Thursday, October 8, 1897
FOREST fires have been raging in southern Indiana, central Kentucky and central Mississippi. Owing to the severe drought the leaves and grass are like tinder. The noted Dismal Swamp is also on fire. Whence comes some of the recent smoke, perhaps.
MAJOR LEWIS GINTER, of Richmond, Virginia, died on the second of October. He was a person of great wealth and did much to improve the city. He was one of the wealthiest men in Virginia and among his achievements was the erection of the Jefferson Hotel in Richmond, which ranks among the finest hostelries in the South.
A VERY disagreeable duty seems to have been met and discharged by a United States circuit judge in Tennessee. He declared the anti-cigarette law of that state to be in violation of the inter-state commerce clause of the Constitution of the United States. Judge Lurton says in rendering his decision that if the act were limited to cigarettes which have lost their character as imports by the breaking of the original packages, the Tennessee law would not be unconstitutional. Congress recognizes the interstate traffic in ardent spirits in original packages as lawful commerce, so also the cigarette traffic in original packages is legal.
The Judge also says that while he comes to this decision without hesitation, yet he is “reluctant to break down a statute aimed at the suppression of an evil of a most pronounced character.”
It is hoped that our West Virginia lawmakers will do something to keep the “coffin nails” away from our precious youth.
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ONE of the most remarkable trials in the whole history of jurisprudence is going on in Chicago; known as the Luetgert case. The accused is charged with murdering his wife and burning the body in caustic potash in the vats of his sausage works. The prosecution introduced expert testimony that the bones found in the vats were those of a human female of slight build. The expert for the defense testified that the same bones were those of a small hog. In a cross examination, a skull was shown to the expert for the defense, and he pronounced it a monkey’s, when in fact, it was a dog’s. This same expert afterwards identified as the bone of a man, one that was a gorilla bone. Both the prosecution and defense have had experts to burn bodies and the results reported have differed greatly. Thus it appears the whole case has become a battle of experts and tends to make circumstantial evidence and expert testimony a doubtful method of arriving at the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
BIOGRAPHIC NOTES
This paper is devoted to the memory of Samuel Waugh, one of the early settlers of “The Hills,” seven or eight miles northeast of Huntersville. The progenitor of the Waugh relationship, according to the most authentic of family legends, was James Waugh, Senior, of Scotch-Irish descent. His wife’s name was Mary. This pioneer husband and wife opened up their home just previous to the Revolution on the place now held by John Shrader, one of their descendants by the third removed. Samuel Waugh, the subject of this sketch, was one of their sons, and upon his marriage with Miss Ann McGuire, settled at the old Waugh homestead. Their family consisted of nine sons and five daughters…
Samuel Waugh and Ann McGuire, imbued with the faith and energy so peculiar to the genuine Scotch-Irish, endured all that is implied in rearing a family of fourteen sons and daughters, and all living to be adults. The sons all lived to be grown and not one was ever known to use tobacco or ardent spirits. This seems scarcely credible, yet it is asserted to be a pleasing truth. Samuel Waugh was one of the original members of the Old Mt. Zion Church, one of the strongholds of its denomination for so many years. His history shows that, in the face of pioneer hindrances and privations, sons and daughters may be reared that may faithfully serve God and support their country in their day and generation. ~ W.T.P.
A GRATEFUL WOMAN – A Prattville, N. Y., woman, whose husband died recently, sent the following communication to a local paper: “Mr. Editor: I desire to thank the friends and neighbors most heartily in this manner for the united aid and cooperation during the illness and death of my late husband, who escaped from me by the hand of death on Friday last while eating breakfast. To the friends and all who contributed so willingly toward making the last moments and funeral of my husband a success, I desire to remember most kindly, hoping these few lines will find them enjoying the same blessing. I have also a good milk cow and roan gelding horse, eight years old, which I will sell cheap. ‘God moves in a mysterious way. His wonders to perform. He plants His footsteps in the sea and rides upon the storm;’ also, a black and white shoat, very low.”