37

EAGER TO HEAR THE CLOSE

A MULTITUDE AT THE SHEEDY TRIAL.

Three Advocates for the Defense Consume the Entire Day in Appeals to the Jury.

Juror James Johnson Causes an Adjournment by Illness--Strode and Lambertson Have an Exciting Spat and the Court Interferes.

To-day Will Close the Argument.

Lincoln's magnificent court house has been tried and found wanting. Its large and handsome law court room was by far too small to furnish accommodations for the crowds of Indies and gentlemen who assembled there yesterday to listen to the arguments in the greatest criminal trial in point of public interest ever held in the state of Nebraska. Long ere :he opening morning hour hundreds of the choicest seats were taken, and the session had not far advanced ere every seat was taken and the aisles were full of standing people willing to forego all comforts and conveniences if only they might hear the pleas advanced for the lives of the two unfortunate and widely contrasted prisoners at the bar. A bevy of ladies were even seated in the private office of Judge Field listening to the impassioned arguments through the open door. which commanded a near and direct view of the jury, the creators and the prisoners.

Bailiff Lou Franklin was at his wits' end and the perspiration steamed from his furrowed brow as he hastened hither and thither guarding the entrance to the inner circle, and at the same time gallantly endeavoring to see that the ladies were accommodated with seats as far as the seating capacity of the room would permit. Finally he gave up in despair, and instead of hunting seats for them [he?] was compelled to devote his entire energies to prevent them from overcrowding the space usually reserved to the court and attorneys, but which, during the later progress of this case, has been given up reservedly to the use of the ladies, who have encircled the august tribunal daily with banks of fair faces peering out from a varied assortment of the choicest and richest work of the milliner's art. All of the ladies, old and young, rich and poor, white, yellow and black, have evinced a desire to perch as near as possible to the throne of justice and the supplicant thereat. And when the ladies start with such an aim and determination, there is no gainsaying them. They are sure to get there. It was noticeable that few of them sought an entrace by the great door freely open to the common herd until they exhausted every chance of getting a place in the inner circles.

At the afternoon session there was a crowd that was truly remarkable. All over the vast court room was presented a sea offices, those of the fair sex apparentlypredominating. All around the walls were banks of humanity pressed too closely together for comfort or convenience. The wide aisle at the doors was crowded with ladies who had arrived too late to secure seats but just in time to shut out great numbers of still less fortunate ladies who had come too late to even get in.

Expressions of approbation were yesterday more frequent than at any former period and the bailiff's duties were therefore the more onerous. His stern rap for silence was frequently heard above the timid applause occasionally indulged. It is said that human sympathy ever goes out to one accused of crime and that popular applause is always in favor of one who defends rather than one who prosecutes a person changed with crime. It is apparent too, that there are many people who are prepared to doubt any proof that a woman of such prepossessing appearance and manners as Mrs. Sheedy could ever be guilty of the crimes sought to be laid at her door." Hence it was that when there were any expressions of approbation it was one expressive of sympathy for Mrs. Sheedy, in which poor Monday McFarland could claim no share of comfort or encouragement.

There was the usual flutter in the audience when Mrs. Sheedy came into court yesterday morning but neither she nor her sisters appeared to observe that they were the center of interest. She was accompanied by Uncle Biggerstaff. Mrs. Morgan and Mrs. Dean, Mrs. Baker had evidently not fully recovered from the effects of the fainting fit which had occasioned her removal from the court room during the previous evening, and did not appear during the morning session. Neither did her husband. They both came in with the party, however, at the afternoon session, but remained but a few minutes. The strain is evidently proving too much for Mrs. Baker, who is said to be subject to such attacks as overcome her on Tuesday. On each occasion it was evident that the calm, pale, sad face of the defendant made a deep impression upon the sympathetic multitude and excited no little admiration. She maintained the utmost composure throughout the day and even the eloquence and earnestness of the three attorneys who spoke in her behalf did not move her to tears or gain the slightest recognition in looks or expression. She appeared to be simply indifferent.

Monday McFarland preceded her each time into the court room. He was accompanied by two or three colored ladies, among them being his wife. He appeared to be equally unmoved by the eloquence and pathos of the attorneys, who recounted again and again the detail of his confession in their efforts to discredit its import and impeach its competency as evidence.

Mrs. Stearns Resumes.

Promptly at 9 o'clock Mr. Stearns resumed his argument in behalf of Mary Sheedy, and began by denying that there was any evidence to show that the night shirts, socks and neckties purchased by Mrs. Sheedy were the same found in possession of Walstrom, and that, therefore, this alleged evidence of the criminal intimacy of Walstrom and Mrs. Sheedy was valueless, as it was necessary for the jury to be convinced of it beyond a reasonable doubt. If there was any criminality. Walstrom was as guilty as Mrs. Sheedy. Why had he been allowed to go! The law doesn't make any dis[?] between man and woman [for?] such crime. He had been allowed to go because there was not more than a shadow of suspicion against him. The utmost endeavors of the state to establish criminal intimacy between Mary Sheedy and A. H. Walstrom had signally failed.

The speaker then took up the state's argument that no one could have delivered that blow as it was delivered that night unless he had had a confederate upon the inside. He said that it was not so light that one might not have stood at the door and awaited John Sheedy's coming, as Henry Krause had told how, when he started out to pursue the assailant, he did not see the lattice work and ran up against it.

"And by the way, what was that Eden musee freak doing around, there that night> I would like some one to explain that to the jury. His own evidence indicates that at least one of Sheedy's shots was aimed at him and that he hid behind a tree. Mrs. Sheedy had called to him to come to her assistance, and assured him he would not be hurt. He rushed into the yard; she asked him to come in and then asked him to go the priest. He did neither, but rushed toward the back of the house and against the lattice work. If the curtain of the east window had been raised, as he e[?] it was, could he not have seen that lattice work. Would not the light from the window have been very apt to disclose it to this view.

The speaker indignantly refuted the assertion of Mr. Hall that "John Sheedy had died there in his own home like a dog."

"I cannot conceive what motive could act [actuate?] an attorney to such an utterance. There is absolutely no evidence upon which to base such a cruel statement. What in the name of God, I ask, could have been done for him that was left undone. Was the wife not there beside him wiping the dew of death from his brow and moistening his lips in his hours of suffering? Was there not a consultation of physicians called and did she not willingly consent to abide by the decision of a majority of them? What, I ask, could she have done further? She did all that the most zealous widely devotion could prompt for a dying husband, and the assertion of counsel is brutal and unwarranted."

Mr. Stearns denied the assertion that circumstantial evidence is the strongest kind of evidence; it is the most unreliable in the world and has resulted in more mistaken convictions, than any other kind of evidence. A number of instances were recited where the evidence had been most convincing, convictions and executions followed and the murders were subsequently found to have been committed by others.

He said that in view of the conflicting nature of the testimony in relation to poisoning, he did not think that the jury were prepared to believe that John Sheedy was ever poisoned. The doctors who were in the pay of the prosecution had been enabled to change their minds about what caused death because of the money there was in it. If they had noticed those symptoms they claim to have noticed on the day if their consultation, why in the name of God didn't they do something to relieve the suffered? The speaker roasted the physicians unmercifully and claimed that they had been trained by Lamberston, especially Dr. Winnett, who, Mr. Stearns contended, had been trained by Lambertson to hold up John Sheedy's skull in court daintily, like a bouquet in the hands of a school girl as she tripped to school, to create a sensation, while Lambertson's bull dog grinned through the open door at the cunning of his master.

He then reviewed the testimony of Wilber Mayes to show that Krause could not have been one of the men whom Mayes [?] running away from the house just after the shooting, as Krause was not in the yard in time, having been restrained from entering because he thought Sheedy's last shot was tired toward him.

He contended that Monday McFarland's confession was not true, and if it were true the jury should never fail to remember that it was powerless to affect Mary Sheedy. He characterized the evidence connecting her with the crime as too remote, too uncertain, too slight to ever permit of a thought of her conviction.

The speaker closed with an allegorical picture of Mercy pleading for the creation of man and promising to guide him through life, and he invoked in an eloquent manner the fulfillment of that promise of mercy.

NOT COMPLETE 6/10/2020

EAGER TO HEAR THE CLOSE

A MULTITUDE AT THE SHEEDY TRIAL.

Three Advocates for the Defense Consume the Entire Day in Appeals to the Jury.

Juror James Johnson Causes an Adjournment by Illness--Strode and Lambertson Have an Exciting Spat and the Court Interferes.

To-day Will Close the Argument.

Lincoln's magnificent court house has been tried and found wanting. Its large and handsome law court room was by far too small to furnish accommodations for the crowds of Indies and gentlemen who assembled there yesterday to listen to the arguments in the greatest criminal trial in point of public interest ever held in the state of Nebraska. Long ere :he opening morning hour hundreds of the choicest seats were taken, and the session had not far advanced ere every seat was taken and the aisles were full of standing people willing to forego all comforts and conveniences if only they might hear the pleas advanced for the lives of the two unfortunate and widely contrasted prisoners at the bar. A bevy of ladies were even seated in the private office of Judge Field listening to the impassioned arguments through the open door. which commanded a near and direct view of the jury, the creators and the prisoners.

Bailiff Lou Franklin was at his wits' end and the perspiration steamed from his furrowed brow as he hastened hither and thither guarding the entrance to the inner circle, and at the same time gallantly endeavoring to see that the ladies were accommodated with seats as far as the seating capacity of the room would permit. Finally he gave up in despair, and instead of hunting seats for them [he?] was compelled to devote his entire energies to prevent them from overcrowding the space usually reserved to the court and attorneys, but which, during the later progress of this case, has been given up reservedly to the use of the ladies, who have encircled the august tribunal daily with banks of fair faces peering out from a varied assortment of the choicest and richest work of the milliner's art. All of the ladies, old and young, rich and poor, white, yellow and black, have evinced a desire to perch as near as possible to the throne of justice and the supplicant thereat. And when the ladies start with such an aim and determination, there is no gainsaying them. They are sure to get there. It was noticeable that few of them sought an entrace by the great door freely open to the common herd until they exhausted every chance of getting a place in the inner circles.

At the afternoon session there was a crowd that was truly remarkable. All over the vast court room was presented a sea offices, those of the fair sex apparentlypredominating. All around the walls were banks of humanity pressed too closely together for comfort or convenience. The wide aisle at the doors was crowded with ladies who had arrived too late to secure seats but just in time to shut out great numbers of still less fortunate ladies who had come too late to even get in.

Expressions of approbation were yesterday more frequent than at any former period and the bailiff's duties were therefore the more onerous. His stern rap for silence was frequently heard above the timid applause occasionally indulged. It is said that human sympathy ever goes out to one accused of crime and that popular applause is always in favor of one who defends rather than one who prosecutes a person changed with crime. It is apparent too, that there are many people who are prepared to doubt any proof that a woman of such prepossessing appearance and manners as Mrs. Sheedy could ever be guilty of the crimes sought to be laid at her door." Hence it was that when there were any expressions of approbation it was one expressive of sympathy for Mrs. Sheedy, in which poor Monday McFarland could claim no share of comfort or encouragement.

There was the usual flutter in the audience when Mrs. Sheedy came into court yesterday morning but neither she nor her sisters appeared to observe that they were the center of interest. She was accompanied by Uncle Biggerstaff. Mrs. Morgan and Mrs. Dean, Mrs. Baker had evidently not fully recovered from the effects of the fainting fit which had occasioned her removal from the court room during the previous evening, and did not appear during the morning session. Neither did her husband. They both came in with the party, however, at the afternoon session, but remained but a few minutes. The strain is evidently proving too much for Mrs. Baker, who is said to be subject to such attacks as overcome her on Tuesday. On each occasion it was evident that the calm, pale, sad face of the defendant made a deep impression upon the sympathetic multitude and excited no little admiration. She maintained the utmost composure throughout the day and even the eloquence and earnestness of the three attorneys who spoke in her behalf did not move her to tears or gain the slightest recognition in looks or expression. She appeared to be simply indifferent.

Monday McFarland preceded her each time into the court room. He was accompanied by two or three colored ladies, among them being his wife. He appeared to be equally unmoved by the eloquence and pathos of the attorneys, who recounted again and again the detail of his confession in their efforts to discredit its import and impeach its competency as evidence.

Mrs. Stearns Resumes.

Promptly at 9 o'clock Mr. Stearns resumed his argument in behalf of Mary Sheedy, and began by denying that there was any evidence to show that the night shirts, socks and neckties purchased by Mrs. Sheedy were the same found in possession of Walstrom, and that, therefore, this alleged evidence of the criminal intimacy of Walstrom and Mrs. Sheedy was valueless, as it was necessary for the jury to be convinced of it beyond a reasonable doubt. If there was any criminality. Walstrom was as guilty as Mrs. Sheedy. Why had he been allowed to go! The law doesn't make any dis[?] between man and woman [for?] such crime. He had been allowed to go because there was not more than a shadow of suspicion against him. The utmost endeavors of the state to establish criminal intimacy between Mary Sheedy and A. H. Walstrom had signally failed.

NOT COMPLETE 6/10/2020