The Sun and the New York herald. [volume], August 08, 1920, Section 4 Sunday Magazine, Page 5, Image 45

About The Sun and the New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1920-1920

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THE SUN AND NEW YORK HERALD, SUNDAY, AUGUST 8. 1920.
Death Chair Demeanor of Murderers
The treat public interest incident to
tlll! execution ot aimer nyatt. tne
.uhtetn year old Rochester boy who
oVd the death penalty in the electric
itcently at Sing Sing for the
mu,,.; of a policeman, brings to
mmd many other murderers memor
able not only for their crimes but for
tensttloiul or otherwise unusual
incidents of their last days. On top of
fit widespread sympathy stirred by
Hyatt's youth came the startling "con-uttic.n"--only
Mteen minutes too late
tostiy execution of a man whose at
Mmol to assume responsibility tor the
hit tne aumoniies aiier inveni-
ctime
gition to p
ronounce him demented.
Young Hyatt's Calmness Recalls Others
Whose Executions Stirred Great Interest
How Dr. Waite, Becker, Hamby
and Harris Faced Ordeal
iivnt according to reports from the
. ... I . . L . . I-.
n'fOfli I""" t0 lne aeal" cnair caimiy.
ame of the murderers whose
cases parallel his in public interest
heed death is told in the accompany-
fai article.
a r
By HERBERT ASBURY.
TUKKU ilucs mil Men to ba any way
ui iti termlnlng how a murderer i
Kuiim tu act win n the time aomM
,, i nl iu jhj with his life the penalty
luw i xncta as punishment for his
i-rttn I' would be sound logic for a mur
t I , execution With the same calm
, i disregard f consequences that ha
,,, M plotting Hi" death of his victim.
Dili ihr electric chair la no respecter f
Annul logic.
Dr. Arthur VVurren Waite was one of the
,! nrkable crlnttnala the detectives of
, tM iTork Police Department have ever
brouglii tu Juatlce. He waa a college man.
graduate dentist with sufficient knowledge
,,i medicine i" have practised aa a physi
cian hud ho so desired, and an athlete of no
,, urder who had distinguished himself
v ;1 tennis player.
Scientific Murder.
Vol In Waite wis a murderer, a double
m rrer He killed his father-in-law and
Ilia mother-in-law, both of them old and
with only a few yens mure to live anyway,
for mi other reason than to obtain quickly
small amount of money which they had
irrumuluted and which would soon have
pawed largely to his Wife In any event.
The New York detectives believe that
Waite plotted the murder of his wife's pgr
i.nts for several years. He studies bacteri
ology until he became well acquainted with
the germs of various diseases Which are al
W always fatal. His mother-in-law. Mrs.
John K. Peck, came from Grand Rapids.
Uli h., to visit the Wattes In their New York
ipurtment late in 191". A month later she
lifetime ill With pneumonia, and a few days
alter thai she contracted typhoid fever also.
She !!'! after two or three weeKs Illness,
thi advice of Ir. Waite the body was
Strayed whatever evidence of his crime
might have remained, and It Is probable
ibat the murder of Mrs. Perk never would
have become known had not the dentist
confessed to It later.
Two months after the death of Mrs. Peck
hor husband came to New York to visit his
daughter and son-in-law. He, too, became
111. and finally died of natural causes so
the death certificate said. Dr. Waite ad
vised thnt the body lie cremated, but the
dead man's son objected and the body was
thin embalmed and sent to Michigan for
burial
Waite continued to urge cremation, and
his plnns probably would have been carried
out had not a mysterious telegram came to
"eivy I"eck, a son of the murdered man.
This message said:
"Suspicions nroused. Demand autopsy.
Do not reveal telegram. K. Adams."
This telegram was one of the great mys
teries of the Waite murder case, and to this
day the police have not been able to find
the person who sent It. It remains an un
solved mystery. Hut Percy Peck became
suspicious also, especially so In view of the
fact that both his father and his mother had
died in Walls's apartment within two
months, He caused an autopsy to be per
formed by Dr. Perry Schultz. who found
large quantities of arsenic In Mr. Peck's
stomach. Detectives Immediately were set
to watch Waite, and when the evidence
against him began to accumulate he took
an overdose of a drug whicjl almost killed
him. When he recovered he was arrested,
eventually confessed to both murders, and
was convicted and sentenced to death. He
a electrocuted at Slug Sing prison shortly
before midnight on May 14, 1917.
After his conviction Waite displayed an
amuzing disregard of what was going to
happen to him. He was absolutely unafraid.
He actuully seemed to be waiting eagerly
for the end.
Waite made no apparent spiritual prepa
rations or oonfeaalon of faith such as m"ii
usually make In like circumstances. For
days prior to his execution he was in com
munication with a woman spiritualist and
he promised her that after he was dead he
would return and give her some message to
prove the existence of the world leyond.
Hut so far as has lieen learned no such mes
sage has been received.
The condemned man seemed to be the
last concerned person In the prison as the
hour of nil death avproached. He often
boasted that the chair would find him as
steady and fearless as he had been through
"Are you ready for me now?" V,
The Instant the lock clicked he pushed the
cell door open and stepped lightly Into the
corridor. He almost skipped along, and as
he camo to the cells of the other nine men
who were swatting execution he stopped
before several of them, raised the black cur-'
tnlns which are always lowered when a man
gOSS out to die, and spolie some word to the
mill who had been his only companions for
months. To several of them he gave pen
cils and fountain pens and other small be
longings. The death procession continued on down
the corridor, and as they drew near to the
death chamber the clergyman stepped for
wnrd, took his place In front and waived
backward, repealing the Twenty-third
I aim ;
"The Lord Is my Shepherd, I shall not
want."
Waite kept his nerve throughout all the
have taking of the men who were soon also
to die, through all the solemnity of the read
ing of Hie Psalm; he kept it until he round
ed a turn In the corridor and came to the
little green door leading Into the, death
bouse.
Then his nerve forsook him. He hesitated,
almost stopped, and It was only with a great
effort that he regained his composure and
stepped into the electrocution chamber. As
the little green door swung open and the
taut and the Catholic chaplains of the pris
on, hut he asked thai neither of them ac
company him to the chslr.
"It seems such mockery," Hamby told
the chaplains, "after the life that I have
len lending to go to the chair with a priest
or a minister by my side. Iet me walk
alone."
Last Hour Spent With Ouija Board.
The bandit and self-confessed murderer
Spoilt bis last hour playing with the ouija
hoard, and when the keepers came to lead
him to his execution he Jumped up, saluted
them with a flourish ami said:
"I'll be right wUh you!"
Hi calmly lighted a cigarette, stuck both
hnndi In his pockets and actually IWaggSrSd
down the corridor, He never faltered when
he came bi sight of the little green door, the
Sight that bad unnerved so many men be
fore him. He came on steadily and con
fidently, puffing calmly on the cigarette, and
bowing cheerfully as he entered to the
newspaper men and the other official wlt
nef.ses who sat silently on the wooden
benches facing the electric chair. Hamby
stopped before the chair, pinched the Are
from his cigarette, and spoke to the warden:
"May I say a word?"
"Certainly," replied the warden, "nnything
you like."
"Thank you," said Hamby. He turned to
the witnesses. "I Just want to say. gentle
men, that any man who stood In front
of Jay B, Allen's gun had a chance. That's
all "
Ho sat calmly In the chulr and motioned
In the guards.
"Co ahead, boys!"
Tin guards busied themselves adjusting
the eleotrodeS and the straps and the prison
physician came nearer to see that every
thing was done properly. Hamby noticed
him and smiled.
' ' ' mil QgfSBaaaW S'NG S'
NgSJBJM WWW XQr
xuijiigsr
III '
ELECTR C CHAIR """H Wm ' '"'l' C9 BjBMH
d sy
Bain NtWf SMvCt
DR ARTHUR WARREN WAITE WHO
KILLED HIS FATHERHN -LAW
Qfniated, after reputable and competent
- who had attended her had certi
fied :ht nhe died from natural causes.
Bui realit Mrs. Peck was murdered by
Waite. Her first illness, a slight cold,
U n result of exposure when Waite took
her automobile riding one chilly January
fternoon The next morning, under pre
wso of giving her medicine to relieve the
nwgested condftissi of her lungs. Waite In
ecclated her with pneumonia germs. He
Immediately called a physician, who began
realm the patient, but as rapidly as the
;','"' gained headway against the disease
Wait,- inoculated Mrs. Peck with more
twins, and when she waa almost dead from
Pneumonia he inoculated her with germs
"f typhoid fver. The end then came
quickly.
fc- having the body cremated Waite de-
thc long days when he waited for death.
Only a few hours before death he asked the
warden, William H. Moyer, if he might
make a statement after he was seated In
the electric chair.
"I will hiive time," he re-narked, "while
the guards are adjusting the straps and the
electrodes."
Warden Mover gave Waite permission to
say whatever he felt he had to say.
At exactly 11 o'clock Principal Keeper
ltorner and Chaplain Petersen walked
sviftly down the corridor ot the death house
to Waite's cell. Waite sat on the couch with
his head clasped in his hands and his body
Waning forward. As the keeper unlocked
the door the keys rattled in his trembling
band. The noise aroused the doomed man.
He looked up, smiled, rose lightly to bis feet
and asked;
doomed man falteringly approached the
death chair three voices were heard to say:
"Goodby, Arthur' Goodby! God bit ss you,
Waite!"
Three of the nine Inmates of the death
house had voiced these parting words, and
WaitC paused for an instant on the thres
hold. It seemed as if he were trying to re
ply. Then his Jaw snapped shut, and with
staring but unseeing eyes, he marched
steadily ahead. In six pact's he reached the
chair and slumped Into it. Had the chair
ln-ep three feet further he never would have
reached It unassisted. He sat there with his
shoulders hunched forward, his face ashen
and gray, his eyes glazed and his hands
twitching nervously.
At last everything was ready. There was
an Instant during which no sound could be
heard save the voice of the clergyman:
"He maketh me to He down in green pas
tures. "
And then the arm of the prison physician
swept downward, and behind a curtain in a
corner of the little room the electrician
threw a switch.
Waite had died without making the state
ment he boasted he was going to make, and
at the last moment he had lost his nerve.
Hamby's Strange Conduct.
Quite different from the behavior of Waite
was that of Gordon Pawcett Hamby. Hamby
was a two gun burglar and bandit, and
after he had been convicted of killing two
officials of trie East Brooklyn Savings Bank
while holding up that Institution and steal
ing $13,000 he confessed that under the
names of Hamby, Boyd Browning and Jay
B. Allen he had committed thirteen hank
robberies, two train holdups and several
murders.
Hamby was of unusual Interest to crimi
nologists. He fought against being extra
dited when he was captured In the West.
But when he finally was brought hack to
New York and identified as the bank rob
ber he took refuge in fatalism. From then
on he did not display the slightest emotion.
He asked that his trial be hurried, he re
quested the Judge to sentence him to death
at once and he forhade his attorneys to take
an appeal from the verdk-t of the Jury.
"I committed the crimes." he said; "it Is
right that I should pay the penalty."
Hamby's conduct was so strange that a
lunacy commission was appointed to inquire
Into his sanity. The commission reported
that Hamby had been unsually well edu
cated, that he had a brilfiant mentality and
that hl mind was hetter and clearer than
that of the majority of men.
There was not the slightest doubt that he
was sane.
Hamby was cheerful all during the time
that he was waiting In the death house go
be executed, even to his last day.
On the morning of the Hay of his execu
tion Hamby was visited by both Use Protes-
"Where Is the red handkerchief. Doc?"
ho asked.
This referred to a joke, as he termed It,
wl.lcb he had been having with the phy
sician. He had suggested that the latter
obtain a new, bright red bandana handker
Chlef with which to signal the electrician
whe:, everything was ready for throwing
the switch.
Ana these were the last words that Ham
by ever spoke.
The doctor made an almost Imperceptible
motion with his hand; tehind the curtain
the electrician threw the switch, there was
a low humming sound and Crordon Fawcett
Hamby was dead with a smile on his face
and a jokt on his lips.
H, was young, somewhere In the early
twenties, hut he left behind him a criminal
record that has been equalled by few.
Guards who had been at Sing Sing or many
years and who have seen many men die say
that Hamby faced the electric chair more
courageously than any other man who ever
pasted through the little green door, with
the possible exception of two Carlyle Har
ris and Sam Haynes.
Haynes was a negro, and he was executed
for murdering a woman near Patterson,
X. Y. He died only a few minutes before
Charles Becker, the New York police lieu
tenant, who was executed for instigating
the murder of Herman Rosenthal, the
g'lmhler, for which four celebrated gunmen
and gangsters also paid the supreme pen
alty. Haynes walked firmly to the chair,
sat down and said in a strong, clear voice:
"Gentlemen, I die strong In Christ!" '
Becker's Execution.
The execution of Charles Becker was the
final episode of one of New York's most
lamous murder cases, and his death and the
stoiy of how he died probably got more
spate In the metropolitan newspapers than
any other execution In the history of Sing
Sing.
Becker was a powerful man physically
and a powerful man mentally as well. He
Kept his nerve throughout all the racking
period of doubt and anxiety, when he and
his attorneys anil his friends and all of the
members of his family were petitioning Gov.
Charles 8. Whitman and all the courts for
i lemency. But they failed, and finally there
came the night when Charles Becker was to
di. . He stepped firmly from his cell when
the keepers unlocked the door and bade him
walk to his death, and he walked firmly
enough down the corridor.
But the little green door was too much for
hilKj as It had been for scores of otrusr
men who hnd gone through It and into the
terrors of the room and the electric chair
beTCni.
He came into the electrocution chamber
with has checks gray and ashen, with bis
tongue rattling loosely in his half open
mouth and his lips quivering like the lips
of a frightened child. He seemed to have
lost all sense of direction. He stumbled
forward, with glazed eyes staring ahead,
his feet pounding flatly on the floor. He
walked beyond the chair and then turned,
and with an awkward sldewise glance he
backed arid sat down In it, or rather he
slumped Into It. He would have fallen out
onto the floor had not the keepers hurriedly
hegun adjusting the straps and applying
the electrodes.
Hut even the hardened keepers were af
fected, so much so that they forgot to fasten
th buckle In the strap across his great
hest, the one of them all which was
c mnted upon to hold his hody in the chair
when the current was applied. They worked
quickly, while the prison chaplain stood be
fore Becker reciting the office of the dead,
and the lips of the doomed man moved In
quavering prayer:
"Into Thy hands, ( ) J.ord. I commend
my ."
He never finished. He never said the
word "soul."
The physician signalled that all was ready
and the electrician threw the switch. But
the chest strap gave way. and the big body
of Becker, hurtled forward hy the force of
the current, flung Itself halfway out ;of the
chair. The keeiiers hurriedly adjusted the
straps again and another shock wan applied.
Then Becker died.
Last Days of the Famed Gunmen.
The four men who were executed for
actually murdering Rosenthal, the gunmen
who fired at him from the security of a
molor car while he stood on the sidewalk In
front of the Hotel Metropole. were rYank
Clroflcl, known as Dago Frank; Harry
Horowitz, known as Gyp the Blood; Jacob
Seidenshnty, known as Whitey I,. -wis. and
Louis Rosenberg, known as Lefty Ixiule.
Nor.e of them was strong mentally, and the
constant strain under which they had been
laboring while waiting In the death house
had so unnerved them that they were piti
ful spectacles when they finally received
the shock of electric current that ended
their careers on earth.
Dago Frank died hravely enough. In that
there was no outcry from him, but his step
faltered as he came through the little green
tlr.m and he fairly dragged himself the
last few feet to the chair. Iewis was next.
He was the most stolid of the four. He
walked to the chair without assistance, sat
dowr and appeared to tie calm. But aa the
keepers advanced to adjust the straps and
electrodes he brushed them aside.
"Gentlemen"' he shouted, loudly, waving
his arms excitedly. "I want to make a
statement, gentlemen; for the sake of Jus
tice I want to make a statement, gentlemen!
Them people on the stand who said they
LAST PICTURE OF CHARLES
BECKER
saw me shoot; gentlemen, I want to mak
a statement! They are perjurers, gentle
men! I swear by God I did not fire a Bhoi
at that Rosenthal!"
His voice rose louder, almost to a shout
and at the height of his harangue the cur
rent was turned on and he died.
Gyp the Blood, for all of his terrifying
name, was the weakest of the lot, and had
to be assisted Into the chair. He seemed
utttrly dazed and bewildered, and said noth
ing and made no resistance when the strapr
and the electrodes were adjusted.
Lefty Louie Runs to the Chair.
Lefty Louie did an extraordinary thing
when his turn came. He came bounding out
( f his cell, stepping swiftly, and led the way
down the corridor. Within sight of the
green door he broke Into a run, and came
running Into the death chamber and seated
h-mself in the chair. He said nothing, but
his face was gray and his fright and agony
of mind were apparent.
Within the memory of Sing Sing keepers
there Is but one man, with the exception of
the negro Haynes. who went to the electric
hair with courage comparable to that of
Cordon Fawcett Hamhy. This man was
Carlyle Harris.
Harris was the principal figure In a mur
der case which attracted great attention
in the early '90s. He was convicted of
having murdered Helen Potts, 19 years
old, by poisoning her with morphine.
Harris was a medical student, and when he
heard that the girl's mother had accused
him of being responsible for her daughter's
death he demanded an investigation hy the
District Attorney. Evidence developed
which caused his arrest, and he was ex
ecuted after a trial which possessed remark
able features. Not the least of these was
the speech which Harris made when the
Judge asked him If he had anything to say
before sentence was pronounced.
Relatives of Harris, particularly his
mother, exhausted every hope In trying to
ol tain a new trial for him, or at least hav
ing the Governor commute his sentence to
life Imprisonment. But nothing could be
done, and on May 8, 1891, Harris was electro
cuted In the death chamber at Sing Sing.
Whatever Harris had been during hie
years of freedom he was a good deal of a
man at the end. Veteran keepers of the
prison said they had never seen a man with
more nerve.
"I can have no motive now for conceal
ment," Harris said after the keepers had
strapped him Into the chair. "I die abso
lutely Innocent of the crime for which I
hive been convicted."
Five minutes later the black flag, rising
to the head of the prison mast, told hls
mother, waiting In a little house on the
hillside near by. that her son was dead.
And '1t she was not content. On that
very day she had graven on his coffin this
inst tiption:
CARLYLE W HARRIS.
Murdered May 8. 1893.
Aged 23 years 7 months and tl days.
"We would no If we had known." Jury.
The last line was Harris's own the words
he had used In his speech In the courtroom
when he was sentenced.
But the second line was his mother's.
Basting Threads
iitt THEN I was a girl." said the lovely
f old lady, "we used to buy for
basting a thread that was
cheaper than the regular sewing thread and
r.ot quite so nice, but which was plenty good
enough for hasting. Then when we pujled
out our basting threads We never threw
them away, but rolled them up on spools and
used them over again as long as we could.
"Maybe there are people still who prac
tise that economy, but, so far as my knowl
edge extends, people to-day buy the best
ty.read and use It for hasting and then throw
the basting threads away. And. dV you
know. I think that In these later days we
have become wasteful In many little ways?
In my youthful days w never wasted anything."