Jefferson County KS Archives News.....Fw: Horrible Affair.(DATE CORRECTED) February 2, 1878
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Jim Laird jlaird@bellsouth.net March 12, 2010, 12:59 pm

The Oskaloosa Independent, Jefferson County, Saturday, February 2, 1878 February 2, 1878
Horrible Affair.
Lane COOPER, recently from the black Hills, was engaged to be married to Alice
Grover, a young girl of fifteen, residing not far from Kirwin, Kansas. A
disagreement arose between the two. On the 10th of January they went to a
neighbor's and quarrelled there. They were told to stop quarreling or leave.
A correspondent says:
They started out together to return to Alice's home. Next morning Cooper found
on the Baine dead, with a fearful gash or stab in the neck. A jury was called,
and the girl under oath stated that she had killed him with a butcher knife. She
says that Cooper, after abusing her terribly, knocked her senseless and outraged
her person; upon her recovery he wanted to swear her to silence. She refused.
Again he struck her and demanded pledges of silence. She steadfastly refused to
give such pledges. He took her by the throat swearing he would kill here. She
drew a butcher knife that she had taken with her from home because she was
afraid of him, and made one desperate blow. The knife entered just above the
breast bone ranging downward toward the heart. He took but a step and fell
forward on his face. She stooped, felt of his pulse, turned him over and opened
his shirt, laid her hand over the heart. It was still, the man was dead. She
folded his arm across his breast and adjusted his!
 limbs, took a last look and then feld from the horrid scene. She never stopped
until she found her father from home. She traveled this distance on foot
carrying a three year old brother that had been left in her charge. She told her
story to her parents and came back with them and went before the jury and made
her statement, the substance of which I have given you above. Do you ask if she
is under arrest? Certainly not. The condition of her face corroborated her
statement as to his striking her several times. Public sentiment says, "served
him right." That scene on the prairie at night--that struggle for life between a
young girl and a burly ruffian, the positive certainity of her own immediate
death if she failed in the first desperate blow with the knife, this scene is
ineldibly stamped upon her mind. It was more than human energy that nerved her
are while with one lightning stroke she plunged the knife to the hilt in his
bosom. Her life depended upon her making thorough!
 work of the fist blow, for if it had not been fatal she would not lik
ely have ever made another. In that case she would have been the victum.
I remain yours truly, H.


Additional Comments:

KS-FOOTSTEPS, rms

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