REMARKABLE INSTANCE OF CAPITAL CRIME.
We will not detain the reader any longer at Detroit, except to notice
a remarkable instance of capital crime. On the 26th of July, during
our stay at Detroit, S. G. S. received the sentence of death, from
the proper tribunal, for the murder of his wife, under circumstances,
aggravated by brutality and savageness, too painful for recital; and
in the contemplation of which humanity shudders. The wretched man’s
own children were the principal witnesses, on whose testimony he had
been convicted. In telling the story of their mother’s dreadful end,
they brought their father to the gallows. In the progress of the
trial, a history of savage violence was disclosed, such, we would fain
believe, as rarely passes upon the records of crime. What demon of
hell can be more fatal to human happiness, and to the souls of men,
than ardent spirits? The children, a son and two daughters, of adult
years, testified abundantly to the natural amiableness and affectionate
kindness, in the conjugal and parental relations, not only of the
mother, but also of their father, in his sober moments. But when
intoxicated, he seemed possessed of the furies of a more abandoned
world.
As the murderer entered the place of judgment, and was conducted to
the bar to receive the sentence of the law, I observed in him a noble
human form, erect, manly, and dignified; of large but well proportioned
stature; bearing a face and head not less expressive, than the most
perfect _beau ideal_ of the Roman; with a countenance divinely fitted
for the play of virtue, of every parental and conjugal affection; and
an eye beaming out a soul, which might well be imagined to have been
once susceptible of the love and worship of the Eternal One--all--all
marred and spoiled by the demon of intemperance; and now, alas! allied
to murder of the most diabolical cast. Rarely is seen among the sons of
men a more commanding human form, or a countenance more fitly set to
intelligence and virtue--made, all would say, to love and be honoured.
But now what change, by the debasements of brutal appetite, and the
unprovoked indulgence and instigation of a fatal passion! By what a
fearful career of vice and crime, had he come to this! “What a piece of
work is man! how noble in reason! how infinite in faculties! in form
and moving, how express and admirable! in action, how like an angel!
in apprehension, how like a god! the beauty of the world, the paragon
of animals!” But when debased and ruined by vice, how like a fiend,
in shape so unbefitting such a spirit! And yet, who could see the
fiendly stamp upon this poor and wretched man? For he wept--he sobbed!
His inmost soul heaved with anguish! he bore the marks of contrition.
As a man, and such a man--if we could forget his crime--he was to be
respected; as being in a condition of suffering, he was to be pitied;
and as seeming the image of repentance, heaven might forgive what man
could not.
It was an awful hour, when he approached the bar even of this earthly
tribunal, anticipating well his doom. For a jury of his country, as he
knew, had set their seal upon it. As he entered this now awful chamber
of justice, he cast his eye around upon the expecting throng, whose
presence and gaze could only be a mockery of his condition;--and with
the greatest possible effort for self-possession, braced his muscular
energies to support his manly frame, while trembling under the tempest
of passion, which agitated his soul. But the moment he was seated, all
his firmness dissolved into the weakness of a child;--and he wept;--he
sobbed aloud. A silence reigned through the crowd, and a thrill of
sympathy seemed to penetrate every heart.
The court, unaccustomed in that land to such an office, felt themselves
in a new and an awful condition, with a fellow-being arraigned at
their bar, charged and convicted of a most atrocious--and in its
circumstances, an unparalleled crime, and his doom suspended at that
moment on their lips. Their emotions were too evident to be mistaken,
and in the highest degree honourable to their hearts. “S. G. S.”--the
name in full being pronounced by the court, broke the awful silence of
the place,--“have you any thing to say, why the judgment of the court
should not now be pronounced?” The prisoner rose convulsed, and with
faltering voice, and in broken accents, replied: “Nothing, if it please
the court, except what I have already communicated”--and resumed his
seat. Upon which a very appropriate, eloquent, and impressive address
was made by the court to the prisoner, setting forth the fact and
nature of the crime, of which he stood convicted; appealing to his own
knowledge for the fairness of his trial; and to his own consciousness
of the justice of his doom; commending him to heaven for that clemency,
which he could no longer ask of men;--and then the awful sentence was
pronounced. “And may God Almighty,” said the judge, with that subdued
emphasis and touching pathos, which became the responsibility of his
office, and the nature of the occasion--“may God Almighty have mercy on
your soul.”
The prisoner, by all the testimony, was in his nature kind. He had
loved his wife excessively, and loved her, strange as it may seem, unto
the last. And for that very love he was the more cruel, and the greater
monster. He was jealous of her fidelity, without cause. Jealousy! “’tis
a monster begot upon itself--born on itself.” “That’s _he_--that _was_
Othello!” And only when intoxicated with strong drink did this terrible
passion gain its dominion over him. In the moments of his sobriety, he
loved and confided, and could say in company of his wife,
“My soul hath her content so absolute,
That not another comfort like to thee,
Succeeds in unknown fate.”
But it would seem, that hell itself were scarcely more furious, or more
terrible, than he, when the demon of ardent spirits assumed control of
his passions. If demoniacs were now-a-days about, the name of that
man, in such predicament and mood, were worthy to be written, as prince
of the host. But in prison, and before the tribunal of justice, this
wretched being, once kind in nature, and made a fiend by the abuse of
his nature, stood _dispossessed_, the guilty and conscious murderer of
her, whom he espoused in her youth and loveliness, and who was ever
worthy of his love;--and whom he took to his bosom, and promised, by
the light and love of heaven, to be her husband and protector.
He was executed on the 24th of September.