Rensselaer Republican, Volume 16, Number 27, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 March 1884 — KICKED THE BUCKET. [ARTICLE]

KICKED THE BUCKET.

The Suicide of Frank Rande, the Moat Infamous Desperado of the West. . |SI Using His Water Pail for a Scaffold, He Hangs Himself in a Cell at the Joliet Penitentiary. When the keeper of the solitary in tho Illinois Penitentiary, at Joliet, opened the cell in which the murderous convict- Frank Rando, was confined, on the morning of the 7th inst., he was surprised to find the irongrated door covered with the ctothing of Rande. Unlocking the grated door he found some little effort was required to open it, but when he had effected an entrance the cause was plain, for, suspended from the grating by the neck was the lifeless aud almost naked body of the noted desperado. He had made the most careful preparations for committing suicide, evidently intending that nothing should prevent him from accomplishing his purpose. He had removed all his clothing except his drawers and stockings, and after tearing his undershirt into strips, had made from them and his suspenders a rope strong enough for his purpose. He then fastoned his coat and vest to the bars of the door in order to protect his naked body from the chilly iron, and after laying his trousers on the floor at the bottom of the door, he placed his water-bucket thereon in order to have something on which to stand while fastening tho roup at the upper bars of the door. These preparations being complete he had only to fasten the rope properly around his neck and kick the bucket away from him and in a few minutes all was over. When found his body was cold, yet -it presented a very natural appearance, for the feet rested on the floor, the hands hung down the sides, the eyes were wide open, and the head was turned a little to one side. A Coroner's jury was summoned, and it took but a short time for them to resolve upon a verdict of willful suicide by hanging. Warden McClaughrey went to Rande’s cell the previous evening and immediately on entering it the convict greeted him with much excitement, and insisted that the Warden should send for ex-Sheriff Hitchcock, of Peoria, and State's Attorney Tunneeliffo, of Galesburg, saying, “When you three are together I will tell you something wonderful.” To this request the Warden made no reply, and just as he was leaving the cell Rande begged him to take him out and hang him, “I cannot do that,” replied the Warden, “but never fear, you will be hanged soon enough.” in a drawer belonging to the work bench of Rande, in the harness-shop among other things was found the cover of an old memorandum book, on the inside of which was written, in the handwriting of the dead desperado, a number of entries, the first of which is dated July 4, 1877, some six months prior to his arrest. Among the entries were the following, all dated July 18, 1877. Mrs. Mary Cftrroll and several others. Canton. Man and wife and a girl at Saville. XOtrSaS woman and her son at the house with a big tree seven or eight miles from Daveujiort, Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific. Dr. Hamrack will testify to my attempt at suicide. I lost five or six quarts of blood.-- —- These entries are supposed lo refer to crimes committed by the dead assassin. There were a number of others which could not be deciphered, but in the back of his dictionary was found the following in Rande’s handwriting: I don't want to go to heaven. There ain’t nothing there. I'm going to hell, the big place. 1 ain't going to heaven. I fell you God brains people—brains 'em. Perhaps that is the reason so many d ; ——to cranks are so anxious to go to heaven to get brained, and also escape the perils of hard work. A stranger appeared at the prison and offered the Warden SI,OJO for the body of Rande and the cell-door upon which the des-* perado ended liis life, llis proposition was not entertained. :