Wilhelm Beck and Karl J. Riehl to Beriah Magoffin

KYR-0001-020-0413.xml

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Accession Number

KYR-0001-020-0413

Document Genre

Petition

Repository

Kentucky Department for Libraries and Archives

Collection

Office of the Governor, Beriah Magoffin: Governor's Official Correspondence File, Petitions for Pardons and Remissions, 1859-1862

Item Location

MG18-143 to MG18-144

Place of Creation

Louisville, Jefferson County, Kentucky

Date of Creation

24 October 1860

Dates Mentioned

1860-10-04

1860-10-24

Wilhelm Beck and Karl J. Riehl to Beriah Magoffin, 24 October 1860, Office of the Governor, Beriah Magoffin: Governor's Official Correspondence File, Petitions for Pardons and Remissions, 1859-1862, MG18-143 to MG18-144, Kentucky Department for Libraries and Archives, Frankfort, KY. Accessed via the Civil War Governors of Kentucky Digital Documentary Edition, discovery.civilwargovernors.org/document/KYR-0001-020-0413, (accessed December 22, 2024).

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To His Excellency Beriah Magoffin,
Governor of the State of Kentucky.

Your petitioners William Beck, and Charles Reel, state heretofore they were indicted in the Louisville City Court. and charged in said Indictment with unlawfully and wilfully defacing and injuring the house, and premises of one William Brookman, and that upon a trial of said Indictment on October 4^th 1860, your petitioners, with one Casper Winterstine were found guilty, and fined the sum of $200⁰⁰ each.

The wife of Brookman, upon said trial swore that she recognised your petitioners while they were stoning the house through a spit in the shutters of a front window. That this opening in the shutter was caused by stones thrown by your petitioners, that she opened the front. door of her house, and was violently struck by a stone thrown at her by your petitioner William Beck, that W^m Beck also fired five or six shots from a revolver, and that this stoning occurred at 2 o'clock at night.

Upon this trial it was shown by one of the witnesses for the Comth. that no pistol shots were fired at this time, and by three witnesses for defendants. (Ger~~man~~mans by birth and speaking through an interpreter) that the shutters were not injured, were not spit, that there was no opening whatever in said shutters, and yet the jury prejudiced by the false tears of Mistress Brookman, and her false swearing as to the striking of herself were induced to render the verdict they did, notwithstanding your petitioners contradicted her statements by the other witnesses for the Comth. and by these German witnesses.

Your petitioners are Germans, and ignorant hardworking citizens, with families to support, and there being in this case no hearing before an Ex^am^ining Court, were unable to meet the statements of Mistress Brookman, and rilying on their own conscientiousness of inocence were totally unable to anticipate the false swearing of said Mistress Brooman.

WUpon a motion for a new trial, which was overruled by the Honorable Judge of the City Court, they showed by the affadavit of one Mrs Meier, A Copy of which is made a part of this petition, that no injury was done to the house and premises of W^m Brookman on the night your petitioners were charged with stoning it, that the injury Mrs Brookman received, was from the kicking of a gun fired by herself, that no stones were thrown into or against said house, that Mrs Brookman on the Morning following ascribed her injury to a stone thrown by one of your petitioners and not to the gun, as at first, and that when she was thus injured no person whatever was in throwing distance of said house, and that the affiant Mrs Meier was in said house with Mrs Brookman. This proof was not known ^to your petitioners untill after the trial.^ Your petitioners also showed by the affadavits of Frederick Deitz & Lewis Reibold that they were elsewhere at 2, o'clock of said night, when the witness swore they were engaged in stoning her husband's
house. Copies of said affadavits are made a part of this petition.

WUpon the motion for a new trial being overrruled, your petitioners being unable to carry their case to the aAppellate Court resolved to ask at the hands of your honor a remission of their fine.

And being innocent of the offense charged against them, and it being proven upon them by one witness alone, who was successfull contradicted upon trial of the cause, and whose statements are shown to be have been false by the affadavits of filed upon the motion for a new trial They ask your honor's clemency, in behalf of the justness of their appeal, and that you may shield them from the relentless malice, and vengeance of one who has by false swearing placed them in the clutches of the law, and this they will ever pray.

Wilhelm Beck
[Karl J Rïehl]

Subscribed and sworn to before me by William Beck and Charles Reel this 24^th day of Oct. 1860.

W^m Mix Jr. N. P. J. C.

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