The execution of Monroe Roberson - day by day suggest

a hard rain fell the day the sheriff led convicted assassin Monroe Roberson to the scaffold in Greenville. The scaffold had served twice in Dayton for the hangings of killers named Adams and Murphy.

Crowds got here by means of carriage, wagon and teach. handiest a number of witnesses were accepted to see the physique fall and neck snap. Many would-be gawkers have been disappointed, but Sheriff Jerry Runkle wanted no a part of a circus. This become a sad obligation for him and nothing extra. He desired Roberson to be treated humanely.

The date was Aug. 20, 1880.

native newspaper coverage changed into wide, and bits and pieces discovered their way to papers in St. Louis and Miami.

As this changed into to be the first putting Darke County ever witnessed, some within the crowd acted as if they had been at a county fair. Most, besides the fact that children, behaved themselves.

keepsake hawkers peddled cuts of rope similar to the one connected to the scaffold.

The brother-in-legislations of the sheriff turned into given the lock and key to Roberson's mobile as his reward for standing look after the nighttime earlier than the execution, lest some locals attempt a lynching.

within the morning, a young lady named Emma Allen sang the condemned man "no person's Darling" and different songs, in line with the Cincinnati every day Enquirer. Roberson polished off a breakfast of ham and eggs.

Many in the crowd felt as in the event that they knew the accused individually. Roberson had written or dictated the story of his existence to the Greenville Democrat.

Rumors swirled that he had killed others in Missouri and Kansas, however he denied all.

He became about forty five when the noose tightened and he dropped, based on the 1880 U.S. Census. His occupation became listed as prisoner. A surviving photo indicates a pointy-dressed man with a trim moustache and a pomaded hairstyle parted in the middle.

defense attorneys notion choose D. L. Meeker had erred passing sentence. They desired the case thrown out as justifiable homicide, however Ohio Gov. Charley Foster refused to toss the conviction.

The protection team reminded the courtroom that Roberson, even though born in Tennessee, had fought for the Union. He noticed commonplace Nathaniel Lyon fall in action during a accomplice rout of Union forces. A jury become unmoved.

What came about, Roberson and the legal professionals argued, turned into that Roberson and his spouse's younger brother obtained right into a drunken row the outdated October. Coulter pursued Roberson for a half mile walking and threatened to kill him.

The incident passed off in Niptown, later renamed Painter Creek, east of Greenville.

Roberson turned, aimed, and shot Coulter three times. He died instant.

both had an acrimonious relationship. Roberson raised the Coulter boy in his family.

Coulter served as a farmhand to Roberson. the two guys generally prowled the saloons of Darke County together. Whiskey grew to become every mean and nasty. after they back domestic inebriated, perpetually they caught hell from a livid Mrs. Roberson.

Mary J. Roberson not ever forgave her husband.

Roberson advised the Democrat that his marriage had soured back when he ran a farm in Kansas. "My wife acquired out of repair with me," he instructed the paper. "i can't inform what, I certainly not did understand, and i are expecting on no account will know. She would certainly not tell me."

Roberson noted his spouse become a afflicted woman. back in Kansas his eldest daughter and he had prevented the spouse from killing herself with a straight razor. "i used to be thunder-struck to suppose she would are attempting to kill herself the style she tried to, and from that point until the current time she has now not been as she changed into prior," he wrote in his memoir.

She allowed her children to seek advice from their father in detention center but twice after which stopped all verbal exchange. The family left town devoid of witnessing the spectacle of Roberson on the scaffold. She remarried and years later came returned to Darke County for a discuss with.

The day of execution had to be moved back one month. Roberson somehow had got a knife blade and sliced his arm and neck, however the suicide try failed. Sheriff Jerry Runkle and his guards performed emergency assist.

It was a penitent Roberson who finished his story for the Democrat. "My final and death blessing is on my poor family," he wrote. "Am sorry I haven't been a much better man, and saved cash for them, as an alternative of crazing myself with whiskey with the funds my babies ought to have."

Runkle changed into a reluctant executioner.

"Hoping that we may additionally in no way should function a like service," he wrote Democrat Editor Charles Roland.

Runkle acquired his hope. No different hangings have took place considering in Darke County.

Hank Nuwer is newly moved to Union metropolis, Indiana — about one block from Darke County. He retired July 1, 2020 from the Franklin school Pulliam college of Journalism after 18 years. he's the writer of the ancient novel Sons of the first light: A Basque Odyssey, which makes use of his experiences as a young reporter trailing a huge band of sheep with Basque herders from Spain. A longtime journal freelance writer, he shares his reflections on the individuals and areas he finds in Darke County. His spouse, Gosia, a native of Warsaw, Poland, is a contract photographer and longtime accountant.