From Fisherman & Farmer,
Elizabeth City, October 3, 1901. An alienist was a mental health professional,
like a psychologist or psychiatrist.
McKinley’s Will
Probated…His Wife Made the Sole Legatee for Life—Executors Named
Canton, Ohio, Special—Secretary Cortelyou came here last
Friday to assist Mrs. McKinley in disposing of matters connected with the late
President’s estate. After meeting Mrs. McKinley, the question of filing the
will was taken up. The trying task of reading it to her was undertaken by a faithful
secretary. Mrs. McKinley made a heroic effort to bear up and succeeded in doing
so, although the ordeal was difficult for her. She is resting well. All legal
formalities necessary for her to subscribe to were disposed of. At 3 o’clock
Judge Day and Secretary Cortelyou went to the office of the probate judge and
offered the will of President McKinley for probate. They carried with them the
following:
“I, Ida S. McKinley, widow of William McKinley, deceased,
hereby decline the administration of his estate and recommend the appointment
of Wm. R. Day and Geo. B. Cortelyou as administrators, with the will annexed.”
This recommendation bears the date of September 27, 1901.
Following is the text of President McKinley’s will.
“Executive Mansion, Washington
“I publish the following as my latest will and testament,
hereby revoking all former wills: To my beloved wife Ida S. McKinley, I
bequeath all of my real estate, wherever situated, and the income of any
personal property of which I may be possessed at death, during her natural
life. I make the following charge upon all of my property, both real and
personal: To pay my mother during her life $1,000 a year, and at her death said
sum to be paid to my sister, Helen McKinley. If the income from property be
insufficient to keep my wife in great comfort and pay the annuity above
provided, then I direct that such of my property be sold so as to make a sum
adequate for both purposes. Whatever property remains at the death of my wife,
I give to my brother and sisters, share and share alike. My chief concern is
that my wife from my estate shall have all she requires for her comfort and
pleasure, and that my mother shall be provided with whatever money she requires
to make her old age comfortable and happy. Witness my hand and seal, this 22nd
day of October, 1897, to my last will and testament, made at the city of
Washington, District of Columbia. William McKinley
“The foregoing will was witnessed by us this 22nd
day of October, 1897, at the request of the testator and his name signed hereto
in our presence and our signature hereto in his presence. Charles Loeffler and
G.B. Cortelyou
It is given out on authority that the McKinley estate will
total $225,000 or $250,000, including life insurance of $67,000. Aside from
this insurance the estate consists of real estate here and contiguous to Canton
and of deposits in Washington banks. Monday morning has been fixed by the
probate court for a hearing prior to probating the will. The will is in the
President’s own handwriting.
-=-
Guilty of
Murder…Czolgosz, the Assassin, Convicted in Short Order…Jury Was Not Long in
Agreeing…The Trial Was Brief But Fair, and the Verdict Was Inevitable—Will Be
Sentenced Soon
Buffalo, Special—Leon F. Czolgosz, alias Fred Nieman, was
found guilty Tuesday of murder in the first degree by a jury in Part III of the
Supreme Court, in having, on the 6th day of September, shot
President William McKinley, the wounds inflicted afterwards resulting in the
death of the President.
The wheels of justice moved swiftly and covered a period of
only two days. Practically all of this time was occupied by the prosecution
presenting a case so clear, so conclusive that even had the prisoner entered a
plea of insanity, the jury would not have returned a verdict different from the
one rendered today.
The announcement made in the afternoon by the attorneys for
Czolgosz that the eminent alienists summoned by the Erie County Bar Association
and by the district attorney to examine Czolgosz and to determine his exact
mental condition had declared him to be perfectly sane, destroying the only
vestige of a defense that Judges Lewis and Titus could have put together.
Before adjournment Justice White announced that he would pronounce sentence
upon the prisoner on Thursday afternoon at 2 o’clock. He was taken at once
through the tunnel under Delaware avenue to the jail. To all appearances he was
in no way affected by the result of the trial.
The crowd gathered at the city hall was the largest which
has seen him since his arraignment. People were lined up on both sides of the
big rotunda on the second floor when court convened and fringed the stairs
leading from the floor above. There was no demonstration except that of
curiosity. A large number of women witnessed the proceedings.
At 2:44 in the afternoon District Attorney Penny abruptly
announced that the case of the prosecution was ended. Judge Lewis arose slowly
and, addressing the court, said that the sudden close of the case against
Czolgosz was a surprise to him and his colleague. They had no witness to call
for the defense. He asked the court that he be allowed to address the jury at
once. The court consented and the venerable jurist began an address that will
long be remembered by those who heard it.
The jury retired at 3:51 to consider the evidence. The scene
in the court room then became dramatic in the extreme. Decorum was somewhat
forgotten and the spectators stood up and many walked about the room and
engaged in conversation. The guards about the assassin, who still sat in his seat
before the bench, were doubled. Chief of Detectives Cusack and two of his men
taking positions just back of Czolgosz’s chair. Others took seats to the left
and right and many “plain clothes” men were seen mingling among the crowd
surging about the room, closely watching every one whose face was not familiar
to them. There was no disposition to crowd about the prisoner, although the
object of every one seemed to be to get in a position where he could have a
full view of his face.
Czolgosz had been seated in his chair all afternoon, his
hands clasped on the arms of the chair and his head bent forward. The room was
not warm but he frequently took his handkerchief from his pocket and mopped the
perspiration from his forehead and cheeks. At one time during the absence of
the jury did he raise his eyes or lift his head or seem to know that he was the
object of interest to several hundred men and women. Every time the door was
opened all eyes were turned in that direction, the evident thought in every
mind being that the jury would take only a few minutes to agree on the verdict.
It was 4:30 when the crier rapped for order and the jury
filed into the room. The clerk called their names, each juror responding
present as his name was called. No time was wasted. The jurors did not sit
down.
Judge White said: “Gentlemen, have you agreed upon a
verdict?”
“We have,” responded foreman Wendt.
“What is your verdict?”
“That the verdict is guilty of murder in the first degree.”
There was a moment of silence and then a murmur arose from
the lips of crowd. It ended there. There was no handclapping; no cheers.
Justice White’s voice could be clearly heard in every part of the room when he
thanked the jurors for their work and allowed them to go until 11 o’clock
tomorrow morning. Court was at once adjourned. Czolgosz was immediately
handcuffed to his guards and hurried from the court room down-stairs to the
basement and through the tunnel under Delaware avenue to the jail.
-=-
Sentenced to
Electrocution…President McKinley’s Murderer Must Pay the Penalty—Date Fixed for
Week Beginning October 27
Buffalo, Special—Leon F. Czolgosz, the assassin of President
McKinley, was Thursday afternoon sentenced to be electrocuted in the Auburn
State prison during the week beginning October 28, 1901.
Before sentence was passed the assassin evinced desire to
speak, but he could not get his voice above a whisper and his words were
repeated to the court by his counsel. “There was no one else but me,” the
prisoner said in a whisper. “No one else told me to do it and no one paid me to
do it. I was not told anything about the crime and I never thought anything
about that until a couple of days before I committed the crime.”
Czolgosz sat down. He was quite calm but it was evident that
his mind was flooded with thoughts of his own distress. His eyes were dilated,
making them heavy and bright, and his cheeks were a trifle pale. The guards put
the handcuffs on his wrists. He looked at one of his officers. There was an
expression of the profoundest fear and helplessness in his eyes. He glanced
about at the people who crowded together in efforts to get a look at him. The
prisoner’s eyelids rose and fell and then he fixed his gaze upon the floor in
front of him.
At his point Judge Titus came over to the prisoner and bade
him good-bye. Czolgosz replied very faintly, letting his eye rest upon the man
who had been his counsel. “Good-bye,” he said weakly. Czolgosz was then hurried
downstairs and through “the Tunnel of Sobs” to the jail, where he will remain
until removed to Auburn to pay the penalty for his crime.
Although the time announced for the convening of court was 2
o’clock every seat and every foot of standing room was occupied before 1:30 and
scores were clamoring outside for admission. The doors were locked and no more
were admitted to the room. The prisoner was brought into the room at 5 minutes
to 2. Five minutes later Justice White took his place upon the bench.
As soon as Justice White assumed the bench, Crier Hess said:
“Pursuant to a recess, this trial term of the Supreme Court is now open for the
transaction of business.”
District Attorney Penney said: “If your honor please, I move
sentence in the case of People vs. Leon Czolgosz. Stand up, Czolgosz.”
Clerk Fisher swore the prisoner and his record was taken by
the district attorney as follows: “Age 28 years; nativity, Detroit; residence,
Broadway, Nowak, Buffalo; occupation, laborer; married or single, single;
degrees of education, common school and parochial; religious instruction,
Catholic; parents, father living, mother dead; temperate or intemperate,
temperate; former conviction of crime, none.
Then Justice White passed sentence as follows: “In taking
the life of our beloved President you committed a crime which shocked and
outraged the moral sense of the civilized world. You have confessed that guilt,
and after learning all that at this time can be learned from the facts and
circumstances of the case, twelve good jurors have pronounced you guilty and
have found you guilty of murder in the first degree.
“You have said, according to the testimony of creditable
witnesses and yourself, that no other person aided or abetted you in the
commission of this terrible act. God grant it may be so. The penalty for the
crime for which you stand convicted is fixed by this statute and it now becomes
my duty to pronounce this judgment against you: The sentence of this court is
that in the week beginning October 28, 1901, at the place, in the manner and
means prescribed by law, you suffer the punishment of death. Remove the prisoner.”
The crowd slowly filed out of the room and court adjourned
at 2:26.
-=-
From the editorial page, W.J. Crowson, editor and proprietor
Under the New
Adminstration
Mr. Roosevelt is winning golden opinions by the wise manner
in which he has entered upon the duties of the Presidency of this great
Republic.
Evidently he is a man of affairs, and if he does not meet
the expectations of the Country it will not be for the lack of effort upon his
part.
Mr. McKinley had become so much a part of the whole people
that some how all sectional lines had faded and we trust that under the
guidance of Mr. Roosevelt all lines which mark sectional differences and strife
may be entirely obliterated.
President Roosevelt has pledged himself to conduct the
affairs of the government in accordance with the plans marked out by Mr.
McKinley, so that on that score we need fear no radical changes.
The democratic simplicity which he has carried into the
White House we honestly believe to be his best security against personal
danger.
The Fisherman &
Farmer propose to stand by the new President to commend what is right and
condemn what is wrong, in a spirit of fairness without regard to the mere
matter of difference of political faith.
Theodore Roosevelt must be lost sight of in the President of
these United States.
God bless the President.
-=-
Washington Letter…From Our Regular Correspondent
Washington, Oct. 1st, 1901—In all probability,
the post office department at Washington will throw down the gauntlet to
publications of an anarchistic character by excluding them from the mails. If
the post master General can discover no clause in the regulations authorizing
such action, he will, it is believed, proceed on general principles on the
ground that those who advocate the destruction of the Government have no right
to enjoy its privileges. Anarchists who disseminate their teachings in print
will by this method be at least driven to making a test case and thus settle an
important point. If it shall ultimately develop that there is no law under
which the spread of such indefensible doctrine can be stopped, so far as the
post office department is concerned, then it will be high time to enact one,
respecting, of course, the rights of decent publications and framing the new
statute in such fashion that it will work no hardship on the guiltless.
The Cubans are slowly preparing to try the experiment of
self-government. In a comparatively short time, they will launch their own ship
of State and, from the present outlook, Senor Tomas Estrada Palma will be the
first skipper. Since affairs in the Island have been gravitating toward self
control, there have been evidences of thoughtlessness, an apparent failure to
appreciate the gravity of the step about to be taken. Fortunately for the
American Government has made haste slowly in completing the emancipation of
this youth among nations from the bonds of guardianship.
The people that Congress will deal with persons of the Emma
Goldman and Herr Most stripe very soon after it convenes for the winter
session. While the right of free speech is a sacred legacy from the
forefathers, there is not the slightest doubt that the framers of the
Constitution, were they living, would be among the first to denounce the vile
and criminal harangues of the typical Anarchists. To the criminal the
constitution guarantees only a fair trial, and, the penalty having been paid,
an opportunity to reform.
At times there is a humorous side even to a great tragedy.
Lord Kitchener, the commander in chief of the British forces in South Africa,
has ordered that his so-called “Mobile commands” at once discard the furniture,
kitchen ranges, pianos and harmoniums which they have carried from place to
place, carefully protected from bullets, while they pursued the fighting
burghers. This will be a hard blow to Tommy Atkins for he has had little enough
to amuse him during his long warfare in Boer land.
In various cities small pox cases have developed recently,
but the disease no longer produces the nervous furore it once did. Medical
science, with its bacteriological researches and its antiseptic discoveries has
made such remarkable strides during the past fifteen years that the public is
no longer terrified by the grim spectre of contagion. Epidemics of very
destructive diseases are becoming less and less probable, and within another
decade, are likely to be all but impossible.
Wireless telegraphy has proven a great boon during the
International yacht races. With the old system, when the boats were hidden by
mists or swallowed up in the distance, the newspaper correspondents were
practically helpless. The Marconi system is enabling thousands of eager
individuals to secure early and accurate reports of the progress of the rival
sloops and the result of their spirited completion.
It is interesting to note that Russia, Germany and France
are considering measures for dealing with the Sultan of Turkey. But the
notoriously Sick Man of Europe has so persistently eluded the punishment due
him that it is feared he will once more escape justice on the plea of continued
and serious indisposition.
Manila dispatches announce that Filipino leaders continue to
surrender and take the oath of allegiance to the American Government. They
likewise report that an army of 25,000 will be required in the Philippines for some
time to come.
It is a peculiar coincidence that the final reinterment of
Lincoln, the first martyred President at Springfield, Ill., is being completed
at this time when the nation is mourning its third victim of the assassin’s
bullet.
It is to be hoped that Sir Thomas Lipton’s Shamrock will
continue to be II throughout the Inter-National yacht races. We have become
greatly attached to the America’s cup.
-=-
Arp on President…Says
McKinley Was a Good and a True Citizen…He Knows Roosevelt’s Uncle…Arp Went to
School With Him, and Thinks It Sould Bring a Government Job
The public grief has assayed. The shock that made the nation
tremble has passed away. Editors and preachers have had their say and the
wheels of government roll on in their established way. Not for a day was there
any interruption to commerce or agriculture. Party and partisans softened down
and paid regard to the time-honored maxim, “De martimus nil nisibonum,” say
nothing but good of the dead. Even the yellow journals stopped their cartoons and
gave their readers a rest. But one extreme always follows another and so
idolatry began as soon as the president was assassinated. He would have been
sainted if sainting was revived. Now that he is dead he is everybody’s
president. But time is a good leveler, and history is beginning to be made. Mr.
McKinley was no demigod nor will he be written down as a great statesman. He
was a Christian gentleman—a better man than his party—but was carried along
with it into an unjust war that will not bear the scrutiny of time. He had to
fall into line with the greed of commerce, and the consequence is there are
thousands of widows and mothers silently mourning for husbands and sons killed
in battle or died in hospitals in foreign land. There is no lamentation over them.
But as Governor Oates said, what are we going to do about
it: nothing? Some preachers say it is the will of God and the way to spread the
gospel. I don’t believe it; and I have not much regard for the preacher who
does. It takes more faith than I have got to see the hand of God in any war for
dominion or the acquisition of territory. For more than a hundred years Ireland
has been held in vassalage against her will. So were the American colonies held
until our fathers rebelled. Napoleon coveted the earth and our government
coveted Cuba and found a casusbelli in a pretense of feeding her starving
people, but never fed them. Then our commercial greed crossed the ocean to the
Philippines and bought them for a song with ten millions of negroes thrown in.
England coveted South Africa and has already spent millions of money and rivers
of blood in an effort to subdue a free people and get possession of their gold
mine! I don’t believe that any of this is God’s will. Greece and Rome and
Carthage and Napoleon all came to grief. Offenses must needs come, but woe unto
those by whom they come. I don’t believe that any war of aggression has the
favor of God, but sooner or later the aggressor will rap what he has sown. John
Brown was backed by Henry Ward Beecher
and other preachers who thought they saw the will of Good in an uprising of the
slaves against their masters, no matter if it resulted in murder and arson and
other outrages too horrible to mention. He was as much an anarchist as
Czolgosz, and his infamous scheme a thousand times more horrible; but last year
they removed his bones to Connecticut and reinterred them with honors and a
monument. No, I am still the same old rebel—unreconstructed, unrepentant, and I
am incredulous of any real or lasting harmony between the north and the south
as long as the pension grab goes on and gets bigger every year and we have to
pay a third of it for being conquered.
If peace and love and harmony prevails, why bleed us forever? Why take
our hard earnings to support the children and grandchildren of Union soldiers,
one-third of whom were Hessians and hirelings who were fighting for $10 a month
and rations, with no thought of patriotism? From that imported class, no doubt,
sprang these anarchists that breed discord and discontent among our people,
Czolgosz was no foreigner. He was born in Detroit; went to school there,
learned his trade there, and his elder brother was a soldier in the Union army
and he is just as much an American citizen as 54 per cent of the population in
New York city—native-born but of foreign parents. The seed of anarchy was sown
long ago, and it is too late to drive it out by any legislation. The assassins
of our presidents were all native born American citizens. Indeed, it is not
surprising that among 75,000,000 of people there are to be found a few men of
such abnormal mind as to glory in killing a president. As Roosevelt said, a
president must take his chances. “Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.” Why
that wretch should wish to kill such a kind-hearted and unselfish man as Mr.
McKinley passeth comprehension. If he was jealous of power or great wealth, why
didn’t he pursue Morgan or Rockefeller or Carnegie? Oh, the pity of it! An
unselfish, great-hearted Christian gentleman. No wonder the women are helping
to build the Atlanta monument for Mr. McKInley was a model husband, true to his
marriage vows and ever thoughtful of his loving wife. Even in apprehension of
his fate he carried $100,000 of life insurance, and it was all for her—yes, all
for her whom he loved better than fame or wealth or power.
And now comes President Roosevelt, the first President from
Georgia stock. I like the start he has made and I believe he will be as much
the president as was Andrew Jackson. If we had a United States bank he would
close it and remove the deposits. Yes, I know the stock from away back. When I
was a schoolboy I visited Roswell, where the Kings and Dunwoodys and Bullochs
and Pratts and Hands all lived in elegant seclusion. Dan Elliott was one of my
companions—a mischievous, black-eyed youth of 16; I went to school with him. He
was half-brother to our president’s mother. Yes, I know the stock and maybe I
can get some little office with good pay and little work—something like a
sinecure or a sine qua non—something that would suit my declining years and let
me down easy. I think I would like that, and the presieent ought to give it to
me because I went to school with his half-uncle Dan or his uncle half Dan.
That’s reason enough.
But my time is up, for my wife says she is going to take an
evening nap and I must look after the two little granddaughters. Jessie’s
children. There is a brand new little boy there now, and the little girls are
staying with us till their little brother gets acquainted. Before long I will
have to brush up my old baby songs again and sing that boy to sleep. They keep
on working me as long as I last. When I die I reckon the women will build a
monument to me and say on it:
“He was a faithful husband and father. He nursed the
children and grandchildren as long as he lasted.”
--Bill Arp in the Atlanta Constitution
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