"Pigott. 'I thought they would be very likely to prove it.'
"Russell. 'Now, reminding you of that opinion, I ask you whether you did not intend to refer—not solely, I suggest, but among other things—to the letters as being the matter which would prove complicity or purport to prove complicity?'
"Pigott. 'Yes, I may have had that in my mind.'
"Russell. 'You could have had hardly any doubt that you had?'
"Pigott. 'I suppose so.'
"Russell. 'You suppose you may have had?'
"Pigott. 'Yes.'
"Russell. 'There is the letter and the statement (reading), "Your Grace may be assured that I speak with full knowledge, and am in a position to prove, beyond all doubt and question, the truth of what I say." Was that true?'
"Pigott. 'It could hardly be true.'
"Russell. 'Then did you write that which was false?'
"Pigott. 'I suppose it was in order to give strength to what I said. I do not think it was warranted by what I knew.'
"Russell. 'You added the untrue statement in order to add strength to what you said?'
"Pigott. 'Yes.'
"Russell. 'You believe these letters to be genuine?'
"Pigott. 'I do.'
"Russell. 'And did at this time?'
"Pigott. 'Yes.'
"Russell (reading). '"And I will further assure your Grace that I am also able to point out how these designs may be successfully combated and finally defeated." How, if these documents were genuine documents, and you believed them to be such, how were you able to assure his Grace that you were able to point out how the design might be successfully combated and finally defeated?'
"Pigott. 'Well, as I say, I had not the letters actually in my mind at that time. So far as I can gather, I do not recollect the letter to Archbishop Walsh at all. My memory is really a blank on the circumstance.'
"Russell. 'You told me a moment ago, after great deliberation and consideration, you had both the incriminatory letters and the letter to Archbishop Walsh in your mind.'
"Pigott. 'I said it was probable I did; but I say the thing has completely faded out of my mind.'
"Russell (resolutely). 'I must press you. Assuming the letters to be genuine, what were the means by which you were able to assure his Grace that you could point out how the design might be successfully combated and finally defeated?'
"Pigott (helplessly). 'I cannot conceive really.'
"Russell. 'Oh, try. You must really try.'
"Pigott (in manifest confusion and distress). 'I cannot.'
"Russell (looking fixedly at the witness). 'Try.'
"Pigott. 'I cannot.'
"Russell. 'Try.'
"Pigott. 'It is no use.'
"Russell (emphatically). 'May I take it, then, your answer to my Lords is that you cannot give any explanation?'
"Pigott. 'I really cannot absolutely.'
"Russell (reading). '"I assure your Grace that I have no other motive except to respectfully suggest that your Grace would communicate the substance to some one or other of the parties concerned, to whom I could furnish details, exhibit proofs, and suggest how the coming blow may be effectually met." What do you say to that, Mr. Pigott?'
"Pigott. 'I have nothing to say except that I do not recollect anything about it absolutely.'
"Russell. 'What was the coming blow?'
"Pigott. 'I suppose the coming publication.'
"Russell. 'How was it to be effectively met?'
"Pigott. 'I have not the slightest idea.'
"Russell. 'Assuming the letters to be genuine, does it not even now occur to your mind how it could be effectively met?'
"Pigott. 'No.'
"Pigott now looked like a man, after the sixth round in a prize fight, who had been knocked down in every round. But Russell showed him no mercy. I shall take another extract.
* * * * *
"Russell. 'Whatever the charges in "Parnellism and Crime," including the letters, were, did you believe them to be true or not?'
"Pigott. 'How can I say that when I say I do not know what the charges were? I say I do not recollect that letter to the archbishop at all, or any of the circumstances it refers to.'
"Russell. 'First of all you knew this: that you procured and paid for a number of letters?'
"Pigott. 'Yes.'
"Russell. 'Which, if genuine, you have already told me, would gravely implicate the parties from whom these were supposed to come.'
"Pigott. 'Yes, gravely implicate.'
"Russell. 'You would regard that, I suppose, as a serious charge?'
"Pigott. 'Yes.'
"Russell. 'Did you believe that charge to be true or false?'
"Pigott. 'I believed that charge to be true.'
"Russell. 'You believed that to be true?'
"Pigott. 'I do.'
"Russell. 'Now I will read this passage [from Pigott's letter to the archbishop], "I need hardly add that, did I consider the parties really guilty of the things charged against them, I should not dream of suggesting that your Grace should take part in an effort to shield them; I only wish to impress on your Grace that the evidence is apparently convincing, and would probably be sufficient to secure conviction if submitted to an English jury." What do you say to that, Mr. Pigott?'
"Pigott (bewildered). 'I say nothing, except that I am sure I could not have had the letters in my mind when I said that, because I do not think the letters conveyed a sufficiently serious charge to cause me to write in that way.'
"Russell. 'But you know that was the only part of the charge, so far as you have yet told us, that you had anything to do in getting up?'
"Pigott. 'Yes, that is what I say; I must have had something else in my mind which I cannot at present recollect—that I must have had other charges.'
"Russell. 'What charges?'
"Pigott. 'I do not know. That is what I cannot tell you.'
"Russell. 'Well, let me remind you that that particular part of the charges—the incriminatory letters—were letters that you yourself knew all about.'
"Pigott. 'Yes, of course.'
"Russell (reading from another letter of Pigott's to the archbishop). '"I was somewhat disappointed in not having a line from your Grace, as I ventured to expect I might have been so far honored. I can assure your Grace that I have no other motive in writing save to avert, if possible, a great danger to people with whom your Grace is known to be in strong sympathy. At the same time, should your Grace not desire to interfere in the matter, or should you consider that they would refuse me a hearing, I am well content, having acquitted myself of what I conceived to be my duty in the circumstances. I will not further trouble your Grace save to again beg that you will not allow my name to transpire, seeing that to do so would interfere injuriously with my prospects, without any compensating advantage to any one. I make the request all the more confidently because I have had no part in what is being done to the prejudice of the Parnellite party, though I was enabled to become acquainted with all the details."'
"Pigott (with a look of confusion and alarm). 'Yes.'
"Russell. 'What do you say to that?'
"Pigott. 'That it appears to me clearly that I had not the letters in my mind.'
"Russell. 'Then if it appears to you clearly that you had not the letters in your mind, what had you in your mind?'
"Pigott. 'It must have been something far more serious.'
"Russell. 'What was it?'
"Pigott (helplessly, great beads of perspiration standing out on his forehead and trickling down his face). 'I cannot tell you. I have no idea.'
"Russell. 'It must have been something far more serious than the letters?'
"Pigott (vacantly). 'Far more serious.'
"Russell (briskly). 'Can you give my Lords any clew of the most indirect kind to what it was?'
"Pigott (in despair). 'I cannot.'
"Russell. 'Or from whom you heard it?'
"Pigott. 'No.'
"Russell. 'Or when you heard it?'
"Pigott. 'Or when I heard it.'
"Russell. 'Or where you heard it?'
"Pigott. 'Or where I heard it.'
"Russell. 'Have you ever mentioned this fearful matter—whatever it is—to anybody?'
"Pigott. 'No.'
"Russell. 'Still locked up, hermetically sealed in your own bosom?'
"Pigott. 'No, because it has gone away out of my bosom, whatever it was.'
"On receiving this answer Russell smiled, looked at the bench, and sat down. A ripple of derisive laughter broke over the court, and a buzz of many voices followed. The people standing around me looked at each other and said, 'Splendid.' The judges rose, the great crowd melted away, and an Irishman who mingled in the throng expressed, I think, the general sentiment in a single word, 'Smashed.'"
Pigott's cross-examination was finished the following day, and the second day he disappeared entirely, and later sent back from Paris a confession of his guilt, admitting his perjury, and giving the details of how he had forged the alleged Parnell letter by tracing words and phrases from genuine Parnell letters, placed against the window-pane, and admitting that he had sold the forged letter for £605.
After the confession was read, the Commission "found" that it was a forgery, and the Times withdrew the facsimile letter.
A warrant was issued for Pigott's arrest on the charge of perjury, but when he was tracked by the police to a hotel in Madrid, he asked to be given time enough to collect his belongings, and, retiring to his room, blew out his brains.
The records of the criminal courts in this country contain few cases that have excited so much human interest among all classes of the community as the prosecution and conviction of Carlyle W. Harris.
Even to this day—ten years after the trial—there is a widespread belief among men, perhaps more especially among women, who did not attend the trial, but simply listened to the current gossip of the day and followed the newspaper accounts of the court proceedings, that Harris was innocent of the crime for the commission of which his life was forfeited to the state.
It is proposed in this chapter to discuss some of the facts that led up to the testimony of one of the most distinguished toxicologists in the country, who was called for the defence on the crucial point in the case; and to give extracts from his cross-examination, his failure to withstand which was the turning-point in the entire trial. He returned to his home in Philadelphia after he left the witness-stand, and openly declared in public, when asked to describe his experiences in New York, that he had "gone to New York only to make a fool of himself and return home again."
It is also proposed to give some of the inside history of the case—facts that never came out at the trial, not because they were unknown at the time to the district attorney, nor unsusceptible of proof, but because the strict rules of evidence in such cases often, as it seems to the writer, withhold from the ears of the jury certain facts, the mere recital of which seems to conclude the question of guilt. For example, the rule forbidding the presentation to the jury of anything that was said by the victim of a homicide, even to witnesses surrounding the death-bed, unless the victim in express terms makes known his own belief that he cannot live, and that he has abandoned all hope or expectation of recovery before he tells the tale of the manner in which he was slain, or the causes that led up to it, has allowed many a guilty prisoner, if not to escape entirely, at least to avoid the full penalty for the crime he had undoubtedly committed.
Carlyle Harris was a gentleman's son, with all the advantages of education and breeding. In his twenty-second year, and just after graduating with honors from the College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York City, he was indicted and tried for the murder of Miss Helen Potts, a young, pretty, intelligent, and talented school girl in attendance at Miss Day's Ladies' Boarding School, on 40th Street, New York City.
Harris had made the acquaintance of Miss Potts in the summer of 1889, and all during the winter paid marked attention to her. The following spring, while visiting her uncle, who was a doctor, she was delivered of a four months' child, and was obliged to confess to her mother that she was secretly married to Harris under assumed names, and that her student husband had himself performed an abortion upon her.
Harris was sent for. He acknowledged the truth of his wife's statements, but refused to make the marriage public. From this time on, till the day of her daughter's death, the wretched mother made every effort to induce Harris to acknowledge his wife publicly. She finally wrote him on the 20th of January, 1891, "You must go on the 8th of February, the anniversary of your secret marriage, before a minister of the gospel, and there have a Christian marriage performed—no other course than this will any longer be satisfactory to me or keep me quiet."
That very day Harris ordered at an apothecary store six capsules, each containing 4-1/2 grains of quinine and 1/6 of a grain of morphine, and had the box marked: "C. W. H. Student. One before retiring." Miss Potts had been complaining of sick headaches, and Harris gave her four of these capsules as an ostensible remedy. He then wrote to Mrs. Potts that he would agree to her terms "unless some other way could be found of satisfying her scruples," and went hurriedly to Old Point Comfort. Upon hearing from his wife that the capsules made her worse instead of better, he still persuaded her to continue taking them. On the day of her death she complained to her mother about the medicine Carlyle had given her, and threatened to throw the box with the remaining capsule out of the window. Her mother persuaded her to try this last one, which she promised to do. Miss Potts slept in a room with three classmates who, on this particular night, had gone to a symphony concert. Upon their return they found Helen asleep, but woke her up and learned from her that she had been having "such beautiful dreams," she "had been dreaming of Carl." Then she complained of feeling numb, and becoming frightened, begged the girls not to let her go to sleep. She repeated that she had taken the medicine Harris had given her, and asked them if they thought it possible that he would give her anything to harm her. She soon fell into a profound coma, breathing only twice to the minute. The doctors worked over her for eleven hours without restoring her to consciousness, when she stopped breathing entirely.
The autopsy, fifty-six days afterward, disclosed an apparently healthy body, and the chemical analysis of the contents of the stomach disclosed the presence of morphine but not of quinine, though the capsules as originally compounded by the druggist contained twenty-seven times as much quinine as morphine.
This astounding discovery led to the theory of the prosecution: that Harris had emptied the contents of one of the capsules, had substituted morphine in sufficient quantities to kill, in place of the 4-1/2 grains of quinine (to the eye, powdered quinine and morphine are identical), and had placed this fatal capsule in the box with the other three harmless ones, one to be taken each night. He had then fled from the city, not knowing which day would brand him a murderer.
Immediately after his wife's death Harris went to one of his medical friends and said: "I only gave her four capsules of the six I had made up; the two I kept out will show that they are perfectly harmless. No jury can convict me with those in my possession; they can be analyzed and proved to be harmless."
They were analyzed and it was proved that the prescription had been correctly compounded. But oftentimes the means a criminal uses in order to conceal his deed are the very means that Providence employs to reveal the sin that lies hidden in his soul. Harris failed to foresee that it was the preservation of these capsules that would really convict him. Miss Potts had taken all that he had given her, and no one could ever have been certain that it was not the druggist's awful mistake, had not these retained capsules been analyzed. When Harris emptied one capsule and reloaded it with morphine, he had himself become the druggist.
It was contended that Harris never intended to recognize Helen Potts as his wife. He married her in secret, it appeared at the trial,—as it were from his own lips through the medium of conversation with a friend,—"because he could not accomplish her ruin in any other way." He brought her to New York, was married to her before an alderman under assumed names, and then having accomplished his purpose, burned the evidence of their marriage, the false certificate. Finally, when the day was set upon which he must acknowledge her as his wife, he planned her death.
The late recorder, Frederick Smyth, presided at the trial with great dignity and fairness. The prisoner was ably represented by John A. Taylor, Esq., and William Travers Jerome, Esq., the present district attorney of New York.
Mr. Jerome's cross-examination of Professor Witthaus, the leading chemist for the prosecution, was an extremely able piece of work, and during its eight hours disclosed an amount of technical information and research such as is seldom seen in our courts. Had it not been for the witness's impregnable position, he certainly would have succumbed before the attack. The length and technicality of the examination render its use impracticable in this connection; but it is recommended to all students of cross-examination who find themselves confronted with the task of examination in so remote a branch of the advocate's equipment as a knowledge of chemistry.
The defence consisted entirely of medical testimony, directed toward creating a doubt as to our theory that morphine was the cause of death. Their cross-examination of our witnesses was suggestive of death from natural causes: from heart disease, a brain tumor, apoplexy, epilepsy, uremia. In fact, the multiplicity of their defences was a great weakness. Gradually they were forced to abandon all but two possible causes of death,—that by morphine poisoning and that by uremic poisoning. This narrowed the issue down to the question, Was it a large dose of morphine that caused death, or was it a latent kidney disease that was superinduced and brought to light in the form of uremic coma by small doses of morphine, such as the one-sixth of a grain admittedly contained in the capsules Harris administered? In one case Harris was guilty; in the other he was innocent.
Helen Potts died in a profound coma. Was it the coma of morphine, or that of kidney disease? Many of the leading authorities in this city had given their convictions in favor of the morphine theory. In reply to those, the defence was able to call a number of young doctors, who have since made famous names for themselves, but who at the time were almost useless as witnesses with the jury because of their comparative inexperience. Mr. Jerome had, however, secured the services of one physician who, of all the others in the country, had perhaps apparently best qualified himself by his writings and thirty years of hospital experience to speak authoritatively upon the subject.
His direct testimony was to the effect that—basing his opinion partly upon wide reading of the literature of the subject, and what seemed to him to be the general consensus of professional opinion about it, and "very largely on his own experience"—no living doctor can distinguish the coma of morphine from that of kidney disease; and as the theory of the criminal law is that, if the death can be equally as well attributed to natural causes as to the use of poison, the jury would be bound to give the prisoner the benefit of the doubt and acquit him.
It was the turning-point in the trial. If any of the jurors credited this testimony,—the witness gave the reasons for his opinion in a very quiet, conscientious, and impressive manner,—there certainly could be no conviction in the case, nothing better than a disagreement of the jury. It was certain Harris had given the capsules, but unless his wife had died of morphine poisoning, he was innocent of her death.
The cross-examination that follows is much abbreviated and given partly from memory. It was apparent that the witness would withstand any amount of technical examination and easily get the better of the cross-examiner if such matters were gone into. He had made a profound impression. The court had listened to him with breathless interest. He must be dealt with gently and, if possible, led into self-contradictions where he was least prepared for them.
The cross-examiner sparred for an opening with the determination to strike quickly and to sit down if he got in one telling blow. The first one missed aim a little, but the second brought a peal of laughter from the jury and the audience, and the witness retired in great confusion. Even the lawyers for the defence seemed to lose heart, and although two hours before time of adjournment, begged the court for a recess till the following day.
Counsel (quietly). "Do you wish the jury to understand, doctor, that Miss Helen Potts did not die of morphine poisoning?"
Witness. "I do not swear to that."
Counsel. "What did she die of?"
Witness. "I don't swear what she died of."
Counsel. "I understood you to say that in your opinion the symptoms of morphine could not be sworn to with positiveness. Is that correct?"
Witness. "I don't think they can, with positiveness."
Counsel. "Do you wish to go out to the world as saying that you have never diagnosed a case of morphine poisoning excepting when you had an autopsy to exclude kidney disease?"
Witness. "I do not. I have not said so."
Counsel. "Then you have diagnosed a case on the symptoms alone, yes? or no? I want a categorical answer."
Witness (sparring). "I would refuse to answer that question categorically; the word 'diagnosed' is used with two different meanings. One has to make what is known as a 'working diagnosis' when he is called to a case, not a positive diagnosis."
Counsel. "When was your last case of opium or morphine poisoning?"
Witness. "I can't remember which was the last."
Counsel (seeing an opening). "I don't want the name of the patient. Give me the date approximately, that is, the year—but under oath."
Witness. "I think the last was some years ago."
Counsel. "How many years ago?"
Witness (hesitating). "It may be eight or ten years ago."
Counsel. "Was it a case of death from morphine poisoning?"
Witness. "Yes, sir."
Counsel. "Was there an autopsy?"
Witness. "No, sir."
Counsel. "How did you know it was a death from morphine, if, as you said before, such symptoms cannot be distinguished?"
Witness. "I found out from a druggist that the woman had taken seven grains of morphine."
Counsel. "You made no diagnosis at all until you heard from the druggist?"
Witness. "I began to give artificial respiration."
Counsel. "But that is just what you would do in a case of morphine poisoning?"
Witness (hesitating). "Yes, sir. I made, of course, a working diagnosis."
Counsel. "Do you remember the case you had before that?"
Witness. "I remember another case."
Counsel. "When was that?"
Witness. "It was a still longer time ago. I don't know the date."
Counsel. "How many years ago, on your oath?"
Witness. "Fifteen, probably."
Counsel. "Any others?"
Witness. "Yes, one other."
Counsel. "When?"
Witness. "Twenty years ago."
Counsel. "Are these three cases all you can remember in your experience?"
Witness. "Yes, sir."
Counsel (chancing it). "Were more than one of them deaths from morphine?"
Witness. "No, sir, only one."
Counsel (looking at the jury somewhat triumphantly). "Then it all comes down to this: you have had the experience of one case of morphine poisoning in the last twenty years?"
Witness (in a low voice). "Yes, sir, one that I can remember."
Counsel (excitedly). "And are you willing to come here from Philadelphia, and state that the New York doctors who have already testified against you, and who swore they had had seventy-five similar cases in their own practice, are mistaken in their diagnoses and conclusions?"
Witness (embarrassed and in a low tone). "Yes, sir, I am."
Counsel. "You never heard of Helen Potts until a year after her death, did you?"
Witness. "No, sir."
Counsel. "You heard these New York physicians say that they attended her and observed her symptoms for eleven hours before death?"
Witness. "Yes, sir."
Counsel. "Are you willing to go on record, with your one experience in twenty years, as coming here and saying that you do not believe our doctors can tell morphine poisoning when they see it?"
Witness (sheepishly). "Yes, sir."
Counsel. "You have stated, have you not, that the symptoms of morphine poisoning cannot be told with positiveness?"
Witness. "Yes, sir."
Counsel. "You said you based that opinion upon your own experience, and it now turns out you have seen but one case in twenty years."
Witness. "I also base it upon my reading."
Counsel (becoming almost contemptuous in manner). "Is your reading confined to your own book?"
Witness (excitedly). "No, sir; I say no."
Counsel (calmly). "But I presume you embodied in your own book the results of your reading, did you not?"
Witness (a little apprehensively). "I tried to, sir."
It must be explained here that the attending physicians had said that the pupils of the eyes of Helen Potts were contracted to a pin-point, so much so as to be practically unrecognizable, and symmetrically contracted—that this symptom was the one invariably present in coma from morphine poisoning, and distinguished it from all other forms of death, whereas in the coma of kidney disease one pupil would be dilated and the other contracted; they would be unsymmetrical.
Counsel (continuing). "Allow me to read to you from your own book on page 166, where you say (reading), 'I have thought that inequality of the pupils'—that is, where they are not symmetrically contracted—'is proof that a case is not one of narcotism'—or morphine poisoning—'but Professor Taylor has recorded a case of morphine poisoning in which it [the unsymmetrical contraction of the pupils] occurred.' Do I read it as you intended it?"
Witness. "Yes, sir."
Counsel. "So until you heard of the case that Professor Taylor reported, you had always supposed symmetrical contraction of the pupils of the eyes to be the distinguishing symptom of morphine poisoning, and it is on this that you base your statement that the New York doctors could not tell morphine poisoning positively when they see it?"
Witness (little realizing the point). "Yes, sir."
Counsel (very loudly). "Well, sir, did you investigate that case far enough to discover that Professor Taylor's patient had one glass eye?"[25]
Witness (in confusion). "I have no memory of it."
Counsel. "That has been proved to be the case here. You would better go back to Philadelphia, sir."
There were roars of laughter throughout the audience as counsel resumed his seat and the witness walked out of the court room. It is difficult to reproduce in print the effect made by this occurrence, but with the retirement of this witness the defendant's case suffered a collapse from which it never recovered.
* * * * *
It is interesting to note that within a year of Harris's conviction, Dr. Buchanan was indicted and tried for a similar offence—wife poisoning by the use of morphine.
It appeared in evidence at Dr. Buchanan's trial that, during the Harris trial and the examination of the medical witnesses, presumably the witness whose examination has been given above, Buchanan had said to his messmates that "Harris was a —— fool, he didn't know how to mix his drugs. If he had put a little atropine with his morphine, it would have dilated the pupil of at least one of his victim's eyes, and no doctor could have deposed to death by morphine."
When Buchanan's case came up for trial it was discovered that, although morphine had been found in the stomach, blood, and intestines of his wife's body, the pupils of the eyes were not symmetrically contracted. No positive diagnosis of her case could be made by the attending physicians until the continued chemical examination of the contents of the body disclosed indisputable evidence of atropine (belladonna). Buchanan had profited by the disclosures in the Harris trial, but had made the fatal mistake of telling his friends how it could have been done in order to cheat science. It was this statement of his that put the chemists on their guard, and resulted in Buchanan's conviction and subsequent execution.
Carlyle Harris maintained his innocence even after the Court of Appeals had unanimously sustained his conviction, and even as he calmly took his seat in the electric chair.
The most famous English poison case comparable to the Harris and Buchanan cases was that of the celebrated William Palmer, also a physician by profession, who poisoned his companion by the use of strychnine in order to obtain his money and collect his racing bets. The trial is referred to in detail in another chapter.
Palmer, like Harris and Buchanan, maintained a stoical demeanor throughout his trial and confinement in jail, awaiting execution. The morning of his execution he ate his eggs at breakfast as if he were going on a journey. When he was led to the gallows, it was demanded of him in the name of God, as was the custom in England in those days, if he was innocent or guilty. He made no reply. Again the question was put, "William Palmer, in the name of Almighty God, are you innocent or guilty?" Just as the white cap came over his face he murmured in a low breath, "Guilty," and the bolts were drawn with a crash.
On December 15, 1900, there appeared in the New York World an article written by Thomas J. Minnock, a newspaper reporter, in which he claimed to have been an eye-witness to the shocking brutality of certain nurses in attendance at the Insane Pavilion of Bellevue Hospital, which resulted in the death, by strangulation, of one of its inmates, a Frenchman named Hilliard. This Frenchman had arrived at the hospital at about four o'clock in the afternoon of Tuesday, December 11. He was suffering from alcoholic mania, but was apparently otherwise in normal physical condition. Twenty-six hours later, or on Wednesday, December 12, he died. An autopsy was performed which disclosed several bruises on the forehead, arm, hand, and shoulder, three broken ribs and a broken hyoid bone in the neck (which supports the tongue), and a suffusion of blood or hæmorrhage on both sides of the windpipe. The coroner's physician reported the cause of death, as shown by the autopsy, to be strangulation. The newspaper reporter, Minnock, claimed to have been in Bellevue at the time, feigning insanity for newspaper purposes; and upon his discharge from the hospital he stated that he had seen the Frenchman strangled to death by the nurses in charge of the Pavilion by the use of a sheet tightly twisted around the insane man's neck. The language used in the newspaper articles written by Minnock to describe the occurrences preceding the Frenchman's death was as follows:—
"At supper time on Wednesday evening, when the Frenchman, Mr. Hilliard, refused to eat his supper, the nurse, Davis, started for him. Hilliard ran around the table, and the other two nurses, Dean and Marshall, headed him off and held him; they forced him down on a bench, Davis called for a sheet, one of the other two, I do not remember which, brought it, and Davis drew it around Hilliard's neck like a rope. Dean was behind the bench on which Hilliard had been pulled back; he gathered up the loose ends of the sheet and pulled the linen tight around Hilliard's neck, then he began to twist the folds in his hand. I was horrified. I have read of the garrote; I have seen pictures of how persons are executed in Spanish countries; I realized that here, before my eyes, a strangle was going to be performed. Davis twisted the ends of the sheet in his hands, round and round; he placed his knee against Hilliard's back and exercised all his force. The dying man's eyes began to bulge from their sockets; it made me sick, but I looked on as if fascinated. Hilliard's hands clutched frantically at the coils around his neck. 'Keep his hands down, can't you?' shouted Davis in a rage. Dean and Marshall seized the helpless man's hands; slowly, remorselessly, Davis kept on twisting the sheet. Hilliard began to get black in the face; his tongue was hanging out. Marshall got frightened. 'Let up, he is getting black!' he said to Davis. Davis let out a couple of twists of the sheet, but did not seem to like to do it. At last Hilliard got a little breath, just a little. The sheet was still brought tight about the neck. 'Now will you eat?' cried Davis. 'No,' gasped the insane man. Davis was furious. 'Well, I will make you eat; I will choke you until you do eat,' he shouted, and he began to twist the sheet again. Hilliard's head would have fallen upon his breast but for the fact that Davis was holding it up. He began to get black in the face again. A second time they got frightened, and Davis eased up on the string. He untwisted the sheet, but still kept a firm grasp on the folds. It took Hilliard some time to come to. When he did at last, Davis again asked him if he would eat. Hilliard had just breath enough to whisper faintly, 'No.' I thought the man was dying then. Davis twisted up the sheet again, and cried, 'Well, I will make him eat or I will choke him to death.' He twisted and twisted until I thought he would break the man's neck. Hilliard was unconscious at last. Davis jerked the man to the floor and kneeled on him, but still had the strangle hold with his knee giving him additional purchase. He twisted the sheet until his own fingers were sore, then the three nurses dragged the limp body to the bath-room, heaved him into the tub with his clothes on, and turned the cold water on him. He was dead by this time, I believe. He was strangled to death, and the finishing touches were put on when they had him on the floor. No big, strong, healthy man could have lived under that awful strangling. Hilliard was weak and feeble."
The above article appeared in the morning Journal, a few days after the original publication in the New York World. The other local papers immediately took up the story, and it is easy to imagine the pitch to which the public excitement and indignation were aroused. The three nurses in charge of the pavilion at the time of Hilliard's death were immediately indicted for manslaughter, and the head nurse, Jesse R. Davis, was promptly put on trial in the Court of General Sessions, before Mr. Justice Cowing and a "special jury." The trial lasted three weeks, and after deliberating five hours upon their verdict, the jury acquitted the prisoner.
The intense interest taken in the case, not only by the public, but by the medical profession, was increased by the fact that for the first time in the criminal courts of this country two inmates of the insane pavilion, themselves admittedly insane, were called by the prosecution, and sworn and accepted by the court as witnesses against the prisoner. One of these witnesses was suffering from a form of insanity known as paranoia, and the other from general paresis. With the exception of the two insane witnesses and the medical testimony founded upon the autopsy, there was no direct evidence on which to convict the prisoner but the statement of the newspaper reporter, Minnock. He was the one sane witness called on behalf of the prosecution, who was an eye-witness to the occurrence, and the issues in the case gradually narrowed down to a question of veracity between the newspaper reporter and the accused prisoner, the testimony of each of these witnesses being corroborated or contradicted on one side or the other by various other witnesses.
If Minnock's testimony was credited by the jury, the prisoner's contradiction would naturally have no effect whatever, and the public prejudice, indignation, and excitement ran so high that the jury were only too ready and willing to accept the newspaper account of the transaction. The cross-examination of Minnock, therefore, became of the utmost importance. It was essential that the effect of his testimony should be broken, and counsel having his cross-examination in charge had made the most elaborate preparations for the task. Extracts from the cross-examination are here given as illustrations of many of the suggestions which have been discussed in previous chapters.
The district attorney in charge of the prosecution was Franklin Pierce, Esq. In his opening address to the jury he stated that he "did not believe that ever in the history of the state, or indeed of the country, had a jury been called upon to decide such an important case as the one on trial." He continued: "There is no fiction—no 'Hard Cash'—in this case. The facts here surpass anything that fiction has ever produced. The witnesses will describe the most terrible treatment that was ever given to an insane man. No writer of fiction could have put them in a book. They would appear so improbable and monstrous that his manuscript would have been rejected as soon as offered to a publisher."
When the reporter, Minnock, stepped to the witness-stand, the court room was crowded, and yet so intense was the excitement that every word the witness uttered could be distinctly heard by everybody present. He gave his evidence in chief clearly and calmly, and with no apparent motive but to narrate correctly the details of the crime he had seen committed. Any one unaware of his career would have regarded him as an unusually clever and apparently honest and courageous man with a keen memory and with just the slightest touch of gratification at the important position he was holding in the public eye in consequence of his having unearthed the atrocities perpetrated in our public hospitals.
His direct evidence was practically a repetition of his newspaper article already referred to, only much more in detail. After questioning him for about an hour, the district attorney sat down with a confident "He is your witness, if you wish to cross-examine him."
No one who has never experienced it can have the slightest appreciation of the nervous excitement attendant on being called upon to cross-examine the chief witness in a case involving the life or liberty of a human being. If Minnock withstood the cross-examination, the nurse Davis, apparently a most worthy and refined young man who had just graduated from the Mills Training School for Nurses, and about to be married to a most estimable young lady, would have to spend at least the next twenty years of his life at hard labor in state prison.
The first fifteen minutes of the cross-examination were devoted to showing that the witness was a thoroughly educated man, twenty-five years of age, a graduate of Saint John's College, Fordham, New York, the Sacred Heart Academy, the Francis Xavier, the De Lasalle Institution, and had travelled extensively in Europe and America. The cross-examination then proceeded:—
Counsel (amiably). "Mr. Minnock, I believe you have written the story of your life and published it in the Bridgeport Sunday Herald as recently as last December? I hold the original article in my hand."
Witness. "It was not the story of my life."
Counsel. "The article is signed by you and purports to be a history of your life."
Witness. "It is an imaginary story dealing with hypnotism. Fiction partly, but it dealt with facts."
Counsel. "That is, you mean to say you mixed fiction and fact in the history of your life?"
Witness. "Yes, sir."
Counsel. "In other words, you dressed up facts with fiction to make them more interesting?"
Witness. "Precisely."
Counsel. "When in this article you wrote that at the age of twelve you ran away with a circus, was that dressed up?"
Witness. "Yes, sir."
Counsel. "It was not true?"
Witness. "No, sir."
Counsel. "When you said that you continued with this circus for over a year, and went with it to Belgium, there was a particle of truth in that because you did, as a matter of fact, go to Belgium, but not with the circus as a public clown; is that the idea?"
Witness. "Yes, sir."
Counsel. "So there was some little truth mixed in at this point with the other matter?"
Witness. "Yes, sir."
Counsel. "When you wrote that you were introduced in Belgium, at the Hospital General, to Charcot, the celebrated Parisian hypnotist, was there some truth in that?"
Witness. "No, sir."
Counsel. "You knew that Charcot was one of the originators of hypnotism in France, didn't you?"
Witness. "I knew that he was one of the original hypnotists."
Counsel. "How did you come to state in the newspaper history of your life that you were introduced to Charcot at the Hospital General at Paris if that was not true?"
Witness. "While there I met a Charcot."
Counsel. "Oh, I see."
Witness. "But not the original Charcot."
Counsel. "Which Charcot did you meet?"
Witness. "A woman. She was a lady assuming the name of Charcot, claiming to be Madame Charcot."
Counsel. "So that when you wrote in this article that you had met Charcot, you intended people to understand that it was the celebrated Professor Charcot, and it was partly true, because there was a woman by the name of Charcot whom you had really met?"
Witness. "Precisely."
Counsel (quietly). "That is to say, there was some truth in it?"
Witness. "Yes, sir."
Counsel. "When in that article you said that Charcot taught you to stand pain, was there any truth in that?"
Witness. "No."
Counsel. "Did you as a matter of fact learn to stand pain?"
Witness. "No."
Counsel. "When you said in this article that Charcot began by sticking pins and knives into you little by little, so as to accustom you to standing pain, was that all fiction?"
Witness. "Yes, sir."
Counsel. "When you wrote that Charcot taught you to reduce your respirations to two a minute, so as to make your body insensible to pain, was that fiction?"
Witness. "Purely imagination."
Court (interrupting). "Counsellor, I will not allow you to go further in this line of inquiry. The witness himself says his article was almost entirely fiction, some of it founded upon fact. I will allow you the greatest latitude in a proper way, but not in this direction."
Counsel. "Your Honor does not catch the point."
Court. "I do not think I do."
Counsel. "This prosecution was started by a newspaper article written by the witness, and published in the morning Journal. It is the claim of the defence that the newspaper article was a mixture of fact and fiction, mostly fiction. The witness has already admitted that the history of his life, published but a few months ago, and written and signed by himself and sold as a history of his life, was a mixture of fact and fiction, mostly fiction. Would it not be instructive to the jury to learn from the lips of the witness himself how far he dressed up the pretended history of his own life, that they may draw from it some inference as to how far he has likewise dressed up the article which was the origin of this prosecution?"
Court. "I shall grant you the greatest latitude in examination of the witness in regard to the newspaper article which he published in regard to this case, but I exclude all questions relating to the witness's newspaper history of his own life."
Counsel. "Did you not have yourself photographed and published in the newspapers in connection with the history of your life, with your mouth and lips and ears sewed up, while you were insensible to pain?"
Court. "Question excluded."
Counsel. "Did you not publish a picture of yourself in connection with the pretended history of your life, representing yourself upon a cross, spiked hand and foot, but insensible to pain, in consequence of the instruction you had received from Professor Charcot?"
Court. "Question excluded."
Counsel. "I offer these pictures and articles in evidence."
Court (roughly). "Excluded."
Counsel. "In the article you published in the New York Journal, wherein you described the occurrences in the present case, which you have just now related upon the witness-stand, did you there have yourself represented as in the position of the insane patient, with a sheet twisted around your neck, and held by the hands of the hospital nurse who was strangling you to death?"
Witness. "I wrote the article, but I did not pose for the picture. The picture was posed for by some one else who looked like me."
Counsel (stepping up to the witness and handing him the newspaper article). "Are not these words under your picture, 'This is how I saw it done, Thomas J. Minnock,' a facsimile of your handwriting?"
Witness. "Yes, sir, it is my handwriting."
Counsel. "Referring to the history of your life again how many imaginary articles on the subject have you written for the newspapers throughout the country?"
Witness. "One."
Counsel. "You have put several articles in New York papers, have you not?"
Witness. "It was only the original story. It has since been redressed, that's all."
Counsel. "Each time you signed the article and sold it to the newspaper for money, did you not?"
Court. "Excluded."
Counsel (with a sudden change of manner, and in a loud voice, turning to the audience). "Is the chief of police of Bridgeport, Connecticut, in the court room? (Turning to the witness.) Mr. Minnock, do you know this gentleman?"
Witness. "I do."
Counsel. "Tell the jury when you first made his acquaintance."
Witness. "It was when I was arrested in the Atlantic Hotel, in Bridgeport, Connecticut, with my wife."
Counsel. "Was she your wife at the time?"
Witness. "Yes, sir."
Counsel. "She was but sixteen years old?"
Witness. "Seventeen, I guess."
Counsel. "You were arrested on the ground that you were trying to drug this sixteen-year-old girl and kidnap her to New York. Do you deny it?"
Witness (doggedly). "I was arrested."
Counsel (sharply). "You know the cause of the arrest to be as I have stated? Answer yes or no!"
Witness (hesitating). "Yes, sir."
Counsel. "You were permitted by the prosecuting attorney, F. A. Bartlett, to be discharged without trial on your promise to leave the state, were you not?"
Witness. "I don't remember anything of that."
Counsel. "Do you deny it?"
Witness. "I do."
Counsel. "Did you have another young man with you upon that occasion?"
Witness. "I did. A college chum."
Counsel. "Was he also married to this sixteen-year-old girl?"
Witness (no answer).
Counsel (pointedly at witness). "Was he married to this girl also?"
Witness. "Why, no."
Counsel. "You say you were married to her. Give me the date of your marriage."
Witness (hesitating). "I don't remember the date."
Counsel. "How many years ago was it?"
Witness. "I don't remember."
Counsel. "How many years ago was it?"
Witness. "I couldn't say."
Counsel. "What is your best memory as to how many years ago it was?"
Witness. "I can't recollect."
Counsel. "Try to recollect about when you were married."
Witness. "I was married twice, civil marriage and church marriage."
Counsel. "I am talking about Miss Sadie Cook. When were you married to Sadie Cook, and where is the marriage recorded?"
Witness. "I tell you I don't remember."
Counsel. "Try."
Witness. "It might be five or six or seven or ten years ago."
Counsel. "Then you cannot tell within five years of the time when you were married, and you are now only twenty-five years old?"
Witness. "I cannot."
Counsel. "Were you married at fifteen years of age?"
Witness. "I don't think I was."
Counsel. "You know, do you not, that your marriage was several years after this arrest in Bridgeport that I have been speaking to you about?"
Witness. "I know nothing of the kind."
Counsel (resolutely). "Do you deny it?"
Witness (hesitating). "Well, no, I do not deny it."
Counsel. "I hand you now what purports to be the certificate of your marriage, three years ago. Is the date correct?"
Witness. "I never saw it before."
Counsel. "Does the certificate correctly state the time and place and circumstances of your marriage?"