Wilmington, Sept. 3—The confession of Tom Robinson, negro, convicted and sentenced to electrocution for criminally assaulting a student nurse he on the night of August 12, is regarded by local authorities as leading possibly to an admission that he was the perpetrator of the other attempted assaults upon other white women of this city in the same locality.
“You, Sheriff Jackson, and Mr. Tindal, have saved my life—and I want you to know everything bad I have done,” Robinson told the sheriff aboard the train as they were en route to the State Penitentiary in Raleigh. It is understood that the sheriff probably will receive a letter from the negro to be opened after his execution next month, and it is believed this will contain a confession of a startling nature.
The negro admitted he was afraid of mob violence before he was carried to Raleigh for safekeeping and after he was brought back to the city for trial, Sheriff Jackson and his deputies have been highly commended by citizens for the able manner in which law and order was maintained under conditions that have hardly ever existed int his community before, for the resentment to the heinous crime was to outspoken that at times it appeared as though an outbreak could not be prevented.
From the front page of The Smithfield Herald, Tuesday morning, September 8, 1925
newspapers.digitalnc.org/lccn/sn92073982/1925-09-08/ed-1/seq-1/
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