To the Gallows
Part I of II
By: Dusty Williams
In
the article I wrote previously entitled, "The
Bushwhacker", Bill Wilson, or a Missourian was
murdered north of Mantua near present day Van
Alstyne. After a search party was organized
they captured two young men, also from
Missouri, William O. Blackmore and John
Thompson. The men were held in McKinney before
being taken to Sherman for trial, a trial and
outcome that would make history in Grayson
County.
William
Owen Blackmore was born about 1848 in Nicholas
County, Kentucky to Thomas W. & Sarah
Howse Blackmore. Sarah had previously been
married to John Litton and had several
children, including N. W. Litton who rode with
Bloody Bill Anderson in Missouri. Both Litton
and Blackmore were listed on John M. Edwards’
1877 list of men who followed Frank James from
Clay County, Missouri to join Bloody Bill
Anderson in 1864.
John
Thompson was born about 1842 in Missouri,
probably Barry County, to Absalom and Susan
West Thompson. John, with his brother in law,
Joe Peevy, had already gotten into trouble in
Missouri before he came to Texas. In May of
1867, John Thompson murdered a man named Hiram
Christian in Springfield, Missouri. He then
escaped to Texas.
After
a quick trial in Sherman, the men were
sentenced to be hanged. Thompson was tried
first, followed by Blackmore. During
Blackmore’s trial he pled that Thompson was
the leader of this incident and although the
jury might have had sympathy for him, there
was nothing they could do except sentence him
the same. The
McKinney Enquirer reported on
February 20, 1869 that “The Citizens of
Grayson County have organized a company to
guard Thompson and Blackmore until the day
appointed for their execution, for which they
are to be paid a stipulated amount. The sum,
we learn, is to be raised by subscription; any
of our citizens who wish to contribute, can
leave the amount they wish to give with some
of our merchants.” Thompson and Blackmore were
kept for about eight weeks while they waited
their execution in Sherman.
The
following is a full account, including
confessions, of what took place in Sherman on
March 26th, 1869, taken from local
newspapers at the time.
“From
the Sherman
Courier, we learn that on the 26th
ult., William O. Blackmore and John Thompson
suffered the extreme penalty of the law for
murder. The murder was committed about the 22nd
of January, as a part of an act of robbery,
upon the person of a stranger, Wilson, of
Missouri, traveling through the country.
Blackmore and Thompson were two young men,
also from Missouri, but at the time of the
murder were making their home near McKinney,
Collin County.
On
the discovery of the body of the murdered,
Wilson, great excitement prevailed and
suspicion falling on the two men, Blackmore
and Thompson, they were arrested and taken
before the District Court, which then happened
to be in session at Sherman. After a full
trial, with able counsel on both sides, they
were convicted and sentenced, and have now
expiated their crime upon the gallows.
The Courier
publishes the confession of both the
prisoners, made just before their execution.
Both acknowledged to the commission of the
dreadful murder and the justice of their fate.
Both attributed their wicked career, in a
great measure, to the evil influences of bad
company and bad habits, and exhorted the young
men of the country to flee from them.
Thompson
says: I do believe that a man’s sins sooner or
later, blood hound-like, will scent him down.
I have been running in sin a long time, but it
has overtaken me at last.
Blackmore
also wrote letters to his mother and brother
(N. W. Litton) in Missouri and urged them not
to grieve for him, hoped his peace was made
with God and exhorted his younger brother to
shun bad company. Blackmore claimed to be the
younger in the crime and that he was led into
it, only after repeated entreaties, by
Thompson.
Of
the scene at the gallows, the Courier
says. The gallows was erected at the south
window on the East front of the Court House in
the open room of which the prisoners had been
confined since their trial. At about one
o’clock P.M. the prisoners were led out.
Enshrouded in white, their faces only visible.
We may not have looked upon them as others
perhaps did, but to our mind the two men
presented quite a contrast. While Blackmore
appeared to accept his fate with quiet and
even prayerful resignation, Thompson, though
deeply affected, met his with stern
determination. No words escaped the lips of
either. At 1:30 P.M., the sharp stroke of the
hatchet which severed the rope, was heard-the
drop fell, and Thompson and Blackmore hung
suspended in the air. The neck of Blackmore
was dislocated and died almost immediately;
the fall failed to break Thompson’s neck, nor
did the cord draw sufficiently to stop
immediate respiration; he lived near half an
hour, and his death was terrible.”
Although the
hanging did not take place until early that
afternoon, the public square in Sherman was
full of spectators by 10 A.M. that morning.
The scaffold which the men were hung from
was constructed outside of their window. On
the day of their execution, the men were
walked out of the open window and onto the
scaffold where they were hung. The
anniversary edition of, The Sherman
Courier, in 1917 stated that the
sheriff, Jacob Gumm was ill at the time of
the execution and that his deputy, John
Hunter was the one who hung the men. Dr. J.
B. Stinson, county physician, pronounced the
men dead. Their final words were also
published in the paper and will be presented
in the next installment of, Trails of Our
Past.
