Rensselaer Republican, Volume 26, Number 10, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 November 1893 — Echoes From Pettit’s Death. [ARTICLE]

Echoes From Pettit’s Death.

Lafayette Courier. The remains of the late W. F. Pettit were shipped from Michigan City Saturday nig lit to Oswego, N. Y., where Pettit’s mother resides, and with whom Warden French had had frequent correspondence regarding her son’s condition. After Pettit was dead, Warden French opened a box containing many of the dead man’s things, among which was a bible, presented to him by his father. Between its leaves were pictures of Pettit’s father, mother, wife and child. The leaves of the book were piofusely inscribed with marginal notes, which were made in all probability while Pettit was a minister. The chaplain states that he never saw Pettit reading from his bible, and the prisoner never referred to religious matters from the first day of his incarceration to the day of his death. Upon all matters personal to himself he was silent, except as to his oft-re-peated anxiety that the supreme court might act upon his case. It is doubtful if Pettit’s request that Be be buried beside the remains of his wife will be complied with. Mrs. Pettit’s body lies in the family burying ground of her sister, Mrs. Laura M. Shields, at West Monroe, Oswego county, N. Y. Mrs. Shields hated Pettit with a fierce intensity and was most relentless in her belief of his guilt and would, never consent to: Pettit’s being buried there.—Mrs Shields has posession of little Dine Pettit, the only child of W. F. Pettitand wife. The child is now about seven years of age. When Mrs. Shields stopped in this city, en route home after the conviction of Pettit, she gave an interview to a Courier reporter, which showed her heart full of the most severe bitterness against the man who had been convicted of taking her sistei’s life. Time may have softened her feelings, and it may be that the dying man’s wishes will be carried out and that after the stormy life, he and his wife lie near each other in their last resting place. The Crawfordsville Journal moralizes on Pettit’s death as follows: “Was it some Higher Power hastened the convict’s end that a just verdict should prevail in spite of the rulings of a high tribunal? Was it the final act in the great tragedy of an unjust conviction? The answer is with that grim sphinx, Death, whose secret no man knoweth A man of superior intellect, of charm of manner and magnetic personality died a convict for the murd r of his wife. His dying request was to be buried at his wife’s side. Was that sensational request the consumation of the brazen effrontery of damning guilt or was it the last tribute of conscious innocence and undying affection ? No man knows. We may all have our opinions, but none of us know. W. F. Pettit has passed to the bar of a higher c&urt and there the deeds done in the flesh shall be expiated. If he was guilty he has suffered most terribly for a most terrible crime. If he was innocent he has been the victim of a most awful persecution and the most unfortunate train of circumstantial evidence.”