The Potteries Examiner : — 1872-03-09 (Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England)

EXECUTION OF A WOMAN.  The St, John's •(Newfoundland) correspondent of the New York World writes an follows :--An execution for the first time in 100 years has produced a universal feeling of awe throughout every town and settlement of this quiet island. Patrick Gehan, a fisherman, murdered his brother-in-law, Garrett Boyers, an old man, and his wife, Mary Gehan. The one he wounded with a pistol bullet and beat to death with a mattock; the other he smothered with a large feather bed. Living in Gehan'a house was a beautiful girl named Johannah Hamilton, who assisted Gehan in removing Seyers's body to an ash heap. The body of Mrs. Gehan was removed to a lonescine part of the Spaniard's Bay Road, and left there. The blood was then washed off the floor of the room in which the tragedy was enacted, and every other vestige of the atrocious crime was destroyed. rho body of: Mrs. Gehan was found as it was laid upon the road; and the mutilated body of Seyera in the ash heap. This led to the arrest and imprisonment of Gehan and the girl. In spits of the advice of her counsel, Johannah made a full confession. On the 24th of December they were brought up for trial, and sentenced to be hanged on Friday, the 2nd of February, in the north-east yard of the courthouse of St. John's. Last night I visited the condemned in their cells. The woman refused to retire, and walked to and fro in her cell with her face buried in her handkerchief. When spoken to she rarely answered. Gehan sat upon the pallet in his cell with an air of callousnessand non. °balance, smoking a pipe and talking freely with the warder. At midnight he retired; but first inquired after Johannah, his accomplice, and begged that some one would tell her that he had asked for her, and that he hoped she would die 'game beside him. Here the priest, who had arrived a little before t solve o'clock, interposed and told Gehan that he wished to communicate with him. Gehan eubmissively consented to receive the advice of his spiritual counsel, after which he retired for the night. At five o'clock he was aroused from his fitful sleep, and recommended to prepare himself for the last offices of the church of which he declared himself to be a member. He then ate some mutton chops, toast, and coffee with groat relish, after which he said he felt "plucky." But the more worthy object of human sympathy in this case was the frail but lovely creature who sat wearied, yet sleepless, upon the miserable pallet within her last abode on earth. Her tears had steadily fallen during the night; bat when the priest announced himself to her, she cried aloud for many moments before speaking to him. At length he succeeded in calming down her grief, but only to hear from her the distracted and plantive appeal, " 0 ! Father! foe the love of sweet Jens, save me ! " The priest then gradually led her thoughts away from earth. Sho slowly grew resigned to her fate.  Goshen, accompanied by a clergyman and two deputy sheriffs, led the way to the cortile of the oourt house. Approaching the platform upon which the fatal trap-bars were, the doomed woman again shrunk back and cried bitterly. But, again encouraged by the counsel of her spiritual adviser, she went courageously up to the platform. There she knelt and prayed ardently. Gehan also prayed. Their prayers being finished, they arose, and the black caps were drawn over their eyes by the deputy sheriffs, and the noose of each was adjusted to ropes, which dangled from two protruding beams. The fatal trap-doors soddenly fell soon after, and Gehan and his accomplice were swinging between earth and sky. Great sympathy was felt for the girl, and it was hoped by many that the Governor would relent before the sentence had been fulfilled.