Evening Republican, Volume 16, Number 288, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 December 1912 — TOUCHING LETTER BEGS MAN’S PARDON [ARTICLE]

TOUCHING LETTER BEGS MAN’S PARDON

James Whitcomb Riley Pleads For Release of Man Sentenced in Missouri for Murder. On February 3, 1909, at St. Louis Mo., Herman Kretschmar murdered Clarence N. Jones. Jones was the president and Kretschmar had been the secretary of the Commonwealth Milling Co. Jones, so Kretschmar claimed, had secured his removal as secretary. He went to the office of Jones and killed him. He pleaded at the trial. He was convicted and sentenced to 18 years in the penitentiary. He tried to suicide after learning the verdict. Recently a strong effort has been made to secure his pardon. James Whitcomb Riley, the Hoosier poet, who had been a close friend of Kretschmar, wrote the following plea to Governor Had ley: “My Dear Governor: “Word has just reached me that ' everywhere the friends of Herman Kretschmar are making an earnest and a loving effort to secure, by pardon, his release from the Missouri state penitentiary. As one who knew him well, who admired him greatly, who was ever won to him by his endearing personality and who is well proud to call him friend, I wish to add my plea to those already presented.

“Were I able practicably, I should consider it a privilege to journey to Jefferson City that I might make my supplication in person. But this is denied me, and I must ask you to read into this letter the warmth and urgency of the spoken word. "That my friend has, or ever had any guilt in his soul is as unthinkable, to me as that vice and virtue are one and inseparable. If ever an honest, straighforward [straightforward], kindly eye sparkled in the head of a true man, it sparkled in the head of Herman Kretschmar. “If punishment was the object of his incarceration, has it not been amply accomplished? “If he was to be made a warning to others, has not the lesson been fully driven home? If the protection of society was contemplated, can there now be any fear of danger from one whose good record and good friends alike plead for clemency “And so, my dear Governor, I ask that the poor fragments of my-friend’s unhappy life be given to his own keeping, believing in all sincerity that he will weld them into a golden whole to his own peace and to the benediction of Him who grants them. “With great respect, believe me, faithfully yours, “JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY.” “I shall preserve the letter as a literary gem,” said Governor Hadley, but he did not comment on the case.