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A new article has been added at Newspaper Abstracts > United States > Missouri > Christian
http://www.newspaperabstracts.com/index.php?action=displaycat&catid=3013
Direct link to article: http://www.newspaperabstracts.com/link.php?id=57937
Submitted by: Gigimo
Article Title: St. Louis Globe Democrat
Article Date: March 17 1887
Article Description: Governor MARMADUKE Commutes the Death Sentence of Young James PAYTON.
Article Text:
Jefferson City, Mo., March 16. Gov. MARMADUKE to-day commuted to imprisonment for life the death sentence of James S. PAYTON. PAYTON's crime has the following history:
William R. PAYTON and James S. PAYTON, two brothers, aged at the time 16 and 14 years, respectively, were indicted at the last August term of the Christian County Circuit Court for the murder of Claudie R. MATTHEWS, infant son of L. T. MATTHEWS, on April 12, 1885. At the February 1886 term a severance was granted, and the trial of the younger brother took place. He was found guilty, and sentenced to be hanged Friday, May 28, 1886. The case was appealed to the State Supreme Court on the grounds that three of the PAYTON family and four others testified to facts to show that James could not have been present at the killing.
In order to give a full history of the crime it is necessary to go outside of the testimony admitted at the trial. In February, 1885, old man PAYTON, father of the defendants, and L. T. MATTHEWS had a replevin suit before a Justice of the Peace, and bitter feelings existed between the two men and their families. The former won the suit.
Two weeks after the trial, at a late hour in the night, the occupants of the PAYTON log cabin were startled by a terrible explosion on the roof over their heads. Some one had thrown a stick of giant powder upon the top of the house, and, as is the nature of that explosive, it had expended its terrific force in a downward direction. One little child of Mr. PAYTON was so badly injured that it died in a few days, and Mr. PAYTON himself and other members of the family were more or less painfully injured. The suspicions of the PAYTONS were directed against L. T. MATTHEWS, who they thought was either directly or indirectly responsible for the outrage in revenge for the last lawsuit.
On April 12 Mr. MATTHEWS gathered his household goods and with his wife, sister-in-law and two little children started to remove to Chadwick, the terminus of the Springfield and Southern Railroad. He had proceeded but half a mile when, without warning, the sharp report of two rifles rang out almost simultaneously from the roadside. One ball struck MATTHEWS, inflicting a serious but not dangerous wound in the arm, and the other ball passed through the side-boards of the wagon and hit the head of little Claudie, who was sitting down in the bottom of the wagon, killing him instantly. MATTHEWS testified at the trial that after the shooting he saw the two defendants rise up from behind a log and run away. His wife and sister-in-law saw no one. The defense endeavored to prove an alibi, but the jury gave credence to the testimony of MATTHEWS.
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