Occurrence At Palmetto County

ALL CHARACTERS ARE ADULTS.

Abner Spinks murdered Carissa Browne, at Palmetto County, Florida on February 14th, 1899; Valentine's Day. He was convicted of first degree murder and sentenced to die by Judge Rollo Sanders of the circuit court. So said the local newspaper.

Spinks ambushed Carissa on her way to a neighbor's house. He waited for her, concealed within a heavy thicket of palmettos, adjacent to a stretch of road that was deep sand, forcing the young woman to dismount her bicycle and push it along.

At a spot where she and her bike became firmly mired in the sand Spinks left his hide, stopped the bicycle with his strong hands, and demanded lewd intimacy from her. She tried to flee but was trapped. Neighbors found her, and her father and brother brought her to town in their wagon. I examined her. She was beaten with a bicycle chain and stabbed 32 times.

People are morbidly curious about hangings. They travel from far away to attend one, and readily inconvenience themselves to witness such macabre events if it's possible.

July in Florida is always hot and humid, and the summer and fall of 1899 were unusually severe. By 9 o'clock of the morning most people were wet with sweat, and uncomfortable. At such times sleep is impossible until late at night, and fitful when it comes. The morning of the hanging was more of the same.

The local crowd arrived early: by buggy, horseback, and walking. The Pensacola train unloaded a 2nd crowd at 9 o'clock, and the Jacksonville train yet another at 11 o'clock. A gang of young boys went to the train station, to greet and fleece passengers.

"Stand on my head for a nickel?" said one. A passenger put his hand into his pocket, the boy did his trick, in no very professional style, be it said, and with a grin stretched out his hand. The nickel glistened in the sun but fell to the ground as it was being exchanged; and in an instant a second boy sprang forward, snatched it up, and made off in triumph amid the hilarious applause of his fellows. The acrobat's countenance indicated a sense of injustice.

"Where is our honor among thieves?" I imagined him asking himself.

Walking to the court-house, two women followed close behind me, and one of them complained of the sand, to which she was not yet accustomed.

"Yes," said the other, "I found it pretty hard walking at first, but I learned after a while that the best way is to set your heel down hard, as hard as you can; then the sand doesn't give under you so much, and you get along better."

I wonder whether she noticed, just in front of her, a man who began forthwith to bury his boot heel at every step?

When the arrangements for the execution were completed, a few minutes before noon, the large yard between the court-house and jail was packed with sightseers: men, women, and children. This part of the theatre may be termed the "gallery," but many ladies had taken reserved seats in the windows of the court-house, and two or three men had been invited to the "wings" of the stage, where they had a close view of the actors.

There was a carnival atmosphere to the occasion. I saw clowns and men with tamed animals, and refreshment vendors.

Out along Broad Street were sundry amusements and activities. The boys from the train depot were on the scene, again doing acrobatics for coins. I saw a man teaching his young lady friend to ride a bicycle, and his pupil was at the most interesting stage of a learner's career when the machine is beginning to steady itself.

With very little assistance she went bravely, while at the same time the young man felt it necessary to keep his hold upon her for more than a few moments. At all events, he must be available to her at the turn. She plied the pedals with vigor and enthusiasm, and he ran alongside or behind, as best he could; she excited, and he out of breath. Back and forth they went, and he finally took off his coat. I left him panting in his fair one's wake, and hoped it would not turn out a case of "love's labor's lost."

Large crowds attended every hanging in Palmetto County. This is likely for two reasons, I suppose. First, because the only offensive part of the event is hidden from the spectators outside the scaffold and its enclosure, and second, because of the impressive religious service, which is far more effective than any held in a church on account of its earnestness.

For then is the time when people can form a true estimate of the blessings of faith, for it is only faith which helps the condemned stand up and talk and sing instead of collapsing. And I fail to see why the curiosity which compels the crowds to witness hangings is called "morbid." We all face death sooner or later, and it's natural that those whose nerves allow them to come want to see how a fellow human in good health behaves in the face of death.

If I am not much mistaken, some of the many conversions to religion, which occurred in Palmetto County in the last few years, began in the jail-yard during the hanging of a criminal. A hanging beats game into God's nets better than a battalion of preachers.

There is also the trite old saying that "misery loves company," and some of our ordeals are better borne when we are surrounded by our fellow men rather than endured alone; thus a crowd of people probably boosts the courage of the condemned man, and a charitable act is committed, though it may not be intended. Besides, the people make laws for capital punishment and we should not be too squeamish to see how the law works out, nor ashamed to see the result of our collective will.

I went to Spinks' cell with his spiritual advisers, Revs. H.W. Bartley and J.W. Roberson, of the Oakhurst Methodist Episcopal Church, to see the final preparations.

This was an impressive religious service; it was beautiful and inspiring. The jailer moved Spinks to a cell in the southwest corner of the building, and he sat so that the few rays of the sun passing through the bars shone down on him. Possibly the last sunshine he would experience for eternity.

The preachers and an assistant sat outside and in front of him. Spinks sat on his heels, back pressed against the wall, arms resting on his legs, alone inside the cell. These austere walls and iron bars have, on many occasions, reverberated with the screams of the mad, the ribald songs of the hardened criminal, and the anguished sobs and wailing of the repentant murderer, as he arouses up from sleep to a cold sweat and a very real nightmare. His moment of truth.

In a short while, though, the musty old jail resounded with melodies from the well-trained voices of the preachers and a woman who accompanied them to the ceremony. The clerics also provided emotional prayers and exhortations; in all of this Spinks took part.

The word of God is beautiful and to be respected wherever uttered; faith, hope, and charity are virtues the angels smile upon. The full power and beauty of that splendid hymn, "Nearer My God to Thee," can only be appreciated when heard from the lips of a person who stands on the threshold of eternity.

The sweet evangel, "I am the way, the truth and the life: He that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live, and whosoever believeth in me shall never die," shines out in its full splendor of promise when it is read to the dying to sustain his spirit. In ordinary times, when our minds are not sensitive for its reception, it fails to impress us much.

Ever and anon the condemned man cast shy, furtive glances through the window at the crowd below and the enclosure of the scaffold.

Shortly before 11 o'clock Jailer Alvarez came up to the cell and gave Spinks a cigarette, which the boy accepted thankfully and smoked as his last material solace. A little later Mr. Alvarez brought Spinks a suit of new clothes and a hat; the preachers helped him dress. Soon thereafter the ominous clanking of the heavy locks sounded below, and the sheriff entered, accompanied by Deputies. Time was up.

A few days earlier, Spinks threatened that there were not enough men in Palmetto County to hang him; trouble was expected. But, because of the effective work of the preachers, no unpleasant scene occurred. Spinks was handcuffed without defiance, opposition, or resistance, and the solemn procession went out of the jail, led by the preachers, down the stairs and up the steps of the scaffold.

Spinks looked around at the huge crowd; the crowd looked back at him. The trap doors of the scaffold were open and the boy looked through the opening. To allow a drop of the eight and a half feet, a pit was dug beneath the gallows, and looking down was virtually the same as looking into your own grave. Abner didn't flinch. There were more prayers and songs, and Deputy Sheriff Cameron read the death warrant.

Spinks then made a talk, in which he confessed that he was possessed by an evil angel when he murdered Carissa. He stated that the crime he was to atone for resulted from wickedness due to a weak mind and unholy obedience.

Reverend Roberson then said a prayer, which for eloquence and fervor was first-rate.

Afterwards, Spinks stood quietly by while the trap doors were closed and the trigger carefully adjusted. Sheriff White distributed the binding straps to his deputies, to make escape impossible after the drop, which they fastened on Spinks after first removing the handcuffs.

As Mr. Alvarez was tying the straps to the prisoner's wrists, Abner said, "They are tight enough." Alvarez then guided Spinks forward till he stood on the trap where more straps were added, this time around the ankles.

The prisoner spoke his last words in a muted voice and bid farewell to all. The spectators saw that death is not such a terrible event, after all, if we have peace with our God.

Some men possess copious amounts of vainglory in their self-regard, and it is not impossible that Spinks, seeing all the preparations made for him, plus the large crowd of people who came to hear him speak and watch him die, made him feel betterc and helped him cope with impending death. If this is so, it's unlikely anyone begrudged him such a small comfort. None of the faces I saw looking up at Spinks expressed any feelings but pity or curiosity.

After the noose was dropped over Spinks' head, the next to last task on the program was to cover his head with a black hood. The hood was small and did not fit properly, and there was some trouble getting it under the noose. When the hood was down as far as possible, the knot of the noose was moved below Spinks' left ear. Almost everyone on the scaffold then pressed the young man's manacled hands in farewell, saying, "Good-bye, Abner."

Who really knows how much good the friendly action helped poor Spinks? I wondered.

Abner stood above the trap-door, waiting; the crowd was hushed and still, in the distance he heard crows cawing.

"Good-bye, Abner," a voice, only he heard, said, then laughed.

Sheriff White looked pale, but calm. The proof of his preparations was at hand. He is a man with a tender heart, and this awful duty was distasteful to him; still it was his duty, and he intended to execute it himself rather than force it on others.

At the appointed time White seized the lethal lever, gave it a quick pull, and Spinks' body fell through the trap. When the rope tightened, his 180 pounds shook the scaffold till it swayed. This was at 11:47 a.m. The fall broke Spinks' neck and the body never moved again after the gallows ceased moving.

Before the hanging, Deputies stretched the rope with a heavy weight for 24 hours, and varnished it; it did not untwist, and Spinks' body hung motionless rather than "dancing on nothing," as happens without this preparation.

I examined the corpse. Though life seemed extinct, I waited 30 minutes before I declared Spinks dead. After the deputies cut Spinks down and placed the noose on his chest, they took him to D.C. Jones' undertaking parlors where he was embalmed. No one claimed his body and he was buried in the city cemetery, far from his native New York and family, if he had one. Other deputies untwisted the rope, cut it into pieces, and distributed it among the crowd.