Killer Colt (29 page)

W
ith each passing day, the crowds clamoring for entrance to the Colt trial seemed to grow bigger and rowdier. Arriving at City Hall at 8:00 a.m. on Thursday, January 27, James Gordon Bennett marveled at the droves that had already gathered, and found it “impossible to compliment Deputy Sheriff Westervelt too highly for the excellent arrangements which he has made to preserve order.” When the doors opened two hours later, the “courtroom immediately became crowded to excess.”
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The morning session offered one “very singular scene”—nothing to compare to the thrillingly gruesome display of Samuel Adams’s decomposed head but macabre enough to create a “considerable sensation” among the audience.
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Shortly before noon—following the examination of several more witnesses called to describe Adams’s peevish and short-tempered disposition—Dudley Selden produced a batch of badly stained and soiled items, including various articles of men’s clothing. They been retrieved from the outhouse behind the Granite Building, where—said Selden—they had been dumped by John Colt on the night of the murder.

John P. Brinckerhoff, superintendent of a company in the business of cleaning out privies and converting the contents (“night soil,” as it was euphemistically called) into a dried manure called “poudrette,” was summoned to the stand to describe the recovery of the evidence. In the first week of October, acting on information provided by John Colt, one of Brinckerhoff’s men, armed “with a light and a rake,” had been lowered into the privy by rope. His search through the two-foot layer of stinking muck
had turned up nothing. At Selden’s insistence, however, another attempt was made on Tuesday, January 23. This time, instead of raking through the sewage by lamplight, Brinckerhoff’s men had brought it out in tubs and examined it aboveground.

“Go on and state what you discovered there,” said Selden.

Besides “some cloth and some pieces of towel,” answered Brinckerhoff, they “found a bundle.” This consisted of a large linen handkerchief with “diagonal corners” that were “tied in a hard knot.” When the knot was undone and the bundle opened, it was found to contain a hat “cut lengthwise in two pieces”; a “folded-up vest,” the color of which was difficult to determine, though “it might have been yellow”; a torn pair of gambroon pantaloons, also “neatly folded up”; a pair of suspenders that had been “taken off the pantaloons and wrapped up with them”; part of a badly torn shirt, “completely saturated with blood”; and a pair of shoes. A subsequent search through the thick mass of excrement had uncovered several other items, including “two keys, a silver pencil case, and half dollar piece.”

“Is it your belief that the bundle was down there when you first examined that place?” asked Selden.

“From the state the bundle was in and the garments being rotted,” replied Brinckerhoff, “I have no doubt that they have laid there for some months. I think the pencil case had also been there some time. Parts of it were very rusty. They must have been overlooked on the first examination.”

Shown the pencil case and keys—which, like the other items brought into court, had been thoroughly scrubbed—several of Adams’s associates identified them as articles “that he carried in his pocket.” Selden then took the unusual step of calling his own cocounsel Robert Emmett, who testified that “a day or two after his arrest, Mr. Colt told me that he had thrown the bundle into the privy; that in pulling off the pantaloons of Mr. Adams, the keys, the pencil case, and half a dollar fell out; that he, Colt, afterwards put those things into his own hat, went downstairs, and threw them down into the privy.”
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That John had disposed of evidence in the Chambers Street outhouse was the first new detail of the crime to emerge since his arrest four months earlier. But it was only a prelude to the revelations yet to come. Shortly after Emmett’s testimony, both the district attorney and the defense announced that “they were through.” Intent on wrapping up the trial before
the weekend, Judge Kent directed that summations begin immediately after the afternoon recess. When the court reopened at 4:00, Emmett rose at once and delivered what would prove to be the trial’s climactic surprise.

The case now before the twelve jurors, he declared, had no “parallel in the history of jurisprudence.” Certainly, “there has never been a case in which public excitement has been so strongly directed against a prisoner.” Unfortunately, the prosecution had made every effort to exploit those violent passions by casting the crime in the ugliest possible light. Why else, demanded Emmett, did the district attorney summon witnesses to testify “that the body of Mr. Adams had been salted down in the box?” Whiting knew very well that the defendant’s “effort to conceal the body” made his offense seem particularly heinous. Surely the testimony concerning the salt “was only calculated to render Colt’s actions still more disgusting.” “The public officers,” said Emmett in indignant tones, “have done their worst against Mr. Colt, and this was driving the last nail in his reputation.”

To be sure, continued Emmett, the defense was in no way suggesting that the prisoner was an innocent man. “We do not contend anything other than that the death of Mr. Adams was caused by Mr. Colt.” Nevertheless, he insisted, Colt’s actions, “no matter how appalling in appearance,” did not constitute a case of “deliberate murder” but rather of manslaughter. The “particulars of the crime,” once fully known, “render that conclusion irresistible.” Emmett now intended to present those particulars for the first time.

Reaching to the defense table, he took hold of a sheaf of papers, held it aloft, and revealed that it was the prisoner’s handwritten confession.

“We have admitted that Colt took the life of Mr. Adams, and we now propose to tell you as far as possible how it was done,” said Emmett, sending a ripple of excitement through the audience. “As none but the God above us saw the transaction, we have the right to show the manner in which the act was done. I shall speak in the first person, giving the facts as Mr. Colt would, were he to stand up and state them to you.”
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Then, in the anticipatory hush of the courtroom, Emmett began to read the statement. His recitation would go on for several hours, and in that time, the world would learn virtually all that it would ever know about the murder of Samuel Adams by John C. Colt.

S
amuel Adams called on my office, as near as I can recollect, between the hours of three and four o’clock. Whether he had any special object in view in coming at that time or not, I cannot say. When he entered my office, I was sitting at my table, as usual, and was at that time engaged in looking over a manuscript account book, as I had been engaged in this work for one or two days previous; that is, I was reading over the entries and reconsidering the arithmetical calculations belonging to the entries, etc.

“Mr. Adams seated himself in a chair near the table, and within an arm’s length of myself, so near that if we both leaned our heads forward towards each other, I have no doubt that they would have touched. I spoke of my account, which he had at my request handed to me ten or twelve days before. I stated to him that his account was wrong, and read to him at the same time the account as I had made it out on another piece of paper, and requested him to alter his account as I had it. He objected to it at first, saying I did not understand printing. He, however, altered his figures as I read them from my account.

“After he had altered his figures, and on looking it over, he said that he was right at first, and made the remark that I meant to cheat him. Word followed word till it came to blows. The words ‘you lie’ were passed, and several slight blows, until I received a blow across my mouth, which caused my nose slightly to bleed. I believe I then struck him violently with my fist. We grappled with each other at the time, and I found myself shoved to the wall, with my side and hip to the table.

“At this time he had his hand in my neck handkerchief, twisting it so that I could scarcely breathe, and at the same time pressing me hard upon the wall and table. There was a hammer upon the table which I then immediately seized hold of, and instantly struck him over the head. At this time, I think, his hat was nearly in my face, and his face, I should think, was downwards. I do not think he saw me seize the hammer. The seizing of the hammer and the blow was instantaneous. I think this blow knocked his hat off, but will not be positive. At the time I only remember his twisting my neck handkerchief so tight that it seemed to me as though I lost all power of reason. Still I thought I was striking away with the hammer. Whether he attempted to get the hammer from me or not I cannot say. I do not think he did.

“The first sense of thought was, it seemed, that his hand or something brushed from my neck downwards. I cannot say that I had any sense or reflection till I heard a knock at the door. Yet there is a faint idea still remains that I shoved him off from me, so that he fell over; but of this I cannot say. When I heard the knock at the door, I was instantly startled, and am fully conscious of going and turning the key so as to lock it. I then sat down, for I felt very weak and sick.

“After sitting a few minutes and seeing so much blood, I think I went and looked at poor Adams, who breathed quite loud for several minutes, threw his arms out and was silent. I recollect at this time taking him by the hand, which seemed lifeless, and a horrid thrill came over me that I had killed him.

“About this time some noise startled me. I felt agitated or frightened, and I think I went to the door to see if I had fastened it, and took the key out and turned down the slide. I think I stood for a minute or two, listening to hear if the affray had caused any alarm. I believe I then took a seat near the window. It was a cold, damp day, and the window had been closed all day, except six or eight inches at the top, which I let down when I first went to the office and which remained down all the time I occupied it. I remained in the same seat, I should think, for at least half an hour without moving, unless it was to draw the curtains of the window close while they were within reach. My custom was to leave the curtains about one-third drawn from the side of the window towards Broadway.

“The blood, at the time, was spreading over the floor. There was a great
quantity, and I felt alarmed lest it should leak through into the apothecary’s store. I tried to stop it by tying my handkerchief round his neck tight. This appeared to do no good. I then looked about the room for a piece of twine, and found in a box which stood in the room, after partially pulling out some awning that was in it, a piece of cord which I tied tightly round his neck after taking the handkerchief off and his stock, too, I think. It was then I discovered so much blood, and the fear of it leaking through the floor caused me to take a towel and gather with it all I could and rinse it into the pail I had in the room. The pail was, I should think, at that time about one-third full of water, and the blood filled it at least another third full. Previous to doing this, I moved the body towards the box, and pulled out part of the awning to rest it on and covered it with the remainder. I never saw his face afterwards.

“After soaking up all the blood I could, which I did as still and hastily as possible, I took my seat again near the window and began to think what was best to do. About this time someone knocked at the door, to which, of course, I paid no attention. My horrid situation remained from this time till dark, a silent space of time of still more horrid reflection. At dusk of the evening, and at the same time some omnibuses were passing, I carefully opened the door and went out as still as possible and, I thought, unheard. I crossed into the park and went down from thence to the City Hotel, my purpose being to relate the circumstance to a brother who was stopping at that house. I saw him in the front reading-room, engaged in conversation with two gentlemen. I spoke to him, a few words passed between us, and seeing that he was engaged, I altered my purpose and returned as far as the park.

“I walked up and down the park, thinking of what was best to do. Many things I thought of—among others, was going to some magistrate and relating the facts to him. The horrors of the excitement, a trial, public censure, and false and foul reports that would be raised by the many who would stand ready to make the best appear worse than the worst for the sake of a paltry pittance gained to them in the publication of perverted truths and original, false, foul, calumniating lies. All this, added to my then feelings, was more than could be borne. Besides, at the time, in addition to the blows given, there would be the mark or evidence of a rope drawn tightly round the neck, which looked too deliberate for anything like death caused in an affray.
Firing the building seemed at first a happy thought, and all would be enveloped in flame and wafted into air and ashes. Then the danger of causing the death of others (as there were quite a number who slept in the building), the destruction of property, etc., caused me at once to abandon the idea. I next thought of having a suitable box made and having it leaded inside so that the blood would not run out, and moving it off somewhere and burying it. Then the delay of all this, and the great liability of being detected.