and look a man in the face. I don't know as I ever knew him to ask questions; might have asked about his work. I humored him. He was a good fellow to work. [Witnes further testified in substance as upon the traverse. See trial.]

now.

THOMAS F. MUNROE, called and sworn for the people, testified as follows; I have resided in Auburn twenty-four years. I knew him when a boy; was with the constables when he was arrested for stealing the horse. Freeman denied stealing the horse himself. He was then fifteen or sixteen years old. He then had a down-cast look. He was deaf then, but not so deaf as I recollect that he was an ugly boy and threw stones at white boys. I am the police officer of the village of Auburn. The next morning after the murder I was requested to go to John Depuy's. I asked Depuy where Bill was. He said he had not been seen since he threatened to kill him. He then asked me what caper Bill had been cutting up. I told him I wanted him for a witness. I told him so that I might not alarm him, and that, if possible, I might arrest the prisoner. I never heard that he was crazy till since the murder. My opinion is I never saw any insanity in him. I think if he is insane most of the negroes in Auburn are.

CROSS EXAMINATION.-I don't know as I ever said Freeman ought to be Lynched. I have said that if they had hung him, it would have saved the county a great deal of expense. I might have said that it would have been better if he had been hung or killed. That was since the manufacture of craziness in this county.

Q. Have you not said that he ought to have been Lynched?

A. If I did it was in reference to the course taken by a certain set of men in relation to it.

Q. Have you not said that counsel ought to be tarred and feathered for defending him?

A. I might have said they deserved it for the course they have taken in his defence.

Q. Have you not made that or a similar declaration, and that, too, frequently?

A. I probably have said considerable about it, and somebody may have reported me.

Q. I desire an answer to my question if you can favor me?

A. I can't recollect what I have said. I am opposed to the course pursued, because I supposed all the testimony about his derangement was manufactured. [Witness further testified in substance, as upon the traverse. See post.]

ARETUS A. SABIN, called and sworn for the people, testified as follows: I knew the prisoner fifteen years ago. He then lived with Captain Warden. He was a wild boy and would run away. I next knew him in the prison. I was an officer there, in the cooper's shop. I saw Freeman filing in the hame shop. Never heard or said that he was crazy then. I don't know

that he was deaf in the prison. [Witness continued as upon the traverse. See post.]

ABRAHAM A. VANDERHEYDEN, sworn for the people, says: I have been acquainted with the prisoner since he was a boy. I arrested him for stealing Mrs. Godfrey's horse. He always insisted that he did not steal the horse. Two or three weeks afterwards the horse was found, and one Jack Furman was arrested. Jack said Bill stole the horse. I saw him in State Prison several times, and have seen him since he came out. I think he appears different from what he did before he went in. It is harder to converse with him; his head hangs down and you have to talk loud. I did not know that he was deaf before. He answers questions put by me. He evaded questions in relation to the murder.

I met him at Baldwinsville, and assisted in bringing him to Auburn under arrest for the murder of the Van Nest family. I asked him how he got his hand cut; asked twice before he answered. He said by stabbing. I, with others, asked him how in the world he came to commit such a deed. He said he did'nt want to say any thing about it.

When the room was cleared so that but one person besides myself was with him, I said that he might as well tell me about the matter. I asked him how he came to commit the murder. He said, "you know there is no law for me." I asked what he meant by that. He said, "they ought to pay me." I asked him how he come to kill the child. He said he didn't know it was a child. I then asked him how he left. He said he took a horse. I then asked him where he rode the horse. He said he rode to New Guinea. I asked what he did with him. He said the horse fell and he left him there. He would answer questions, but would never lead on. He made no confession, except as stated. My opinion is that he is not crazy. [Witness continued in substance as upon the traverse. See post.]

STEPHEN S. AUSTIN, Sworn for the people, testified: I know Freeman. He was a mischievous, cunning kind of a darkey, rather still and down-cast. When he was in jail, before he went to State Prison, I did not know that he was deaf. He didn't speak unless spoken to. He would turn up his eye instead of his head. I have seen him in the streets since he came out of prison. I can't see any difference except in color. I think he is of a lighter color than before he went to prison. He has grown. I have seen him several times, and it never occurred to me that he was crazy.

CROSS EXAMINATION.-I heard him answer questions in jail, when W. T. Worden, Esq., was there. He answered questions put to him; he did not ask any; he generally answered yes or no. There was this difference; before he went to prison, he asked questions; in jail, he did not. I don't think Bill is a fool. I think he knows as much as either of my dogs. I don't recollect that I ever said he was a fool. I said he was not worth the powder and shot to shoot him. I said, at the time, things that I didn't believe, to keep the mob from killing him.

WILLIAM HOLMES, sworn for the people, testified: I am a contractor in the State Prison, in the hame shop. Freeman was in our shop; he worked at filing iron. He was an ordinary workman: fine jobs were put in the hands of other men; he was in the shop nearly two years; he generally spoke monosyllables. They learn by comparison, and work by sample laid before them. He had difficulty with James E. Tyler, the keeper. I took occasion to reprimand him. Freeman said that the keeper. was going to whip him, and he had done nothing worthy of confinement. He frequently alluded to the fact that he had not committed the crime; that he did not want to work; that he was deriving no benefit from his labor. I have never spoken to him since he left the prison. He always had a down-cast countenance, and turned up his eyes when he spoke.

I would not swear whether

CROSS EXAMINATION.-I had the entire direction of the hame shop. The wages averaged about twenty-five cents a day. There is a great difference in men. I inquired why he should conduct so as to occasion himself trouble. He replied, that Tyler was going to whip him; that he didn't feel disposed to suffer punishment when he didn't deserve it. I have heard him use the words "feel disposed." He said he didn't want to stay there and work for nothing. He said he was accused of stealing a horse; but he didn't commit the crime. When he was first brought into the prison, I said it was a pity so young a boy should be brought to prison for horse-stealing. He said he didn't commit the act; they swore false against

him.

I was at Van Nest's on the day of the prisoner's arrest. I made a proposition there to leave him to the hands of justice.

Q. Was it not proposed by you to Lynch him?

A. Not by me. I proposed to leave him to the law; but there was a proposition to make a different disposition of him.

Q. Was there not great excitement there?

A. There was.

Q. Did you not participate in the excitement?

A. Why, I was there, and there was great excitement and indignation at the result of the Wyatt trial.

Q. Did the assemblage pass a resolution to hang the prisoner on the spot? A. My son said they had passed a vote to hang him, and the friend who was with me said I had better go and try to stop it.

Q. Did you lend your

aid to stop it?

A. I stepped up to a gentleman standing on the steps, who I supposed might have influence, and urged him to put a stop to it. He said if I didn't come there to assist, that I had no business on the ground. He treated me with considerable indignation.

Q. Was the person whom you addressed engaged in the effort to hang the prisoner?

A. He said he came for that purpose, and meant to see justice done before he went home.

Q. Did you do any thing further toward quieting the excitement?

A. I told him if any mischief was done to the negro he would place himself in the same predicament of the negro-amenable to the law; "but," he replied, "we have no law; we have tried it once; justice is denied us; we will take the law into our own hands." I told him I had learned just before I left Auburn, that the judge had determined to call a special court to try Wyatt and this negro.

Q. Was there an effort made at Van Nest's house to kill the prisoner? A. When Esquire Bostwick came to the door to take the prisoner out, I asked him to state the fact, to appease the multitude, that a special court would he held. The magistrate stated to the crowd that there was reason to believe that others were implicated, and perhaps white people. As the prisoner was led out, there was a cry of "kill the negro;" "take him away;" and a rush was made upon the officers who had him in charge.

Q. Did not this indicate a determination to execute the prisoner, had the crowd been able to have rescued him from the officers?

A. There were a good many respectable persons there, whom I thought were anxious to have him executed on the spot.

RE-EXAMINATION.-Q. Did the crowd assign any reasons for doing so, other than those stated?

A. The result of the Wyatt trial was the reason uniformly assigned. It was said that justice had been denied, and the community would not consent to have their wives and children butchered.

Q. Do you know that the defence in Wyatt's case was insanity?

A. I do; and the result was, that the jury could not agree. No verdict was brought in.

Q. Has he since been tried?

A. He has, and has been convicted for murder.

JAMES E. TYLER, sworn for the people, testified: I was a keeper in the hame shop, in the State Prison, and knew Freeman there. He came under my charge in November, 1841. I soon discovered that he didn't do quite as much work as he ought to. I told him he was capable of doing as much work as other men of his size and experience, and he must do a reasonable day's work, and if he did not I should punish him. I talked to him at different times, about two months after he came in. Finding that talking did not have the desired effect, I called him up to flog him. Sometimes he said he did all he could, and sometimes he said he was sent there wrongfully. He may have made other excuses.

I called him up and told him I had done talking to him; I was going to punish him. I told him to take his clothes off. I turned to get the cat, and received a blow on the back part of the head from him. It started me a

little. As I looked around, Bill struck me on the back. I kicked at him, and knocked him partly over; perhaps he fell clear down. He jumped up, went across the shop, took up a knife and came at me. I took up a piece of board lying on the desk, went down and met him. It was a basswood board, two feet long, fourteen inches wide, and half an inch thick. It was a board one of the convicts had laid on my desk, on which was a count of lumber, planed on both sides. When I came in reach of him, I struck him on the head, flatwise; split the board, and left a piece in my hand four inches wide. (See ante, page 20.) He was then approaching me with a knife. I struck him on the wrist and knocked the knife out of his hand. I struck him five or six times across the buttocks with the board. I punished him and sent him to his work. I had no further difficulty with him. I struck no other blow on the head. I think the blow could not have hurt him. My impression is that the blow was upon his forehead, but may have been partly on the left side. He worked well after that. He held his head down and was rather down-cast. I never noticed any thing remarkable about his eye. He looked then as he does now. He made but few answers, but answered pertinently and short. I saw him two months ago in jail, and asked him if he knew me. He said he couldn't hear me. He was hard of hearing, but I saw no difference after he was struck. I think he could not have been hurt by the blow. I think it struck him on the fore part of his head. I never saw any thing to induce me to think he was insane.

CROSS EXAMINATION.-Convicts do not talk much in the prison. They are required to speak only when spoken to, unless it is necessary to their work. It was the general conduct of Freeman that induced me to think he was not insane. I didn't consider him as intelligent a man as the generality of men in the prison. He was not as quick as most men. I noticed no stupidity about him.

BENJAMIN VAN KEUREN, sworn for the people, testified: I was foreman in the hame shop while Freeman was there. He filed iron for plating. He was a middling kind of a workman, not the best, nor the poorest. He went into the yard from our shop. The filing requires some judgment, and some practice. I had no conversation with him, only to give him work and to take it away. I noticed his manner and appearance. I cannot see much difference in his manner. He was partially deaf. I recollect when James E. Tyler, the keeper, punished him. He was not more deaf after that, only as deafness grows on a person. I think it grew some on him. I saw Tyler when he split the board on Freeman's head. I shouldn't think such a blow injured him. The board was only about two feet long, twelve or fourteen inches wide, and from a half to three quarters of an inch thick. I think Tyler struck him twice on the hand. I did not see him strike Tyler. I first saw Tyler making for Freeman, with his board. He was seized by convicts. Tyler told the men to let go of him; told Freeman to sit down. He sat there an hour or more, and then Tyler punished him. There is a good