Arizona republican., 1914-02-05
THE TRIAL OF
 EUGENE ARAM

There was so much that was un- usual and romantic in the crime and trial of Eugene Aram that both found it of sufficient appeal to pre- serve it to posterity in poetry and fiction. It was due to their interest that a common murderer is more or less of a hero, not through exroiiing the crime, but through the clever ness with which it was hidden for so many years. So much sympathy for Eugene was created by Hoods poem that determined efforts have been made at various times and by var ious writers to prove that he was martyr, but the evidence against him was too conclusive to be argued away.
 The Aram crime was first revealed in 1759, when some workmen were engaged in digging out stone in a quarry near Knaresborough, England, human skeleton. The bones were collected and taken into the village and an effort was made to identify them. One of. the old inhabitants remembered that a man named Dam iel Clark had mysteriously disappear ed some fifteen years before, Then another old inhabitant recited how Clark was intimate With a man named Houseman and he was last seen in Houseman's company, so Houseman was hunted up and an ef- 1 fort was made to find out what he knew about Clark's disappearance. After being closely questioned Houseman finally made a confession. ! The bones that had been dug up were not those of Clark, but House. man led them to the place where Clark was buried. In Houseman's 1 confession he said that he and Clark | and Eugene Aram had been associat- ed for some time in a general swindling scheme. Aram, who was | educated and clever directed the Op- ! erations, and Clark and Houseman did the coarse work.
 After a successful robbery upon dividing the spells one evening Clark and Aram got into an altercation and the latter killed the former and
 threatened Houseman if he spoke Of what he had seen. Aram moved away from the scene of the murder, but
 upon Houseman's confession he was Iapprehended and was brought tc trial.
 On August 3, 1759, Houseman
 Aram and Henry Terry were indicted for the murder of Daniel Clark or the night between the 7th and Sth ot February, 1774 or 1775. Housemar was first tried. but the evidence no being sufficient he was acquitted Thus free, he was entirely at liberty to give evidence against Aram, tn, principal, who actually committed the crime. But from Houseman. evidence it is not improbable to sup pose that Clark's death was pre- viously concerted between them an, that their end in perpretrating it wa to make themselves entirely master of all the goods in Clark's posses sion.
 Aram, at the trial. asked House man how he could be so positive a
 to swear that he saw him strik Clarke, when he himself admittet that it was done at night, in tn depth of winter when everybod
 knows the nights are dark To thi Housemna answered that though thi was done in the night, yet the moo1
 was then up, and that it was ligh
 enough to distinguish objects at
 short distance, though not very dis
 tinctly, and that he could see by tn
 motion of Aram's hand that he wa
 striking Clark. though he could no
 perceive the weapon with which h
 struck him.
 When asked by the court Whethe he had any witnesses or whether h
 had anything to offer in his own de
 fense Aram answered that it wa l impossible for him, after so long a 1 interval as had passed since tn
 commission of the fact with Whic
 he was charged, to produce any wit
 nesses in his justification: that thos
 who could have been of use to hr ! in his present embarrassing situatio
 were dead or so dispersed about tn
 kingdom that he knew not where t
 find them
 Aram said he hoped the coul