129 Sheet – American State Trials 1918 Volume X Leo Frank Document

Search for:

Reading Time: 3 minutes [396 words]

Here is the translated text as follows:

EDWARD D. WORRELL

Edward D. Worrell, with his remarkable beard, his remarkable military pants, his military cap, and the not-so-remarkable saddlebags of Gordon, keeps his company without change until he reaches Pittsburgh. There, McGee induces him to have his mustache taken off, and the change wrought is so great that he is not recognized by a gentleman who had traveled on the cars with him from Vincennes. "You have the advantage of me," said the gentleman, "I do not know you." "I am Worrell, do you not know me? This is the difference"—pointing to the absent mustache. Here was a suggestion which no sane fellow could disregard, but he is solicitous to disclose even an accidental and unintentional disguise.

At Baltimore, he gets into a conversation with a stranger on the affairs of Kansas. The circuit attorney, in allusion to this strange interview, exclaims, "If all the men who get excited about Kansas are insane, the hospitals of the country won't hold them!" The prosecutor dodges the point, gentlemen; the point of the incident is that there was no dispute, no disagreement; but on the contrary, a perfect coincidence of opinion on the subject between Worrell and the stranger, and yet Worrell became so excited as to require the interference of another. There is no solution to that excitement but the senseless irritability of mental disorder. The effort to evade the fact proves its power even on the mind of Mr. Gale. Little as he affects to know of insanity, he feels the force of this parenthetical fact.

At Baltimore, he purchases clothes and a trunk. Now the saddlebags may be no longer needed to carry their contents; the military pants may be thrust aside; the military cap need be no longer worn, and the boot with its identifying patch may be left off! He is at last near home and kindred. One day may bring him to Dover, where he will meet those two (pointing to his father and mother), who now sit by his side and watch the currents of this trial. Their presence will inspire the absent, missing instinct of self-preservation! Surely, he will rid himself now of all trace of crime, and as far as may be, of every mark of identity. There is a Dover, Maryland, and a Dover in Delaware! "I am going to Dover," he says.