Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 19, Number 34, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 31 December 1897 — SOUTHERN. [ARTICLE]

SOUTHERN.

The Southern Railway Company will acquire the Memphis and Charleston Railroad Jan. 1. At Alstott's store, Casey County, Kentucky, John Alstott shot aad instantly killed his brother Claude. A bill has been introduced in the Virginia Senate forbidding the whipping post for persons guilty of petty larceny. Leon Lawson, 18 years old, who murdered his father in Brush Creek, Ky., has been given a life sentence in the penitentiary. Joe Godney, wanted at Baton Rouge for murder, is serving a sentence in the Nevada penitentiary under the name of Jones. The American Federation ended its session at Nashville and elected Thomas I. Kidd of Chicago fraternal delegate to the Canadian labor congress. The case of the State of Florida against C. B. Collins, late State Treasurer, ended in a verdict of acquittal. The indictment alleged embezzlement of over $52,000. Curtis Hearing, a son of one of the most prominent business men in Louisville, Ky., shot in cold blood and instantly killed Claude Bryant, a barkeeper in a saloon and sporting resort. Miss Leila Herbert, daughter of ex-Sec-retary of the Navy Herbert of Alabama; died at her home in Washington, D. C. rt| as the result of leaping from the third story of her home. A long illness had unsettled her reason.

Grady Reynolds and Bud Brooks were executed at Jefferson, Ga., for the murder of M. C. Hunt of Belton, Ga. Robbery was the motive. Brooks and Reynolds were moonshiners. Reynolds negotiated with Hunt for the purchase of his stock of goods. Reynolds told Hunt the money was in the bank at Harmony Grove and invited him to ride to that place with him. Midway Brooks met the pair and the two committed the murder, robbed their victim of $1,200 in his possession and buried the body. Reynolds was arrested, confessed and implicated Brooks.