The Devil's Gentleman (43 page)

81

T
he Pan-American Exposition came to an official end on Saturday, November 2. At the stroke of midnight, while ten buglers sounded taps from the Electric Tower, John Milburn threw a switch, and the sprawling fairgrounds—illuminated by 160,000 incandescent lights—went dark forever. To some observers, however, the ceremony seemed slightly redundant. The murder of the president two months earlier had already cast a deep shadow over the “Rainbow City” from which it had never fully emerged.
¹

By then, Leon Czolgosz was dead, electrocuted four days earlier at the state prison in Auburn, New York. Immediately after his execution, the top of his skull had been sawed off and his brain examined for signs of mental impairment. His corpse was then stuck inside a black-stained pine box, doused with sulfuric acid (to obliterate his identity), and buried in an unmarked grave in the prison cemetery.
²

From the moment of the assassin’s capture to the day of his death and ignominious disposal, less than two months had elapsed—a striking contrast to the situation of Roland Molineux, who, at the time of Czolgosz’s execution, had been behind bars for more than two years, awaiting a final disposition of his case.

Still, Roland and his father no longer had cause for complaint. On Tuesday, October 15, the Court of Appeals had finally handed down its decision. In his battle against ex-senator Hill, John Milburn had triumphed. Had the great world’s fair he had helped shepherd into existence not climaxed in catastrophe, he, too, would have had every reason to celebrate.

The decision in the Molineux appeal—trumpeted on the front pages of newspapers across the country—would prove to be a judicial landmark, defining the conditions under which prosecutors could introduce evidence of previous crimes at a defendant’s trial. Generally speaking, wrote Justice William E. Werner in a formulation that even today is known as the “Molineux rule,” the state “cannot prove against a defendant any crime not alleged in the indictment.” This rule was intended as a constitutional safeguard, protecting a defendant from “the assumption that [he] was guilty of the crime charged because he had committed other, similar crimes in the past.”

To be sure, there were exceptions, instances where evidence of prior offenses might be admitted. For example, the prosecution could introduce “proof of another crime” if it helped to establish motive in “the specific crime charged.” In Roland’s case, however, neither this nor any other exception applied.

The motive for attempting to kill Cornish was, according to Werner, “hatred, engendered by quarrels between them.” The motive for poisoning Barnet, on the other hand, was “jealousy caused by the latter’s intervention in the love affair of the former.” Since the two motives had “no relation to each other,” evidence pertaining to the murder of Barnet threw “no light upon the motive which actuated the attempt upon the life of Cornish” and was therefore inadmissible.
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Based on this principle, the prevailing opinion held that Recorder Goff had erred in admitting testimony related to the death of Henry Barnet. The judgment of conviction against Roland Burnham Molineux was reversed and a new trial granted.
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82

G
eneral Molineux was at his office at the Devoe and Raynolds paint factory when the news reached him. He was still beaming with joy a half hour later when a flock of newsmen arrived to hear his reaction.

“Just what I expected, but thank God the strain is over,” said the General, offering cigars all around. “I tell you, boys, this has added years to my life.”

And what about the rumors, asked one reporter, that the district attorney might decide to forego another trial and simply set Roland free?

“That wouldn’t please me at all,” said General Molineux. “This thing has gone too far. To let him off would brand him for life with suspicion. I’d rather see my son pass through the ordeal of another trial than have him set free without a complete vindication.”

But what if he were to be convicted again? someone asked.

“Impossible,” snorted the General. “Why, even on the evidence that sent him to the death cell, he should have been acquitted.”

A short time later, he was on the train to Sing Sing. He arrived too late to see Roland, who received the happy news early the next morning from Warden Johnson.

Roland was awake and standing expectantly by the barred door of his cell when Johnson entered the Death House at 6:30
A.M.
, Wednesday, October 16. “Well, Roland, I have good news for you,” he said. “The Court of Appeals has granted you a new trial.”

For a moment, Roland made no reply, “as if he did not realize the full purport of the information.” Finally, he let out a laugh and said, “It seems too good to be true.” He then thanked Johnson for bringing him the news, while the inmates in the adjoining cells called out their congratulations.
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Just before noon the following day, word reached Warden Johnson that a police officer had left New York City with a requisition for Molineux. Preparations for the transfer were immediately begun. At 3:00
P.M.
, a rickety hack pulled up at the prison gate and discharged Detective Sergeant Robert McNaught, along with General Molineux and George Gordon Battle. The three were immediately ushered into the office of Keeper Connaughton.

A few minutes later, Roland—freshly shaved and wearing a new black serge suit and a pair of tan shoes in place of his prison slippers—was brought into the room. At the sight of his father, he broke into a broad grin, then threw himself into the old man’s arms. They embraced and kissed each other’s cheeks before stepping back and shaking hands.

“You don’t know how good it feels to get hold of you,” said Roland, eyes glistening.

“Your grip is as strong as ever, my boy,” said the General, clutching his son’s hand in both his own. “There’s many a good fight left in us yet. We’ll stick it out, all right, and the next time we take a journey together, it will be back home to Brooklyn.”
²

A few minutes later, Roland, looking dapper in a black fedora and overcoat provided by the General, emerged from the gray walls of Sing Sing. Outside the gates, he climbed into the ramshackle coach with his father, lawyer, and Detective Sergeant McNaught. They had traveled only half the distance to the railway station when the rear springs gave way and the body of the coach came down with a crash between the wheels.

Roland was the first out and helped his father to crawl through the door, followed by McNaught and Battle. After ascertaining that no one was hurt, the foursome walked the rest of the way to the station, Roland cracking jokes about his bumpy return to the real world.
³

The platform was packed with villagers when the party strolled up to the station. Roland and the others pushed their way through the gawkers to the waiting room. Inside, Roland was greeted by the stationmaster and other railroad officials, who shook his hand and congratulated him on his release. A few minutes later, the train—known as the “Croton local”—drew up and the party boarded one of the smoking cars. Settling into a forward seat, his father beside him and the two other men directly behind, Roland pushed open the window and let the autumn air wash over him all the way back to New York City.

After arriving at Grand Central station, the four men piled into a cab and drove straight to the Tombs. By nightfall, Roland Molineux was back in his former second-tier cell, which had been whitewashed and furnished with a new bed in preparation for his return.
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Two nights later, veterans of the 159th New York State Volunteers—about seventy-five of the grizzled old soldiers, all told—gathered at the Molineux home in Fort Greene Place for their annual reunion. It was the thirty-seventh anniversary, to the day, of the Battle of Cedar Creek, in which Edward Molineux and his brigade had acquitted themselves so heroically. Following the meal, General Horatio C. King, recipient of the Congressional Medal of Honor, rose and delivered a speech in which he paid tribute to the “exceptional and brilliant part” General Molineux had played in that “desperate struggle”—a fight that had ended with the “complete rout” of the enemy forces.

“But we are here not to celebrate that victory alone,” King continued, while his listeners—lawyers, judges, congressmen, and other members of the social and political elite of Brooklyn—sat raptly at their tables. “The hearts of your comrades have warmed to you even more than they did in that mighty conflict because of the terrible battle for another’s life which you have so heroically made in the past two years or more. Out of the valley of the shadow of death, the boy who is dearer to you than your own life has emerged with another and fairer opportunity to establish his innocence. We, your comrades and friends, who love you and believe in the innocence of your son, are here to congratulate you most fervently, and to pray for an early and complete sweeping away of the dark clouds which have so long hung over your beloved house.”

An outburst of thunderous applause interrupted King at this point. He waited until the ovation subsided before bringing his address to a rousing close. “We renew to you the pledge of our friendship and our confidence. In sunshine and shadow, in weal or woe, we are your comrades now as we were when shot and shell made gruesome music in our ears; and the comradeship formed under such conditions can never weaken or fail.”
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Backing up their vows of support with direct and practical action, the General’s old comrades joined together in offering financial help to defray his enormous and ever-mounting legal expenses. “It is well known,” read a declaration issued by the veterans, “that by reason of unfortunate circumstances involving the good name of General Molineux and his family, great sacrifices have been made in order to maintain their reputation unsullied. To a younger man, the opportunity to recuperate financially might present itself, but at the age of nearly three score and ten, it would seem almost too late for the General to retrieve his fortune.”

The proud old warrior, however, would have none of it. Conveying his heartfelt thanks to his “boys,” he graciously declined the offer. He “was not, thank God, down to that necessity. I have said that I would spend my last dollar in the defense of my son,” he declared, “and I will. That last dollar has not yet been reached.”
⁶

The General’s willingness to sacrifice his fortune on behalf of his son only enhanced his already lofty reputation among the public. Even his former enemies in the South rallied to his side. “I faced you in battle, but I congratulate you on the prospective release of your son,” one ex–Confederate officer wrote to him. “Your brave and generous heart deserves it. I believe in the vindication of your son.” He received sympathetic letters from other onetime foes, including a major from the Fifth Georgia Regiment, who denounced Assistant DA Osborne for insulting the General’s daughter-in-law and offered to horsewhip the scoundrel should he ever show his face down South.
⁷

The General, of course, had always been an object of admiration, even reverence. The outpouring of sympathy for his cause in the wake of Roland’s release from Sing Sing, however, was something new. Even the yellow papers, which had tried and convicted Roland in their pages, had lost their taste for attacking the gallant old General’s son.

As one observer would put it, “the hostile tide against Roland had begun to ebb.”
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83

D
espite public statements from both Roland and his father that they would settle for nothing less than the complete vindication of an acquittal, the Molineux defense team quickly mounted an effort to quash the murder indictment and have their client set free without a second trial.
¹
To argue their case, Weeks and Battle called in Frank S. Black, who had served a term as governor of New York before resuming private practice in Manhattan. Opposing him was another former New York governor, David B. Hill, who had unsuccessfully represented the state before the Court of Appeals.

This time, Hill emerged victorious. On December 6, 1901, Judge Joseph Newburger rendered a decision denying the motion to dismiss the indictment. Roland Molineux would have to be tried again, quite as if the first trial—one of the longest and most costly criminal proceedings in the history of the state—had never taken place.
²

Roland would spend another year in the Tombs waiting for his trial to begin. Still, he had little to complain about. Despite a smallpox scare in March 1902 that necessitated the immediate vaccination of all 392 inmates,
³
life in the city prison was a holiday after the hell of the Sing Sing Death House. Roland could exercise in the open air, enjoy catered meals, read newspapers to his heart’s content, and see friends and relatives on a daily basis. His parents and brothers took full advantage of the liberal visitation policy.

The story was different with Blanche.

The previous fall, within days of Roland’s return to the Tombs, she had gone to see him in the company of the General. The meeting took place in the warden’s office. Roland, brought down from his cell on Murderer’s Row, immediately threw his arms about his wife and kissed her. To observers, Blanche seemed “nervous at first,” though she managed a smile and was soon chatting warmly enough with her husband. They remained in each other’s company for an hour.

Afterward, in an interview with reporters, she reiterated her belief in Roland’s innocence and angrily denied rumors that she had “grown tired of” her marriage and planned to abandon him.

“It is all false!” she cried. “I would gladly give my life in an instant to see Roland happy.”
⁴

In the following months, however, her visits became less and less frequent until, by the spring of 1902, they had ceased altogether. A few weeks later, she moved out of the Molineux brownstone.

By then, relations between Blanche and her in-laws had grown unbearably tense. With Roland’s prospects looking brighter than at any time since his arrest, the General finally agreed to give her a bit of freedom. At first, she was allowed to make afternoon jaunts into Manhattan, where after years of social starvation she hungrily took in shows and concerts and luncheons with friends.

The taste of these pleasures only strengthened her determination to escape the stifling household once and for all. In August 1902, she moved into an airy corner suite at a residential hotel in the Murray Hill section of Manhattan. Her rent was paid by the General, who also provided her with a generous monthly allowance.

In return, Blanche agreed to only one stipulation: during Roland’s second trial, she would be at his side in the courtroom.

The General wasn’t taking any chances. To be sure, he had every reason to feel optimistic. Even James Osborne acknowledged that public sentiment had changed and that many people, formerly against young Molineux, now “believed he has been punished sufficiently.”
⁵

Still, Roland wasn’t free yet. Appearances must be maintained. The scandalous rumors about Blanche, suggesting that she had lost faith in her husband, would be put to rest. The jury would see for itself just how much she loved and believed in her husband.
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