran, and spread over
Europe whose tenets were "to kill and
destroy everything they could not,
make use Of"