229

Sheedy's Murder

DAWNING OF THE HORRIBLE FACTS.

Monday McFarland Makes a Confession That Confirmes Current Suspicion.

The Wife of the Deceased is Arrested in Company With her Supposed Paramer, A. H. Walstrom.

Suspicion The Poison From Her Own Hand Completed the Murder So Well Begun--The Body [?] Sunday.

Slowly but surely the web is tightening around the principals in the Sheedy murder case and already have the guilty parties been ensnared in its meshes. Link by link had been forged the chain of circumstances until it is completed and now the veil that shrouded the mystery has been torn away and the clear light of day is mining upon the terrible affair, leaving the assassins exposed to view. Every detail in the dark tragedy is now known and it stands revealed as one of the most skilfully planned and cold blooded crimes in the annals of criminal history and is absolutely without a parallel in the history of Nebraska.

The first step in the untangling of the skein was the arrest of Monday McFarland Saturday night as the assassin who struck the blow that laid John Sheedy low. In its narrative of the arrest of McFarland THE JOURNAL, owing to circumstances that were eminently proper in order that the ends of justice might be accomplished, refrained from going into the full details of the crime and gave only a meagre account of the affair. Happily these obstacles have been removed and THE JOURNAL is now in a position to give the fullest and most minute details of the crime.

After Monday McFarland was placed in a cell Detective Malone set to work to persuade the prisoner to make a confession and acknowledge his complicity in the crime, and also to reveal the identity of his accomplice, for it was well known to Malone that McFarland was not alone in the commission of this awful deed. All night long McFarland was put through a rigid questioning, and as he was made aware of each link in the chain of circumstances against him began to falter and finally, before the sun arose in the eastern horizon, McFarland, in the presence of Detective Malone and Officer Kinney, confessed to the killing of John Sheedy and unfolded a tale that was at once terrible and horrible in its import. McFarland's confession implicates none other than Mrs. Mary Sheedy, wife of the murdered man, and her paramour, one A. H. Walstrom, a young man whom she met in Buffalo, N. Y., last summer during a visit there and with whom she became infatuated and who followed her to Lincoln, all unknown to her husband. The details of McFarland's confession as related to a JOURNAL reporter by Detective Malone and Officer Kinney are substantially as follows. The confession was repeated in the presence of Mayor Graham, Marshal Malick, Detective Malone and a stenographer who took it all down. At present writing it is impossible to publish it verbatim. However, the substance of the confession is given below:

For several years past McFarland has been acting in the capacity of hair dresser to Mrs. Sheedy and always performed his work at the Sheedy residence. In the course of these hair dressing visits an intimacy sprang up between Mrs. Sheedy and her dark skinned servitor. This intimacy gradually reached the point where Mrs. Sheedy took McFarland into her confidence to such an extent as to confide to his keeping all her domestic difficulties. Gradually, according to McFarland this intimacy assumed such proportions that he became something more than a common African hair dresser. He became fascinated with the woman, but it was a fascination that also partook of fear, a fascination and fear that was destined to place the brand of Cain upon his brow and possible to lead him a shameful death upon the gallows. In the latter part of the last November, while McFarland was at the Sheedy residence upon one of his hair-dressing expeditions, Mrs. Sheedy made a proposition to him so horrible in its import as to cause him to turn sick at heart. It was no less than a proposition for him to murder her husband for a money consideration and for other favors yet to come. The unnatural wife agreed to pay McFarland $15,000 to murder her husband, $500 after the deed was committed and the murdered man buried and the remainder of the $15,000 after the estate had been settled up, McFarland would not agree to do the job, whereupon Mrs. Sheedy threatened to kill him and compelled him to fall upon his knees and swear that he would commit the terrible crime.

Eventually McFarland agreed to get Sheedy out of the way by Christmas. The time drew near for the commission of the crime and McFarland began to weaken. He frequently called at the Sheedy residence during the absence of the unsuspecting husband. He and Mrs. Sheedy finally agreed that the job must be done, and the means to be employed a revolver. On the evening of December 19 last McFarland filled up the whisky to nerve himself to do this deed. He took his station in the yard shortly after 9'clock and awaited the coming of his intended victim. He was under the impression that Mr. and Mrs. Sheedy were calling on on Mr. and Mrs. Charles Carpenter, who live a few doors east of Sheedy's residence, and was expecting Sheedy to come from that direction. Unknown to McFarland Mr. and Mrs. Sheedy attended the Eden Musee on that evening and came home from the opposite direction and McFarland was taken unawares. In order to prevent Sheedy from recognizing him he fired a shot from his revolver in the air and then ran through the back yard, into the alley and made his escape.

The first attempt had proven fruitless and John Sheedy was still in the path of his wife and his lover, Walstrom. But she was determined that her husband must die and she sent a note for McFarland to come and see her. McFarland came and again Mrs. Sheedy and he planned to kill Sheedy. Mrs. Sheedy said the deed must be done by New Years and that is must be done by a blow. She gave McFarland money to buy a heavy cane and the latter went to Goldwater's pawnshop on North Ninth street on Friday January 9, and purchased the fatal cane. He hit it under the steps of John Sharp's barber shop and left it there until half past 5 o'clock on the Sunday evening the blow was struck. He took the cane at the hour mentioned and went to the Sheedy residence, meeting Mrs. Sheedy on the back porch. She told McFarland that the deed must be done that night and gave him 50 cents to buy a pint of whisky to bolster up his courage. She also said if the blow did not kill her husband she would do the rest; all she cared for was to get him in bed and then she would find means to remove him forever.

McFarland went out to a drug store at the corner of Twenty-third and O streets and bought a pint of whisky and then started back. On the way he drank the whisky and arriving at the Sheedy residence he entered the back yard and again met Mrs. Sheedy on the back porch. She told him that her husband was going out in a few moments and then was the time to strike the blow. She told McFarland to station himself at the south end of the porch and when her husband was about to step out she would raise the window curtain and then McFarland was to be prepared when Sheedy opened the door to jump on the porch and beat him down. She then went into the house and returned with a goblet of whisky which she gave to McFarland. The cowardly assassin gulped the liquor down and then nerved himself for the final moment.

When Sheedy stepped out of his door, unconscious of the presence of the hired assassin and dreaming of no dnager, McFarland bounded upon the porch and struck the blow. The dastardly assassin struck his victim with such force as to cause himself to fall. Quick as a flash the bullet flew over McFarland, who jumped to his feet and ran towards the rear of the yard. He ran against the lattice work and fell again, but quickly recovering himself, regained his feet and sped out of the yard and up the alley to Thirteenth street believing in his cowardly terror that all of the five balls from Sheedy's revolver were implanted in his miserable carcass. He then went to the residence of Police Officer Botts on O street, between Thirteen and Fourteenth, where his wife and children were and accompanied them home. He afterwards went to a gambling joint and gambled all night, becoming beastly intoxicated from frequent slugs of whisky. The following day he continued his debauch and wandered from saloon to saloon drinking heavily, trying to drown remembrance of the awful crime he had committed. That same day, remembering he had dropped the cane when he assaulted Sheedy, he procured another one similar in appearance in order to throw the police off the track in case the cane was identified. One day during the week he called at the Sheedy residence to procure some money from Mrs. Sheedy, but was unable to see her.

McFarland's confession was the last link in the cabin of circumstances and revealed the terrible crime in its true light, and indissoluble and incontrovertible connecting Mrs. Mary Sheedy and H. H. Walstrom as aiders, abettors and accessories before and after its commission.

Having the evidence complete, Marshal Melick and Detecitve Malon at 8 o'clock yesterday afternoon placed Mrs. Sheedy under arrest, and an hour later arrested Walsrom at his room in the Heaton block on O Street. Mrs. Sheedy was kept under guard at her residence until evening, when she was escorted to more secure quarters. She takes her arrest very cooly and denies all knowledge or connection with the crime.

Walstrom, Mrs. Sheedy's Buffalo lover and accomplice, is twenty-eight years of age, about the medium height, dark complexion and wears a dark mustache. He is quite nice looking and dresses well. He had on his person $226, a gold watch and chain, a diamond pin and the diamond ring that was given to Mrs. Sheedy by her husband, which she claimed to have lost. Walstrom is sullen and morose and is uncommunicative.

Detective Malone found his first clue in his case by meeting McFarland at Seligsohn's saloon on North Tenth street Monday morning very drunk and hearing him talking incessantly about the Sheedy case. McFarland had plenty of money, and this unusual circumstance aroused Detective Malone's suspicion and he at once went to work investigating McFarland's movements. Malone learned that McFarland had called at Sweeney's barber shop Tuesday and procured John Sheedy's shaving mug, informing the proprietor that Mrs. Sheedy had sent him after it. About this time Hyman Goldwater, the Ninth street pawnbroker, identified the cane at the police station as one he had sold to McFarland. What was before a belief was now a certainty, and Malon knew McFarland was the guilty man. Malone also over heard a conversation between two colored girls named Ida McFarland and Maggie Trusty, which gave him additional evidence in the case. He caused them to be summoned before the coroner's jury, but both girls told stories in direct contradiction to the statements they had previously made. The arrest of McFarland could have been made Thursday, but Marshal Melick and Detective Malone decided to be dead sure of their man before an arrest was made. Marshal Melick and Detective Malon, in unearthing the mystery that shrouded this terrible crime, have accomplished a piece of work that redounds to their ability; sagacity and zeal in the hightest degree. The culmination of their untiring efforts in unearthing the terrible plot and arresting the murderer and his accomplices is a piece of detective skill that will add undying laurels to their names, and places them in the front rank of their avocation. Mayer Graham also aided materially in the work and is to be congratulated upon the success of himself and his officers.

Since McFarland's confession it is the general opinion among the police and the friends of Sheedy and John Sheedy did not die from the effects of McFarland's blow, but that Mrs. Sheedy and Walstrom in the dead of night administered a deadly poison to him that caused his death. One of the various rumors that have been going the rounds is that Walstrom was seen at Sheedy's house at a late hour of the night on which Sheedy was assaulted, and that Mrs. Sheedy was sitting in his lap. It is hinted that Sheedy awoke from his slumber and seeing his wife in the position, fainted from the shock and never regained consciousness. This rumor has never been fully verified but has generally been credited to be true.

Mrs. Mary Sheedy is all attractive woman of face and form and is about thirty-five years of age, although she appears much younger. Her maiden name was Miss Mary Gabriel. She has been married three times, having come to Lincoln some ten years ago with her second husband, George Merrill, a worthless, dissolute fellow, by occupation a stone cutter. She was brought up at Abington, Ill., where she married Merrill. Some time after she came to Lincoln she procured a divorce from Merrill on rather delicate grounds and under peculiar circumstances and married John Sheedy. Her life has not been immaculate, and her reputation previous to her marriage to John Sheedy was far from being good.

The unlocked for developments in this cave have created a great deal of excitement and the city jail was surrounded by excited groups of people all the afternoon and evening yesterday. The case is the sole topic of conversation and more developments are eagerly awaited.

Sheedy's Murder

DAWNING OF THE HORRIBLE FACTS.

Monday McFarland Makes a Confession That Confirmes Current Suspicion.

The Wife of the Deceased is Arrested in Company With her Supposed Paramer, A. H. Walstrom.

Suspicion The Poison From Her Own Hand Completed the Murder So Well Begun--The Body [?] Sunday.

Slowly but surely the web is tightening around the principals in the Sheedy murder case and already have the guilty parties been ensnared in its meshes. Link by link had been forged the chain of circumstances until it is completed and now the veil that shrouded the mystery has been torn away and the clear light of day is mining upon the terrible affair, leaving the assassins exposed to view. Every detail in the dark tragedy is now known and it stands revealed as one of the most skilfully planned and cold blooded crimes in the annals of criminal history and is absolutely without a parallel in the history of Nebraska.

The first step in the untangling of the skein was the arrest of Monday McFarland Saturday night as the assassin who struck the blow that laid John Sheedy low. In its narrative of the arrest of McFarland THE JOURNAL, owing to circumstances that were eminently proper in order that the ends of justice might be accomplished, refrained from going into the full details of the crime and gave only a meagre account of the affair. Happily these obstacles have been removed and THE JOURNAL is now in a position to give the fullest and most minute details of the crime.

After Monday McFarland was placed in a cell Detective Malone set to work to persuade the prisoner to make a confession and acknowledge his complicity in the crime, and also to reveal the identity of his accomplice, for it was well known to Malone that McFarland was not alone in the commission of this awful deed. All night long McFarland was put through a rigid questioning, and as he was made aware of each link in the chain of circumstances against him began to falter and finally, before the sun arose in the eastern horizon, McFarland, in the presence of Detective Malone and Officer Kinney, confessed to the killing of John Sheedy and unfolded a tale that was at once terrible and horrible in its import. McFarland's confession implicates none other than Mrs. Mary Sheedy, wife of the murdered man, and her paramour, one A. H. Walstrom, a young man whom she met in Buffalo, N. Y., last summer during a visit there and with whom she became infatuated and who followed her to Lincoln, all unknown to her husband. The details of McFarland's confession as related to a JOURNAL reporter by Detective Malone and Officer Kinney are substantially as follows. The confession was repeated in the presence of Mayor Graham, Marshal Malick, Detective Malone and a stenographer who took it all down. At present writing it is impossible to publish it verbatim. However, the substance of the confession is given below:

For several years past McFarland has been acting in the capacity of hair dresser to Mrs. Sheedy and always performed his work at the Sheedy residence. In the course of these hair dressing visits an intimacy sprang up between Mrs. Sheedy and her dark skinned servitor. This intimacy gradually reached the point where Mrs. Sheedy took McFarland into her confidence to such an extent as to confide to his keeping all her domestic difficulties. Gradually, according to McFarland this intimacy assumed such proportions that he became something more than a common African hair dresser. He became fascinated with the woman, but it was a fascination that also partook of fear, a fascination and fear that was destined to place the brand of Cain upon his brow and possible to lead him a shameful death upon the gallows. In the latter part of the last November, while McFarland was at the Sheedy residence upon one of his hair-dressing expeditions, Mrs. Sheedy made a proposition to him so horrible in its import as to cause him to turn sick at heart. It was no less than a proposition for him to murder her husband for a money consideration and for other favors yet to come. The unnatural wife agreed to pay McFarland $15,000 to murder her husband, $500 after the deed was committed and the murdered man buried and the remainder of the $15,000 after the estate had been settled up, McFarland would not agree to do the job, whereupon Mrs. Sheedy threatened to kill him and compelled him to fall upon his knees and swear that he would commit the terrible crime.

Eventually McFarland agreed to get Sheedy out of the way by Christmas. The time drew near for the commission of the crime and McFarland began to weaken. He frequently called at the Sheedy residence during the absence of the unsuspecting husband. He and Mrs. Sheedy finally agreed that the job must be done, and the means to be employed a revolver. On the evening of December 19 last McFarland filled up the whisky to nerve himself to do this deed. He took his station in the yard shortly after 9'clock and awaited the coming of his intended victim. He was under the impression that Mr. and Mrs. Sheedy were calling on on Mr. and Mrs. Charles Carpenter, who live a few doors east of Sheedy's residence, and was expecting Sheedy to come from that direction. Unknown to McFarland Mr. and Mrs. Sheedy attended the Eden Musee on that evening and came home from the opposite direction and McFarland was taken unawares. In order to prevent Sheedy from recognizing him he fired a shot from his revolver in the air and then ran through the back yard, into the alley and made his escape.

The first attempt had proven fruitless and John Sheedy was still in the path of his wife and his lover, Walstrom. But she was determined that her husband must die and she sent a note for McFarland to come and see her. McFarland came and again Mrs. Sheedy and he planned to kill Sheedy. Mrs. Sheedy said the deed must be done by New Years and that is must be done by a blow. She gave McFarland money to buy a heavy cane and the latter went to Goldwater's pawnshop on North Ninth street on Friday January 9, and purchased the fatal cane. He hit it under the steps of John Sharp's barber shop and left it there until half past 5 o'clock on the Sunday evening the blow was struck. He took the cane at the hour mentioned and went to the Sheedy residence, meeting Mrs. Sheedy on the back porch. She told McFarland that the deed must be done that night and gave him 50 cents to buy a pint of whisky to bolster up his courage. She also said if the blow did not kill her husband she would do the rest; all she cared for was to get him in bed and then she would find means to remove him forever.

McFarland went out to a drug store at the corner of Twenty-third and O streets and bought a pint of whisky and then started back. On the way he drank the whisky and arriving at the Sheedy residence he entered the back yard and again met Mrs. Sheedy on the back porch. She told him that her husband was going out in a few moments and then was the time to strike the blow. She told McFarland to station himself at the south end of the porch and when her husband was about to step out she would raise the window curtain and then McFarland was to be prepared when Sheedy opened the door to jump on the porch and beat him down. She then went into the house and returned with a goblet of whisky which she gave to McFarland. The cowardly assassin gulped the liquor down and then nerved himself for the final moment.

When Sheedy stepped out of his door, unconscious of the presence of the hired assassin and dreaming of no dnager, McFarland bounded upon the porch and struck the blow. The dastardly assassin struck his victim with such force as to cause himself to fall. Quick as a flash the bullet flew over McFarland, who jumped to his feet and ran towards the rear of the yard. He ran against the lattice work and fell again, but quickly recovering himself, regained his feet and sped out of the yard and up the alley to Thirteenth street believing in his cowardly terror that all of the five balls from Sheedy's revolver were implanted in his miserable carcass. He then went to the residence of Police Officer Botts on O street, between Thirteen and Fourteenth, where his wife and children were and accompanied them home. He afterwards went to a gambling joint and gambled all night, becoming beastly intoxicated from frequent slugs of whisky. The following day he continued his debauch and wandered from saloon to saloon drinking heavily, trying to drown remembrance of the awful crime he had committed. That same day, remembering he had dropped the cane when he assaulted Sheedy, he procured another one similar in appearance in order to throw the police off the track in case the cane was identified. One day during the week he called at the Sheedy residence to procure some money from Mrs. Sheedy, but was unable to see her.

McFarland's confession was the last link in the cabin of circumstances and revealed the terrible crime in its true light, and indissoluble and incontrovertible connecting Mrs. Mary Sheedy and H. H. Walstrom as aiders, abettors and accessories before and after its commission.

Having the evidence complete, Marshal Melick and Detecitve Malon at 8 o'clock yesterday afternoon placed Mrs. Sheedy under arrest, and an hour later arrested Walsrom at his room in the Heaton block on O Street. Mrs. Sheedy was kept under guard at her residence until evening, when she was escorted to more secure quarters. She takes her arrest very cooly and denies all knowledge or connection with the crime.

Walstrom, Mrs. Sheedy's Buffalo lover and accomplice, is twenty-eight years of age, about the medium height, dark complexion and wears a dark mustache. He is quite nice looking and dresses well. He had on his person $226, a gold watch and chain, a diamond pin and the diamond ring that was given to Mrs. Sheedy by her husband, which she claimed to have lost. Walstrom is sullen and morose and is uncommunicative.

Detective Malone found his first clue in his case by meeting McFarland at Seligsohn's saloon on North Tenth street Monday morning very drunk and hearing him talking incessantly about the Sheedy case. McFarland had plenty of money, and this unusual circumstance aroused Detective Malone's suspicion and he at once went to work investigating McFarland's movements. Malone learned that McFarland had called at Sweeney's barber shop Tuesday and procured John Sheedy's shaving mug, informing the proprietor that Mrs. Sheedy had sent him after it. About this time Hyman Goldwater, the Ninth street pawnbroker, identified the cane at the police station as one he had sold to McFarland. What was before a belief was now a certainty, and Malon knew McFarland was the guilty man. Malone also over heard a conversation between two colored girls named Ida McFarland and Maggie Trusty, which gave him additional evidence in the case. He caused them to be summoned before the coroner's jury, but both girls told stories in direct contradiction to the statements they had previously made. The arrest of McFarland could have been made Thursday, but Marshal Melick and Detective Malone decided to be dead sure of their man before an arrest was made. Marshal Melick and Detective Malon, in unearthing the mystery that shrouded this terrible crime, have accomplished a piece of work that redounds to their ability; sagacity and zeal in the hightest degree. The culmination of their untiring efforts in unearthing the terrible plot and arresting the murderer and his accomplices is a piece of detective skill that will add undying laurels to their names, and places them in the front rank of their avocation. Mayer Graham also aided materially in the work and is to be congratulated upon the success of himself and his officers.

Since McFarland's confession it is the general opinion among the police and the friends of Sheedy and John Sheedy did not die from the effects of McFarland's blow, but that Mrs. Sheedy and Walstrom in the dead of night administered a deadly poison to him that caused his death. One of the various rumors that have been going the rounds is that Walstrom was seen at Sheedy's house at a late hour of the night on which Sheedy was assaulted, and that Mrs. Sheedy was sitting in his lap. It is hinted that Sheedy awoke from his slumber and seeing his wife in the position, fainted from the shock and never regained consciousness. This rumor has never been fully verified but has generally been credited to be true.

Mrs. Mary Sheedy is all attractive woman of face and form and is about thirty-five years of age, although she appears much younger. Her maiden name was Miss Mary Gabriel. She has been married three times, having come to Lincoln some ten years ago with her second husband, George Merrill, a worthless, dissolute fellow, by occupation a stone cutter. She was brought up at Abington, Ill., where she married Merrill. Some time after she came to Lincoln she procured a divorce from Merrill on rather delicate grounds and under peculiar circumstances and married John Sheedy. Her life has not been immaculate, and her reputation previous to her marriage to John Sheedy was far from being good.

The unlocked for developments in this cave have created a great deal of excitement and the city jail was surrounded by excited groups of people all the afternoon and evening yesterday. The case is the sole topic of conversation and more developments are eagerly awaited.