Evening Star
- State and Hall Defense Battle on Fingerprints
- School Is Blown Down; Many Reported Buried
- Youth’s ‘Amen’ Too Loud in Church, He Is Jailed and Fined
The Evening Star of November 9, 1926, reported from the Hall-Mills murder trial in Somerville, New Jersey, where the morning session turned almost entirely on the Rev. Edward W. Hall's calling card, found near his body. Under cross-examination, two State fingerprint experts held to their testimony that a print on the card belonged to the defendant Willie Stevens. A late bulletin reported that a windstorm had blown down the public schoolhouse at La Plata, Maryland, and that many children were believed buried in the ruins. Early word on casualties conflicted: a telephone operator had heard of injuries but no deaths, while the town hotel spoke of as many as 20 children killed. A lighter Associated Press item told of a young man fined $20 for shouting "Amen" too loudly during a sermon; the court remarked that a proper amen depends on fervency, not volume.
Translation
STATE AND HALL DEFENSE BATTLE ON FINGERPRINTS
By the Associated Press.
With only two witnesses testifying, a calling card of the Rev. Edward W. Hall, found near his body, was the basis for practically the entire discussion of the morning session of the Hall-Mills case today. Two of the State's expert fingerprint witnesses, Joseph A. Faurot of New York and Edward Schwartz of Newark, repeated under cross-examination their testimony given on direct examination that a fingerprint on the card is that of Willie Stevens, a defendant in the case with his sister, Mrs. Frances Stevens Hall, and brother, Henry Stevens.
SCHOOL IS BLOWN DOWN; MANY REPORTED BURIED
The public schoolhouse at La Plata [?], was blown down by a windstorm this afternoon. Many children are reported to have been buried in the ruins.
Efforts to obtain confirmation of the extent of the disaster were unavailing. The telephone operator declared that "many children" were injured, but that she understood none was killed. From the hotel at La Plata, Md., it was stated that as many as 20 children were killed and that they were "bringing the injured in here now."
Youth’s ‘Amen’ Too Loud in Church, He Is Jailed and Fined
By the Associated Press.
For saying "Amen" too loudly in church Arthur Isaacson of Deer Creek was arrested and fined $20 in Municipal Court here. Isaacson attended Union Church in Oak Valley with several other youths. During the sermon they became enthusiastic, interrupting the parson with loud and frequent "Amens." Isaacson pleaded guilty to disturbing the peace. It was pointed out in court that fervency, not volume, constituted a proper "amen."
Context
Why a 1922 double murder came to trial in 1926
The calling card argued over in Somerville came from a crime four years old. Edward Wheeler Hall, an Episcopal priest in New Brunswick, and Eleanor Mills, a member of his choir with whom he was having an affair, were murdered on September 14, 1922. The first inquiry produced nothing: a grand jury spent five days hearing 67 witnesses, including the woman the press called "the Pig Woman," and took no action. The case revived three and a half years later, when a piano tuner, Arthur S. Riehl, petitioned to annul his ten-month marriage. Continued speculation in the New York Daily Mirror, fed by comments from a man connected with one of Mrs. Hall's housekeepers, kept the story alive. The Mirror was a new Hearst paper eager to win a circulation war with the established Daily News, and it led the press in demanding that the case be reopened. Governor A. Harry Moore then ordered a second investigation and a trial in 1926. That is why Mrs. Hall and her brothers Willie and Henry Stevens were sitting as defendants when this report was filed.
How the calling-card fingerprint held up
The Evening Star caught the prosecution's fingerprint case at its firmest moment, with two State experts, Joseph A. Faurot of New York and, by the paper's account, Edward Schwartz of Newark, holding to their identification under cross-examination. In the prosecution's scenario Willie Stevens supplied the weapon, and his fingerprint was on the calling card left at the scene; Faurot is remembered as the trial's testifying fingerprint expert. The card itself was weak evidence. In 1922 curiosity-seekers trampled the scene, took souvenirs and passed Hall's calling card around the crowd. By the time of the trial it had developed "flyspecks" and had spent three years in the possession of the Daily Mirror's editor. The defense answered with three fingerprint experts of its own, who could find no resemblance between the smudge on the card and Willie Stevens's prints. The detective who received the card in 1922 also testified that he had put his initials on it, yet the card in evidence showed none. Against the steadiness of the State's experts reported here, the defense therefore attacked both the reading of the print and the card's custody.
The verdict of December 3, 1926
The fingerprint testimony did not carry the jury. After hearing 87 witnesses for the State and 70 for the defense, the jurors deliberated for five hours, and all three defendants were acquitted on December 3, 1926, less than a month after the session described in this report. All charges against Henry Carpender, a cousin who had also been accused, were then dropped. Members of the family went on to sue for libel, including against William Randolph Hearst and the Evening Journal, and all the suits were settled out of court for undisclosed sums. A later reference account of the trial states that the crime has never been solved, so the question behind the State's fingerprint evidence, who had handled the card at the scene, was never settled in court.
What the La Plata storm actually cost
The Evening Star's bulletin went to press amid contradictory reports, and the final toll lay between its two informants. The windstorm was a tornado, later classed as F4, that killed 17 people on November 9, 1926. The Associated Press reported the next day that it had concentrated its fury on the schoolhouse, where 61 pupils, teachers and attendants were gathered, and counted 15 killed and two score injured, mostly schoolchildren, with four more severely hurt at Cedarville, 14 miles northeast. The Cumberland Evening Times added that more than twenty other pupils were injured and that a Black couple living nearby had also died. The historical marker at the site records thirteen pupils and four townspeople killed and about thirty-five injured; another modern summary counts fourteen of the 17 dead from the school. Either way, the telephone operator's understanding that no one had died proved wrong, and the hotel's report of as many as 20 children killed overstated the pupil deaths.
Original
STATE AND HALL DEFENSE BATTLE ON FINGERPRINTS
With only two witnesses testifying, a calling card of the Rev. Edward W. Hall, found near his body, was the basis for practically the entire discussion of the morning session of the Hall-Mills case today. Two of the State's expert fingerprint witnesses, Joseph A. Faurot of New York and Edward Schwartz of Newark, repeated under cross-examination their testimony given on direct examination that a fingerprint on the card is that of Willie Stevens, a defendant in the case with his sister, Mrs. Frances Stevens Hall, and brother, Henry Stevens.
SCHOOL IS BLOWN DOWN; MANY REPORTED BURIED
The public schoolhouse at La Plata [?]., was blown down by a windstorm this afternoon. Many children are reported to have been buried in the ruins. • Efforts to obtain confirmation of the extent of the disaster were unavailing. The telephone operator declared that " many children " were injured, but that she understood none was killed. From the hotel at La Plata, Md., it was stated that as many as 20 children were killed and that they were " bringing the injured in here now. "
Youth’s ‘Amen’ Too Loud in Church, He Is Jailed and Fined
For saying " Amen " too loudly in church Arthur Isaacson of Deer Creek was arrested and fined $ 20 in Municipal Court here. Isaacson attended Union Church in Oak Valley with several other youths. During the sermon they became enthusiastic, interrupting the parson with loud and frequent " Amens. " Isaacson pleaded guilty to disturbing the peace. It was poihted out in court that fervency, not volume, constituted a proper " amen. "
Source: Holding institution