0:05 [SPEAKER_04]: Before it was called Rich Valley, the community the French family was living in was known as Keller Station. 0:12 [SPEAKER_04]: Isaac Keller and his brother owned large tracks of land in this area, as well as a popular and in tavern that was the social hub of the neighborhood. 0:20 [SPEAKER_04]: Isaac Keller actually owned the land that the French's and now the Hubbard's have been living on. 0:25 [SPEAKER_04]: On their way to the cabin, the Posse blocates Keller, they also find a doctor and they bring both men with them. 0:32 [SPEAKER_04]: There are conflicting reports about what they find when they reach the house. 0:36 [SPEAKER_04]: Some say a foul smell greets the group as they approach. 0:40 [SPEAKER_04]: Others say they smell nothing at all, but the house is locked and the group forces their way inside. 0:45 [SPEAKER_04]: They look for a trapdoor leading to this impossible basement, John has mentioned. 0:51 [SPEAKER_04]: There isn't one. 0:52 [SPEAKER_04]: They look everywhere imaginable in and around the cabin, which doesn't take long. 0:58 [SPEAKER_04]: They find nothing. 1:02 [SPEAKER_02]: So they decide to pull up the floorboards because the sheriff's deputy who's with them tells them they said under the house as I said earlier the house has a 16 inch gap between the floorboards and the floor so it's pretty sizable like today we put houses up on still same concept they get down there. 1:22 [SPEAKER_02]: and they see that the dirt under the floorboards has been disturbed. 1:28 [SPEAKER_02]: The doctor goes down in there with a pick. 1:32 [SPEAKER_02]: and probes the dirt and it catches on something. 1:37 [SPEAKER_02]: So they decided to start digging. 1:40 [SPEAKER_02]: They had not brought a shovel just to pick. 1:43 [SPEAKER_02]: And so they stick the pick down in the ground and it strikes something. 1:47 [SPEAKER_02]: They pull the pick up and there's an impaled infant on the end of the pick. 1:53 [SPEAKER_02]: They stop everything and they go and get a coroner's jury together. 1:58 [SPEAKER_02]: The coroner's jury comes over another collection of random lay people, and they come and dig up the basement. 2:07 [SPEAKER_04]: What they find will shake the community to its core beneath that infant. 2:13 [SPEAKER_04]: So new to the world that her name is today unknown was her older brother, Tillman, age six. 2:20 [SPEAKER_04]: Beneath Tillman, Louisa, age eight, then Sarah, eleven, and John, thirteen. 2:27 [SPEAKER_04]: At the bottom of the hole, Lee Mr. and Ms. French, the skull of each was crushed with the heavy object. 2:34 [SPEAKER_04]: The coroner's jury agrees the murder weapon is likely a hammer. 2:39 [SPEAKER_02]: Sarah French had a broken leg, a broken neck, and a fractured skull, and defensive wounds. 2:46 [SPEAKER_02]: So perhaps they killed Aaron French and his sleep and she woke up and tried to defend herself at some point or another. 2:57 [SPEAKER_02]: The children were killed either before all that happened or they did not appear to have known anything about it. 3:04 [SPEAKER_02]: They ranged in age from 13 to indeterminate because back then, people didn't really keep track of birthdays because child mortality was so high. 3:14 [SPEAKER_02]: So if you were under five, they didn't really, you were just an infant. 3:18 [SPEAKER_02]: So they had that all the way down and also, interestingly, Sarah French's body was naked. 3:25 [SPEAKER_04]: The other victims all wore the night shirts, or sleeping underwear, that was conventional in that day. 3:31 [SPEAKER_04]: The obvious suggestion behind the woman's naked body was that the murder of this family involved a sexual crime of some sort. 3:39 [SPEAKER_04]: But later that day, the sheriff discovered an even simpler explanation for Sarah French's missing underwear, Sarah hovered, was wearing them. 3:48 [SPEAKER_04]: But apart from that discovery, local law enforcement was in over its head. 3:53 [SPEAKER_04]: We already mentioned that the county had to have Hubbard's handcuffs, and the lock on his cell specially made, and when it came time for the trial, the sheriff had to actually cut the lock out of the jail cell door in order to bring the defendant to court because one of his deputies lost the keys. 4:12 [SPEAKER_02]: The sheriff is an elected position here so it was kind of just 4:16 [SPEAKER_02]: Whoever wanted it, and then his deputies were usually as cousins or brothers or whatever that had spare time and nobody knew what to do with something like this. 4:26 [SPEAKER_04]: Part of that was in the 1850s, and part of it is just small life in a small rural midwestern town in North Central Indiana. 4:35 [SPEAKER_02]: Even to this day, if you ask a police officer here, a very large portion of their job is relating to lost farm animals. 4:44 [SPEAKER_02]: and it's not a givet them, it's a job, but a huge portion of their crime load relates to lost horses and cows and stuff. 4:54 [SPEAKER_02]: And I imagine it was way more of a portion of their workload in the 1850s. 5:01 [SPEAKER_02]: A murder and a murderer or something, they were completely unprepared for. 5:05 [SPEAKER_02]: All told his body count wasn't eight. 5:08 [SPEAKER_02]: and even to this day, that's pretty exceptional. 5:11 [SPEAKER_04]: Of course, by this time, Sarah Hubbard is also in custody, and in an effort to protect her, John attempts to distance her from his alleged crimes. 5:21 [SPEAKER_02]: John Hubbard himself says, I want to be tried separately from my wife, because he knew for certain that they were gonna give him the death penalty. 5:30 [SPEAKER_02]: At the time, women still even to this day, women tend not to get the death penalty as often, and so he divided them up so that his wife wouldn't also be killed. 5:41 [SPEAKER_02]: He declared himself indigent, he gets a public defender. 5:44 [SPEAKER_02]: His public defender was the former judge here. 5:47 [SPEAKER_02]: John U. Pettit, his house is still here. 5:49 [SPEAKER_02]: His heirs are all still here. 5:51 [SPEAKER_02]: They own a printing company today. 5:53 [SPEAKER_02]: But Pettit at that time was about 86 years old, which in 1850 is extraordinarily old. 6:00 [SPEAKER_02]: And so he says, even though maybe I'm the most qualified person for a death penalty case, I need help. 6:07 [SPEAKER_02]: So they recruited a guy from Peru named Cox, and then another guy who's a local lawyer here as well as part of the defense team. 6:16 [SPEAKER_04]: One of the most surprising things about this trial, at least for me, was the overwhelming resistance to the death penalty among potential jurors. 6:24 [SPEAKER_02]: An interesting thing at the time is 116 jurors were called, and 98 of them refused to serve in a death penalty case, because of the anti-death penalty sentiment of the day. 6:37 [SPEAKER_02]: kind of an interesting thing to note that we're in 1855 and this death penalty thing is a pertinent political issue. 6:44 [SPEAKER_02]: We actually have here in the museum several of the stenographer notes of those jury questionings where they would say, do you have a problem with the death penalty and typically they would answer, yes, and then they'd say, okay, you can go. 6:59 [SPEAKER_02]: They would be disqualified by the prosecution. 7:05 [SPEAKER_04]: but eventually they find their 12 jars. 7:07 [SPEAKER_04]: I'll spare you the reading of their names, but as soon as the trial starts, the defense employs one stall tactic after another, sometimes with good reason. 7:17 [SPEAKER_04]: The honorable John U. Pettit, arguably the finest defense lawyer in the state of Indiana, has agreed to take the case, and his first instinct is to create as much space as he can between his client and the initial wave of anger that is still swirling in Wabash at the time. 7:34 [SPEAKER_02]: His first legal tactic is you have a right to call witnesses for your own defense so he calls witnesses from New Orleans and New York and Kansas and all these far-away places and they have to send a letter to these people. 7:49 [SPEAKER_02]: And then, of course, the letter never is delivered because you know who's where these people are. 7:55 [SPEAKER_02]: One of them from New York actually was a real person and showed up for the trial, but the rest did not. 8:01 [SPEAKER_04]: So why would Pettit do this? 8:03 [SPEAKER_04]: To buy time? 8:04 [SPEAKER_04]: Remember, any extended travel in that time was a massive undertaking. 8:09 [SPEAKER_04]: In the mail was unreliable. 8:11 [SPEAKER_04]: The longer the trial is delayed. 8:13 [SPEAKER_04]: The more time the public has to cool off. 8:15 [SPEAKER_04]: In the more time Pettit has to assemble a compelling defense. 8:20 [SPEAKER_02]: Then John Hovered tries for a change venue. 8:24 [SPEAKER_02]: Outside the jail, they had an open window, and people tended to yell things at him at all hours of the day and night through the jail window, so he felt he was being harassed. 8:36 [SPEAKER_02]: And also during his initial hearings, a large group of 8:47 [SPEAKER_02]: So they put in for a change of venue and they wanted the venue change to Grant County where Mary and Indiana is now and the reason why is Grant County at that time was primarily settled by Quakers who still to this day are very anti death penalty. 9:05 [SPEAKER_02]: So that was a nice tactic on the part of the lawyers. 9:09 [SPEAKER_02]: However, when they do the hearing to assign the change venue, the armed mob shows up and more list of clairs that if they try to remove him from the county, they'll lynch him. 9:21 [SPEAKER_02]: So the judge to keep violence to a minimum says, we'll do the trial here, but I don't want the armed mob to come back. 9:31 [SPEAKER_02]: And so the armed mob disperses. 9:35 [SPEAKER_02]: They are going to do the trial here. 9:37 [SPEAKER_02]: It lasts approximately a week. 9:40 [SPEAKER_04]: Perhaps unsurprisingly, John Hubbard claims that the couple has been framed. 9:45 [SPEAKER_04]: He said he had been having issues with the Irish Catholics in his neighborhood, and that they had devised this ingenious plot to ruin his life. 9:53 [SPEAKER_04]: In the Hubbard home, officials have found a metal shoe hammer, which they believe to be the murder weapon. 9:59 [SPEAKER_04]: In the very least, it fits the general profile of the wounds found in the skull of each victim. 10:05 [SPEAKER_02]: During the week of the trial, a few famous figures show up from Lobash history. 10:10 [SPEAKER_02]: Stern's Fisher's a big guy in the canal was on the jury. 10:14 [SPEAKER_02]: Isaac Keller is a witness obviously throughout. 10:17 [SPEAKER_02]: as his brother Jonathan, who was the first ever white person born in Wabesh County, and also Dr. James Ford. 10:26 [SPEAKER_04]: The name of James Ford is prominent in town to this day. 10:31 [SPEAKER_04]: His home is now a public museum. 10:33 [SPEAKER_04]: Ford was an enormously important figure in Wabesh history, and would go on to serve the union during the Civil War. 10:40 [SPEAKER_02]: Dr. James Ford was a friendly witness, and he testified that the hammer that they had, 10:47 [SPEAKER_02]: had no blood on it. 10:48 [SPEAKER_02]: And again, you can't use DNA. 10:50 [SPEAKER_02]: They didn't know about the power of black lights. 10:53 [SPEAKER_02]: So there wasn't any of that. 10:55 [SPEAKER_02]: And they screwed the head off of the hammer and red flakes fell out of it. 11:00 [SPEAKER_02]: And so a big point of contention was that blood. 11:05 [SPEAKER_02]: and Dr. Ford testified that you essentially couldn't tell a difference that it was red grains and you couldn't tell a difference between Rust and Sand. 11:16 [SPEAKER_02]: And it needs trial transcript when the prosecution on cross-examine or examination asked him. 11:22 [SPEAKER_02]: Can you tell the difference between Rust and Blood, he laughed and said no. 11:26 [SPEAKER_02]: Which is pretty exceptional for a physician to say. 11:34 [SPEAKER_04]: The trial lasts only four days, September 3rd through September 7th, with the jury retiring for deliberation at 10 p.m. on the final day. 11:44 [SPEAKER_02]: So the jury returns on Saturday morning with a guilty death penalty verdict, and they ask Hubbard if he has anything to say and he says it he does. 11:56 [SPEAKER_02]: So he says to the court, 11:58 [SPEAKER_02]: that this was all applaud by Irish immigrants to frame him for murder. 12:05 [SPEAKER_04]: Most of the prominent citizens of Wabash are in attendance. 12:09 [SPEAKER_04]: One of these men, a local Baptist minister, named T.C. 12:13 [SPEAKER_04]: Townsend, would be assigned to Hubbard as his personal chaplain at the end of the trial. 12:18 [SPEAKER_04]: The minister later recalled the scene and his memoirs. 12:22 [SPEAKER_01]: The jury had no difficulty in finding Hubbard guilty of the murders. 12:27 [SPEAKER_01]: Although the evidence was entirely circumstantial, the judge, I knew, possessed very humane feelings and great sympathy. 12:36 [SPEAKER_01]: In passing the sentence of the law for Hubbard to be hung, he choked up. 12:40 [SPEAKER_01]: And before he could get through, he turned his back to the audience and wept like a child. 12:46 [SPEAKER_01]: When he finished the sentence, he recommended Hubbard to choose me for his chaplain, which was seconded by Hubbard's attorney. 12:54 [SPEAKER_01]: I was seated inside the bar and tried to be excused. 12:58 [SPEAKER_01]: As I was not a capital punishment man, and did not wish to witness the scene. 13:03 [SPEAKER_01]: But when Hubbard came to me with sobs and tears, I consented. 13:07 [SPEAKER_04]: Even after his conviction, Hubbert maintains his innocence. 13:11 [SPEAKER_04]: He files on appeal, which quickly fails. 13:14 [SPEAKER_04]: He then appeals the dissentance, which most people at the time viewed as a cruel and encivilized punishment. 13:21 [SPEAKER_04]: When Hubbert's sentence was read, the headline of the newspaper of the neighboring town, Peru, had read, Wavash, 13:28 [SPEAKER_04]: goes over to barbarism. 13:31 [SPEAKER_04]: So, Hubbard's appeal of his death sentence has a real chance. 13:34 [SPEAKER_04]: He gave an impassioned speech before the court, in which he restated his theory about the Irish Catholic plot to frame him. 13:42 [SPEAKER_04]: He concluded this speech with the following. 13:48 [SPEAKER_03]: I am guiltless of this terrible charge. 13:50 [SPEAKER_03]: My presumed guilt is wholly without a motive and inconsistent with my past character. 13:56 [SPEAKER_03]: But Providence, careful of right and revengeful of all wrong, remains to mean now, a confident hope of deliverance. 14:04 [SPEAKER_03]: I acknowledge here, at this last stage, surrounded by a strange web of difficult, unwravel, painful, and inexplicable circumstances. 14:14 [SPEAKER_03]: My grateful sense of humane conduct of the sheriff of this county, the integrity of purpose of the human judgment of my conduct. 14:22 [SPEAKER_03]: and the humanity of the jury. 14:24 [SPEAKER_03]: I press again before you that I am an Oculus to this abdominal and atrocious conduct, and appealing from this judgment, whose mercies are exhausted in the verdict of the jury. 14:35 [SPEAKER_03]: I prepared to go to that infinite judge that tries the reins and searches the hearts, not of myself only, but of all of the children of men. 14:44 [SPEAKER_04]: This appeal, too, is rejected, unwilling to accept this damage to his reputation, Herbert asks for a pin in paper in order to record his side of the story. 15:04 [SPEAKER_01]: He said he would read it to me the next time I came to see him. 15:07 [SPEAKER_01]: He was indignant at what he calls his enemies and would not forgive them. 15:12 [SPEAKER_01]: Among them were the jury and the witnesses. 15:14 [SPEAKER_01]: Accordingly, the next time I went to see him, he tried to amuse me with the history of his life, which was truly a novel. 15:22 [SPEAKER_04]: On the night before his execution, Hubbard was visited by the members of the local Quaker congregation, who set with him until almost midnight. 15:36 [SPEAKER_00]: But before his death, the utmost kindness was showed to him by the religious portion of our community. 15:41 [SPEAKER_00]: The ministers in town visited him frequently and talked to him and prayed with him. 15:46 [SPEAKER_00]: So also did several pious ladies. 15:49 [SPEAKER_00]: We are informed that the ladies were the first to make any impressions upon him. 15:54 [SPEAKER_00]: That by them, he was made to weep as a child. 15:57 [SPEAKER_00]: Several ladies, members of the Society of Friends, remained with him until 11 o'clock the night before. 16:04 [SPEAKER_00]: He seemed to be deeply affected and participated in their religious exercises with much earnestness. 16:11 [SPEAKER_04]: But he never confessed. 16:13 [SPEAKER_04]: The church community that stayed with Hubbard that night is still here. 16:16 [SPEAKER_04]: It's called the Wavash Friends Church, and the new building is located on the south side of town, 16:26 [SPEAKER_04]: posted an official announcement of the verdict, along with the date of execution, with the headline of Hubbard to be hung. 16:34 [SPEAKER_00]: The Supreme Court having affirmed the decision in the case of Hubbard, now in jail under sentence of death. 16:41 [SPEAKER_00]: He will therefore be executed in accordance with the sentence on tomorrow, Thursday, December 13, between the hours of 8 o'clock AM and 6 o'clock. 16:53 [SPEAKER_00]: The manner of executing the death penalty is set forth in section 134, page 379 of the section volume of the revised status which reads thus. 17:07 [SPEAKER_00]: The sentence of death shall be executed in some private enclosure as near to the jail as possible. 17:13 [SPEAKER_00]: The sheriff shall invite to be present at the execution by at least three days notice, and the prosecuting attorney, Clerk of Court, together with two physicians in 12 reputable citizens to be selected by him. 17:29 [SPEAKER_00]: He must also, at the request of the defendant, permit any minister of the gospel whom the defendant may name and any of his relatives to attend the execution, and also such peace officers as the sheriff may deem proper. 17:45 [SPEAKER_00]: No person, other than those mentioned in this section, can be present at the execution, nor can any person under age be allowed to witness the same. 17:56 [SPEAKER_04]: As with most of the educated elites of the city of Wavash, Fletcher found the whole proceeding utterly distasteful. 18:03 [SPEAKER_04]: He refrained from offering his personal view on the hanging, but was troubled by the public appetite to see Hubbard dead. 18:11 [SPEAKER_00]: It will be perceived that the execution is to be private, and this is as it should be. 18:16 [SPEAKER_00]: No person that has ever witnessed the execution of a criminal once ever wishes to witness another. 18:23 [SPEAKER_00]: It is a sight too horrible to leave any other than the most revolting impressions, which will appear a thousand times afterwards with all its disgusting reality. 18:33 [SPEAKER_00]: The law has therefore wisely provided for private executions and no person ought to entertain the least desire to be present. 18:42 [SPEAKER_00]: Twelve reputable citizens shall be invited to attend the execution. 18:47 [SPEAKER_00]: Upon the testimony of these persons, the public may be satisfied the law has been properly executed. 18:54 [SPEAKER_00]: Although the murder of the French family consisting of seven persons, five of whom were helpless children, is one of the most cruel and diabolical ever recorded, yet our citizens have in all respects maintaining the supremacy of the law. 19:10 [SPEAKER_00]: We trust this same disposition will be maintained to the end of the dreadful tragedy. 19:16 [SPEAKER_00]: Let no person come to town tomorrow to see Hubbard hung. 19:20 [SPEAKER_00]: Let no person in town make any effort to witness the dreadful sight. 19:24 [SPEAKER_00]: Let the officer of the law do his duty and the ends of justice will be accomplished. 19:31 [SPEAKER_04]: Fletcher's Appeals would be ignored. 19:33 [SPEAKER_04]: When the day came to Hanging John Hubbard in the courthouse square, almost half the county showed up.
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