Paul Minor

Delving Into Yester~Year

Local historian and writer Paul Miner takes items from The Republican’s Yester-Year column to develop an interesting, informative and often humorous article.

To the Editor:

I’m not slightly confident honor exists among the modern many today – at least comparable to past days of chivalry. Punishment with hyperbolic rhetoric was inevitable if clear-cut lines were crossed.

Consider The Republican’s righteous reproof in May 1883 of undisclosed misdeeds of The Gazette’s editor, and the unworthy reaction of those “who have little respect for the will of the people.

“These men have, by a liberal use of (the Gazette’s editor) as a vault cleaning suction pump, attempted to punish us . . . and escape the odium which would otherwise attach to them.” I wasn’t there, I know not the odium. Impugning a woman’s honor cost one’s life, The Republican reported in December 1881. A Mississippi man and his accomplice pursued a man for hundreds of miles and murdered him. “The killing was cold-blooded, merciless, horrible.”

The reason? The victim had published “to the world a most scurrilous piece reflecting on the virtue” of the killer’s wife. “He had destroyed the good name of the lady forever.” Nothing within the law sanctioned the murder, but this was the deep South, where “public sentiment and custom, which are more powerful than the law, do give a southern man . . . the right to kill for a defamation” of a woman. A father, brother or husband was expected to mete justice for the insult. “One who does not do so is looked upon as a low coward.” Was it not “the very best protection of female virtue?” The paper clearly thought it was. “And to this fact we attribute the high standard of virtue among our southern women.” I posit that anyone questioning southern women’s virtue lived on borrowed time. Some clearly believed not a single southern woman lacked virtue, and The Republican’s editorial suggested shootings to protect Hendricks County women’s reputations.

A 17-year-old Central Normal student endured gossip, scandal, threats, and was induced to attempt strychnine suicide in 1885 after an affair gone bad with an older fellow student.

A July 2 front-page editorial and story commanded townspeople’s attention. “Now that a poor girl, who is away from home and without any friends has been robbed of her virtue and outrageously abused,” the paper expected the “same vigilance” from college faculty as when the ex-town marshal struck a student in the post office lobby.

The faculty and “entire Normal School” had convened “an indignation meeting” demanding the marshal’s prosecution. But what of the girl? She was not a local, and the villain reportedly took advantage of her. The paper tried and condemned him for his misdeed.

Headlines summed the story, which contained “much rottenness.” It was “A Horrible Story of Crime.” Indeed, “Seduction, Breach of Promise, and Administering a Deadly Poison Charges.” Yes, a “Foolish Girl Betrayed, Ruined and Driven to Court the Embrace of Death.”

The scoundrel took her to an Indianapolis hotel where they registered as man and wife.

He promised to marry her. Soon afterward, she revealed she was pregnant. He replied he had seduced and pledged to marry yet another. The rogue urged the girl to induce an abortion, then suggested she go to a house of “ill fame,” where she would ”forget” him and make “plenty of money.” When he threatened to kill her, she agreed to“take the medicine.” She tried to flee, but she owed the college money and at its behest her landlady refused to allow her to leave with her baggage. The desperate lass was cornered. Gossip from “the vulgar-minded” hounded her and she “suffered untold agony.” Tearfully, she disclosed her plight to the landlady, who took her to the wife of Central Normal’s president.

Left alone, the girl swallowed the strychnine. A summoned doctor saved her, but her life was ruined.

The jailed wretch was charged with criminal seduction and providing “a deadly poison.” I chose not to pursue the outcome, but I rather think his attorney asked for a change of venue.