Imperial Valley press., 1928-10-19
HICKMAN
F0RFE|TS
HIS Life
Marian Parker's Slayer
Executed This Morning
At San Quentin.
CALM TO THE END
Youthful Murderer Fails
To Break AS He Mounts
To GallOws.
BY United Press Leased Wire
BY GERALD P. OVERTON
United Press Staff Correspondent

United Press Staff Correspondent
DEATH HOUSE, SAN QUENTIN
PRISON, Calf, Oct. 19.-William
Edward Hickman was hanged today
IN San Quentin State Prison.
California IS most notorious mur-
derer in a generation stood for q
moment on the gallows trap, white
faced boy of twenty.
He seemed very young, as the
hush of death silenced the assembly
of a little more than two hundred
witnesses gazing up at the human
being who was about to die.
The trap that dropped the slayer
Of Marion Parker to the end of the
hangman's moose was sprung at
1910 a. m.
Warden James Holohan went to
the condemned cage just before the
hands of the clock in his office
crept around to ten and informed
Hickman the hour of his execution
had arrived.
He had been divested Of his prison
uniform and was clad in a civilian
suit of black broadcloth. Under
meath was white shirt, unbottoned
at the neck.
A heavy leather belt was buckled
around his waist. Straps on the
belt pinned his arms securely to his
side.
Father William A. Fleming of
San Rafael and Warden Holohan
heard Hickman s last words and
the death march started
Out through the door of the wood
en- cage where he spent two nights
and a day in solitary confinement,
Hickman walked with a guard at
either side holding him under the
arm pits.
The hangman and one of the
guards of the death watch were his
escorts.
The priest preceded him, reading
the Litany of the Saints.
The door of the execution cham
Der, barely 80 feet away opened and
the little procession filed through.
Within was roped off space
around the gallows platform. There
waited the prison physicians and
guards assigned to the gallows room.
Outside the ropes stood the Off
cial witnesses, most of them peace
officers and newspapermen.
Father Fleming mounted the Ii
steps to the top of the platform,
breathing a final prayer for the re-
pose of Hickman soul.
Hickman followed the priest up
the stairway, the two guards never
releasing their firm grasp on his
arms.
The hangman took his place there
lcsides the upright posts of the
gallows. a three quarters inch rops
of hemp, already noosed, dangled
from the cross beam.
Hickman stepped upon the trap.
Down below him he saw the up
turned faces of the witnesses.
His face, blanched by months of
Imprisonment, was pale, but there
were some among the spectators
who turned whittier still.
The light from outside filtered
dimly through the white gauzed
windows of the room that suddenly
seemed to grow close and stuffy.
The hangman, whose identity was
cloaked in anonymity threw the
heavy moose about the youth $ neck
and drew the rope tight. The big
knot that formed the moose settled
close against his left cheek.
A guard on the opposite side
stopped quickly, eircled Hickman's
legs with a leather strap and
pinioned them together.
This would prevent him from at
tempting to spread his feet apart
and support himself on the planks
around the trap as it fell,
The hangman drew mask of
Continued on Page Six)