Democratic Sentinel, Volume 10, Number 17, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 May 1886 — Page 3

MAXWELL’S YARN.

The St Louis Murderer Makes a Statement of the Circumstances of the Crime. He Gave Preller Chloroform in Medical Treatment—The Fatal Result. [St. Louis dispatch.] St. Louis newspapers print a statement made by H. M. Brooks, alias Maxwell, now on trial for the murder of C. Arthur Preller, which will constitute his only defense, and which will be urged by his attorneys in the trial. In a word, he will confess to killing Preller by accident, while acting as his physician, and that, being excited and frightened, he concealed, instead of making known the fact of death. He declares he has always wanted to tell the facts, and only refrained by advice of his attorneys. The following is Brooks' statement: “Mr. Preller was suffering from an acute malady, for which I had previously prescribed, mixing the medicine myself from the bottles in the medicine chest I carried with me; but his ailment had reached a stage when it was necessary for me to perform an operation.” Brooks then tells of the purchase of chloroform, which was spilled in the sink on Sunday afternoon while he was washing the instruments preparatory to the operations; of his going to Fernow’s drugstore and buying more, denying incidentally the statements that he there showed evidences of hurry and excitement, and continues: “About 5 p. m. we oegan the operation. I administered the chloroform in (he usual way, holding a saturated cloth to the nose. Mr. Preller passed through the first stage all right. It took several minutes, I don’t know exactly how long. Then he entered the second stage, and here the terrible result came. I discovered, too late, that he was dying. Imagine my horror when this fact dawned upon me. I was wild with fright, but had presence of mind enough to cut the shirt and undershirt from the body, and, getting a wet towel, I beat him around the neck and shoulders for a half hour or more. I did not give up until I was ready to drop from exhaustion, and my efforts were not relaxed until he had been dead some time. All the clothes he had on at the time were his shirt and undershirt; he had stripped for the operation. What did Ido when I saw my friend was dead? What could I do? I didn’t know what to do except drink, and I drank freely. I drank everything I could get—wine, whisky, everything. What were my thoughts? I had not any. All I remember, that I drew ■on a pair of drawers—the first thing that fell into my hands —and put the body into my trunk, from wXch I had removed everything. I put it in the trunk an hour after Preller’s death. What was done besides this I have no recollection of. Liquor and consternation had possession of me, and I knew only that my feelings were those of the utmost horror. I remained in my room that night—the same room in which the remains were—and it would be a lie for me to say I slept, for I did not, and I was glad when morning came. What I did after leaving my room you know, for it has all been printed.” He says he supposed the post-mortem, when the body was found, would disclose the nature of the operation and the cause of death. According to his own story the cutting off of Preller’s mustache, the inscription about “traitor” found in the trunk, and all the other queer incidentals connected with the tragedy are to be attributed to his liquor and fear-crazed condition after the fatality.

LAID LOW BY LEADEN BULLETS.

Martinsville, Va., the Scene of a Bloody and Fatal Combat Between Angry Citizens. [Martinsville (Va.) telegrana.J No greater tragedy has occured in Virginia in a decade than that which fills thia town with gloom and excitement. In a fight on a crowded street many shots were fired, and as a result Jacob Terry, a young farmer, is dead, and the life-blood of his two brothers, J. K. Terry and Benjamin Terry, is fast ebbing away. Colonel P. D. Spencer, a prominent business man and manufacturer; Tarlton Brown, proprietor of Brown’s tobacco warehouse; B. L. Jones, a saloon-keeper; R. L. Gregory, a hotelclerk, and Sandy Martin, a negro, are all dangerously wounded. All the parties are prominent in the business life of this place and well known in Southern Virginia. The affair was due to the posting of an . anonymous circular seriously reflecting on W. K. Terry, a young business man, and his father, the late William Terry, a prominent citizen. Yesterday morning Terry telegraphed for his two brothers, J. K. and Benjamin, living at Aiken Station, twenty miles away. They arrived at 1 p. m., and alter a brief consultation went to the printing office and demanded the author of the card. The printer told them it was Col. P. D. Spencer, a member of the town board, and one of the leading business men. Last evening, soon after the tobacco factory had closed for the day and the streets were filled with operatives returning from their work, the Terry brothers started in the d rection of Spencer’s factory. When about half way they were met by Spencer, with his brother and several friends. W. K. Terry addressed a few words to Spencer; whp told him not to shoot. Just then some one fired a pistol and precipitated the fight. Forty shots were fired. W. K. Terry was shot from the rear, the-ball entering near his spine and lodging in his right breast. Jacob Terry was shot through the abdomen and fell dead. Benjamin Terry was shot through the neck and in the body. Spencer was shot in the hip, and his business partner, Tarlton Brown, received two balls in the groin. Gregory and Martin were hit by stray balls. The Terrys are well known, and occupy a high social position. None of them is married. All the business houses in Martinsville are closed to day. Gen. Sheridan says the malaria he caught when he accompanied President Arthur to the Yellowstone, three years ago, still hangs on and returns to give him a shake every seventh and twenty-first day as regular as clock-work-

SMALL CHILDREN ROASTED.

Four Little Ones Cremated in a Burning Building at Akron, Ohio. [Akron (Ohio) special.] For three years past the widow of Thomas Mooney has lived in a little frame cottage on the hillside one mile north of this city. A forty-acre plot of land gave Mrs. Mooney and her seven fatherless children a meager livelihood. Last evening the widow retired in an up-stairs room with her five children, the eldest twelve years of age and the youngest a babe in arms. In another room slept her grown-up children, Lizzie and Patrick, while in the attic was her brother-in-law, Lawrence Mooney, an old man of 60 years. About midnight Mrs. Mooney awoke and discovered her small bed-chamber filled with smoke. She rose hastily, seized her babe in her arms, and cried to the frightened children who were now’ awake: “Follow’ me; follow your mother.” She made an effort to escape by, the stairway, but the flames and smoke rushing up from below stifled her, and she returned and jumped from the window with the babe still clinging to her breast. In the meanwhile the fire, which had originated from a defective flue in the kitchen, enveloped the little building in flames. The two grown children and the aged man escaped w’ith difficulty. When they reached the open air the heartrending cries of the four little ones in the room above were heard, and the old man rushed into the burning dwelling to save them. The flames drove him back, but not until he was frightfully burned. The house was rapidly consumed, and the cries of the four children became fainter and fainter, and, at last, as the fire broke from every window, their cries ceased, and all was still. This morning all that remains-of the four children consists of a tub full of bones and masses of burned flesh. Lawrence Mooney, the old man who so heroically endeavored to save the children, lies at the point of death. His flesh hangs in shreds upon his body, while the blood is oozing from his finger-tips; his eyesight is gpne, and his gray beard is singed to a bright yellow. His sufferings are terrible. He cannot possibly recover. The scene about the ruins of the hillside cottage this morning beggars all description. The mother, whose four little ones were burned to a crisp, stands about the charred embers of the dwelling with a stolid look in her face. She has grown aged in a night. There is not a tear in her eye. Her grief goes beyond the perceptible emotions. She will neither converse nor receive the sympathy of her neighbors, and it is feared her reason has been destroved forever.

DAVID DAVIS.

Ex-Justice of the Supreme Court and Ex-United States Senator. The venerable Judge David Davis has recently been suffering from malignant carbuncle, so that death was at one time expected. We are glad to learn, however, that he is recovering, with a prospect of complete restoration to health.

David Davis was bom in Cecil County, on the eastern shore of Maryland, on March 9, 1815. His family was of Welsh extraction, and had first settled in that region early in the last century. He was an only child. He received his educational training at Kenyon College, Ohio,, where he graduated in 1832. From college he went directly to the Harvard Law School, and as soon as he finished the course there removed to the West and settled in Bloomington, HL, where he was admitted to the bar in 1835, and commenced at once the practice of his profession. He was soon brought into public life, and as early as 1814 was elected a Representative in the State Legislature. In 1847 he was a delegate to the Constitutional Convention, and a year later was elected a Judge of one of the Circuit Courts of Illinois. This office he held by repeated elections until he finally resigned it in 1862, when he was appointed by President Lincoln a Judge of the Supreme Court of the United States. He remained on the Supreme Bench until March 5, 1877, when he resigned to take his seat in the United States Senate, to which office he had been elected by the Democrats and Independents in the Illinois Legislature. During his service as United States Senator he maintained strict independence and allied himself with the organization of neither party in that legislative body. He was elected presiding officer of the Senate soon after Vice President Arthur assumed the duties of a higher office following the death of President Garfield, and continued to hold this position up to the expiration of his term of office in 1883, when he was succeeded by Senator Cullom. Soon after his retirement trom the Senate Judge Davis married, and he has since been living very quietly at his home in Bloomington, 111. “There is a perfect rage,” says the London Queen, “for wearing flowers in the hair. Flower aigrettes are the fashion for the moment, and all other forms of ornament are at a proportionate discount. A tuft of osprey is introduced among the natural blooms, and owners of single diamonds have an opportunity of displaying them as drw-drops sparkling on freshly gathered roses or lilies. On the corsage, too, large sprays of flowers and foliage are arranged, and long, rich trails ornament the akurt.

NINE YEARS AND TEN MONTHS.

That Is the Length of Time Aiderman Jaehne Will Spend in the Penitentiary. [New York special.] Ex-Alderman Henry W. Jaehne, convicted of bribery in connection with the Broadway franchise steal, has been sentenced by Judge Barrett to serve nine years and ten months in State Prison. Jaehne was pale and his eyes had a weary look when he stood up to receive his sentence. In reply to the clerk he said that he was 36 years old, and a jeweler by trade. He made no reply when asked if he had anything to say why sentence should not be pronounced. In passing sentence Judge Barrett said that it was humiliating that a man who was selected to public office in this city should have so heinously betrayed his trust as the prisoner had. “I oould not be unmoved at the spectacle of your weeping w’ife and broken-hearted mother,” continued the court; “but the saddest thing of all about your case is the doubt which pervaded many good and honest minds of your conviction. There w r as not a doubt of your guilt. It was universally conceded when the evidence was in that the case against you was clear, convincing, and overwhelming. There was no doubt of your guilt, but there was a doubt concerning the chances of convicting you. “The first doubt seems to have arisen from lack of faith in the efficiency of our jury system, the zeal of our public prosecutor, and the efficiency of our police. These doubts will be dispelled by your conviction. It teaches an important lesson. The majority of people in public life have have not their price. Let me again say at this point that your offense was not technical bribery, but a stupendous bribery for the furtherance of a stupendous transaction. “Have the people of this city ceased to remember the fate of Tweed, of Genet, of Connolly, of Fish, and of Ward? The people are not all honey-combed with corruption. According to the testimony in your case the two only honest men in the board were sneered at by you as dudes. Our worthy Sheriff—Grant—refused the proffered bribe, and it is entirely immaterial, as was suggested, whether they expected the reward—Grant to run for Mayor and O’Connor for Governor.” Jaehne’s counsel made application to Judge Daniels for a stay of proceedings and it was denied. Jaehne has been taken to Sing Sing.

SHOCKING ACCIDENT.

The Wife of Minister Pendleton Killed, and His Daughter Seriously Injured. [New York telegram.] Mrs. Alice Key Pendleton, wife of the Hon. George H. Pendleton of Ohio, United States Minister to Germany, was instantly killed in Central Park, and her daughter, Jennie Frances Pendleton, aged 22 years, seriously injured. The ladies were riding in an open victoria behind a high-spirited horse. While on the main drive the horse became unmanageable and ran away, pulling the driver over the dashboard. Mrs. Pendleton jumped from the carriage and struck on her head, while Miss Pendleton followed and was knocked unconscious. A park policeman ran up an instant later to find Mrs. Pendleton dead and Miss Pendleton apparently dying. On being removed to the hospital the young lady revived and may possibly recover. The body of Mrs. Pendleton was taken to the menagerie building, and was identified several hours later by Frank K. Pendleton, her son, a well-known lawyer of this city, who had begun a search for his mother and sister, having become alarmed at their prolonged absence. Mrs. Pendleton and daughter arrived here from Boston two months ago to nurse the wife of Frank Pendleton. At the inquest the Coroner’s jury exonerated the driver. Mrs. Pendleton was 61 years of age, and was married to Minister Pendleton in 1846. She was Miss Alice Key, a daughter of Francis Scott Key, the author of “The Star-Spangled Banner,” and a sister of Philip Barton Key, who was killed by Gen. Sickles.

A TEXAS DUEL.

Mr. Carroll Got His Work In on the Pad getts, and Was Willing to Die. [Canton (Texas) dispatch.] At the close of some litigation here between the Padgetts and Carrolls, two families residing near Grand Saline, Van Zart County, between whom there has been a feud of long standing, J. M. Carroll got into an altercation with W. J. Padgett and his sons Robert and James. Only bitter and violent words passed, until the Padgetts moved off to their horses. Carroll took his breech-loading shotgun and stepped out in front of the Padgetts, cursing them and saying that they did not have the nerve to use their guns. Bob Padgett instantly raised his gun, took deliberate aim, and fired. Then commenced an impromptu duel between the two men. - Padgett s first shot, which contained twelve buckshot, took effect in Carroll's right lung and the upper part of his stomach. Carroll's return shot took effect in Padgett’s right and left lung and left arm. Carroll’s second shot shattered Padgett's arm from the elbow downward. Padgett, with his left arm horribly mangled and bleeding by his side, raised his gun with his right and poured the contents of his second barrel into Carroll’s neck and shoulders when the latter had turned to reload his piece. The Padgetts then rode off. Carroll, who was felled to the ground by the buckshot received in his neck, raised himself and fired both barrels at his retreating enemies, killing one of their horses. Carroll then fell again, and, saying: “Well, boys, 1 got my work in on them all right, and I am willing to die,” gave a gasp and was dead. Bob Padgett was carried home by his father and brother, and cannot live. It is thought that several others will fall victims to this deadly feud before jt is settled

INDIANA STATE NEWS.

—The third annual convention of the Daughters of Rebekah was held recently in the Grand Lodge, I. O. O. F., at Indianapolis. Mrs. Mary McAlpin, of Evansville, was president and Mrs. Henriette Despa, of Indianapolis, secretary. The report of the committee on credentials showed one hundred lodges represented with one hundred and ninety-eight delegates and about sixty visitors. The report of the Colfax monument committee was read. It showed that $2,088 has been subscribed to the fund. A constitution for the government of the convention was adopted and the following officers were elected: President, Mrs. Belle Trester, Aurora; Vice President, Mrs. Henriette Despa, Indianapolis; Secretary, Mrs. Malinda Spurrier, Fort Wayne; Treasurer, Miss Mary R. Banks, Noblesville: Chaplain. Mrs. Stough, Evansville; Warden. Mrs. Hunt, Brazil; Guardian. C. H. Hollier. Knightstown. A resolution was adopted requesting the Grand Lodge, I. O. O. F., to instruct its representatives to the Sovereign Grand Lodge to ask that body to prepare a funeral ceremony to be used at the burial of Daughters of Rebekah. —While Mrs. Dr. F. B. Day, of Franklin, and her cousin, Miss Georgia Crawford, of Mooresville, were at the Union Depot, Indianapolis, a spruce-looking young man offered his services in helping take care of the children of Mrs. Day. As he was a stranger his offers were not noticed, but he insisted that he was used to managing children and kept urging his services. Upon the arrival of the ladies at Franklin, Miss Crawford discovered that a tine gold watch she had carried was missing. It was discovered that the nice young man who was so accustomed to managing a nursery was a pickpocket. Miss Crawford’s name was engraved on the case of the watch. —Recently, “Bud” Wiley, who lives west of Franklin, got into an altercation at the Magnolia House, and fired a shot at a man named Carr. The ball passed through the left cheek, cutting away some teeth, part of the tongue, and, striking a molar tooth on the opposite side, was stopped. Wiley left and has not been seen since. The quarrel began during a warm discussion over the Knights of Labor, and was the result of liquor. —A bold robbery was committed in Bristol not long ago. A wealthy citizen of that place was attacked in front of his house by two highwaymen, who threw him down and robbed him of S2O, all he had about him. He was known to usually have large sums in his possession, but fortunately on this occasion the amount was small. The robbers escaped. —The jury in the case of the State against Lawson Story, for assaulting Robert Early with a knife, at Wabash two months ago, returned a verdict of acquittal. Early was seriously stabbed in the breast, and for a time his life was despaired of. Story is sixty years of age. —The Indiana Electic Medical Society elected officers for the next year: President, Dr. J. C. Burlington, Attica;,Vice Presidents, Drs. C. B. Blacknell, Petersburg, and W. B. Vicks, Green Hill; Secretary, Dr. T. M. Culver, Indianapolis, and Treasurer, Dr. L. Abbett, Indianapolis. —Philip Grotegut, aged sixty-one years, who is serving a two years’ sentence in the prison south for wife murder, was taken before the board of pension examiners at New Albany, and examined for a pension for which he made application sixteen years ago. He has eighteen months to serve. —lt is proposed to convert the old Jes- . fersonville cemetery into a park. It contains but three acres but it is estimated that no fewer than two thousand bodies have been buried in it. It was opened in 1802, and was used until 1847, when it was abandoned. —A teacher in the Kokomo High School was arraigned recently, and fined $17.55 for unmercifully beating a little 12-year-old boy. The boy’s back and legs were welted and bruisetl in a shocking manner. The chastisement was inflicted for truancy. —The Monroe City homicide was granted a new trial by Judge Malott, of Vincennes. On the first trial the jury could not agree; on the second, the defendant was found guilty of manslaughter and given two years in the penitentiary by the jury. —An Anarchist giving his name as Jakob Hamburger established himself on the public square, at Lafayette, and began making a radical speech. He drew a large crowd, and, to suppress the disturbance, he was finally lodged in jail. —A Harrison County lawyer, who was confined in the Caawford County jail for perjury, dug out last week. He told a friend that he dug out to attend a case for a client in a magistrate's court in Harrison County. —The G. A. R. Post at New Providence will decorate, with appropriate ceremonies, the graves of the soldiers buried at that place, and at Martinsburg, Mount Pleasant, and Mount Washington, in Washington County. —A probably fatal accident occurred in Erwin Township, Howard County, lately. The 9-year-old son of a well-to-do farmer was kicked in the head by a vicions horse, crushing in his skull until his brains oozed out. —A Jeffersonville gambler knocked down his mistress, kicked her about the head and body, and then attempted to shoot her, but was prevented by being caught from behind by a timely arrival. —A Marion fisherman had the good luck to sit on a yellow jacket’s nest and nurse it to life. His morning gallop across the country has had no charms for him since.

POPULAR SCIENCE.

A long serieb of determinations of the amount of carbonic acid contained by the air has been made at Liege, Belgium, the average result being 5.12;>8 by weight, and 3.352 G by volume in every 10,000 parts of the air. A meteorological station is about to be established among the h ghest mountains of Mexico, at an elevation of nearly 20,000 feet above sea level. As access to such a place is difficult, and often impossible, the recording apparatus will have to be made almost independent of human attention, and, as far as possible, all the instruments will be made to run a year without stopping. French experiments on the transmission of power by electricity have resulted less successfully than was hoped. Theoretically, the plan is feasible, but it is found to be more economical and practicable for manufacturing purposes to use the power directly at the source of supply. Modern railway facilities make it cheaper to transport goods than power, with its attendant loss of fifty per cent., not to mention its uncertainties. A member of the London Microscopical Society has described a case illus- ■ trating t e value of the microscope as a detective agent. Fraudulent additions were made to a bond, and the ink being darker than the original, the forger traced over the whole writing to give it a uniform shade. Under the microscope the difference between the original ivnd the added portion was clearly discernible, and the forgery was established. Commenting on Lieut. Greely’s discovery of coal within the Arcti; Circle in Greenland, Mr. W. Mattieu Williams expresses himself as dissatisfied with the preva ling nolion which demands a sub-tropical climate for the formation of carboniferous deposits. He has himself described the deposition of coal that is in actual progress at the present time in Norway, within four degrees of the Arctic Circle, and believes that similar deposits may bo found much farther i orth. No very violent alteration of climate, therefore, need be assumed to explain the Greenland coal. The principal astro omical event of 1886 will be the total eclipse of the sun on the 29th of August. The line of totality in this eclipse will cross the Atlantic Ocean, traversng land in the West Indies just after sunrise, and in Southern Africa toward sunset. On the coast of Benguela the total phase lasts nearly five minutes, and at Grenada, in the West Indies, the duration will be nearly four minutes. The comets of known period are expected to return during the year. Olbers’ comet, with a period of 71| years, will probably reach perihelion near the close of the year. A small comet discovered by Pons in 1819, and rediscovered by Winnecke in 1858, is due in 1885, as is also one first seen by Tempel in 1869, and again observed by Swift in 1880. The period of each of these two comets is about 5j years. i

Goethe’s Sweethearts.

The lady-loves, so numerous —often succeed irg each other without an interval between the old love and the new —how worthy, writes Julia Ward Howe, do they for the most part appear in what is Jknown of them ! Each has her individual charm. Thetiist, Frederika Brion, is a blooming rustic. The second, Lotte, is a girl in higher position, gay and sedate by turns, the bethrothed of Goethe’s friend, who bitterly resents the portraiture of l>oth given to the world in “Werther.” The third, fourth, and fifth—Anna, Sibylla, and Maximiliane—are less known to us. The sixth, Lili, is a city belle, the daughter ot a wealthy banker, and something of a coquet She was the inspirer of some of the poet’s best known lyrics, such as: Heart, my heart, what is this feeling That doth weigh on me so sore? Goethe follows her about to scenes of uncongenial gayety, in braided coat, gazing at her “amid the glare of chandeliers.” In his conversations with Eckermann he calls her his first, last, and only love, all others in comparison deserving only to bo classed as inclinations. When he says of this affection, “It has influenced my style,” he pays her the utmost tribute that a literary man can offer to a woman. He loves, but marries not. The first attractions find him precocious in feeling and mature enough in judgment to distrust himself. It costs him bitter tears to forsake sweethearts. We can imagine that the tears shed by them must have been more bitter, and cannot put out of sight the disadvantage suffered by these young girls Vhen, after every appearance of serious intention, the brilliant youth flits from them, and leaves them in (to say the least) awkward isolation. The fact that he did so leave them, reminds me of a serious device in Offenbach’s “Orphee aux Enfers.” Jupiter, w shing to make love to Pluto’s fair bride, descends in the form of a monstrous butterfly, and presently hands forward his card, saying: “Je suis le Baron de Jupiter.” The great Goethe, on the contrary, comes like a lord and departs like a butterfly. Some of the scientists of the day try to undermine the faith of their readers. They would snatch from the drowning man his life-preserver. As the medical properties of some plants can be educed onlv by distillation so our good qualities can be proved only by trials. No man can plough a field by.turning it over in his mind. i