CHAPTER VII.
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.