He Thought Himself Agent of Providence in Killing White

 MENTAL DISEASE HEREDITARY

 Aggravated by Acts of Man, He Killed—Wife and Mother to Testify—People’s Case Short.

 
The case for the prosecution and the opening speech for the defense were completed yesterday in the first day of the actual trial of Harry K. Thaw for the murder of Stanford White in Madison Square Roof Garden on the night of June 25 last.

The People rested after only two hours spent in proving the bare facts of the crime.  Then the defense announced that it would plead that the prisoner, born of a tainted stock and exposed to great stress, was insane when he killed Stanford White and actually regarded himself as the agent of Providence when he fired the fatal shots.  In support of this theory, it will put on the stand his wife, Evelyn Nesbit Thaw, and his mother, Mrs. William Thaw.  It was stated positively that there would be no appeal by the defense to “unwritten law.”

With the exception of the Countess of Yarmouth, all of Thaw’s relatives were in court at the opening, but later his wife and mother were excluded with other witnesses.  They appeared to have benefitted by the two days’ relief from the hearings, but had evidently nerved themselves for a still greater strain upon their feelings.  Since the first day or two the women, with the exception of Mrs. Evelyn Nesbit Thaw, had thrown back their veils as soon as the proceedings began, but yesterday they kept their features hidden from curious observers.

Thaw seemed worried.  He had lost his animation, and kept his eyes fixed on the table throughout nearly all the proceedings.

Plain Description of the Killing.

In opening the case for the prosecution Assistant District Attorney Garvan reduced the crime to its simplest elements and practically ignored everything but that one man had killed another.  He said nothing of Stanford White’s eminence; he left out of account any possible justification.

He did show White in his family relations.  He told how the Sunday before he was killed he had visited his home in the country.  He sketched his meeting with his son, home from college for the holidays.  It was the man, not the architect; the father, not the man about town, whom he showed the jury lying dead at the hands of the defendant.

In the same way the first witness for the People, Lawrence Grant White, could only speak of the murdered man as his father.  He knew nothing of the crime.  He gave his evidence without emotion or straining after effect.

All the other witnesses for the prosecution were concerned with proving the simple facts of the crime.  Not a word was said about motive or cause.  A  man had been killed by a man, and that was all the people had to prove.

Cross-Examination Brief.

The facts were not seriously disputed by the defense.  Delphin M. Delmas, who cross-examined, seemed to care little about shaking the testimony of these witnesses.  He pointed out a few conflicting statements, one as to whether there were two shots or three, and another as to whether Thaw held the pistol over his head after the shooting by the barrel or the butt.

He was very much interested to know in what position White’s left hand was at the time of the shooting and in finding out whether Thaw waved his arms backward and forward over his head or not.  All the witnesses could tell him was that White rested upon the table, and that they could not see his left arm, and that they had not seen Thaw do anything but hold the pistol aloft in his right hand.

The question of the position of White’s left hand, it was thought, might indicate an intention to add to the defense a plea of self-defense, in that Thaw feared an attach by White.

In the unsensational telling of the facts of the crime there were a few dramatic moments.  One witness stated that Thaw had said, “I did it because he ruined by wife,” and she had replied “Yes, Harry, but see what a fix you are in now!”  To this the defendant had replied, “All right, dearie, I have probably saved your life.”

The people rested at 12:45 o’clock, and the court adjourned until 2.  Mr. Garvan’s speech had only taken seven minutes, and all the prosecution’s witnesses had been heard and cross-examined in two hours.

John B. Gleason, who opened for Thaw, spoke for an hour and a quarter.  He stated that the defense would rely on every plea it could uphold, not excluding a belief in the need of self-defense, but his main argument came to this:

That comes from a family with insanity on both sides.  He is of a high-strung temperament, easily losing control of himself.  For years he courted Evelyn Nesbit with the consent of the mother, for a time she refused him for some reason connected with White, which she herself will take the stand to explain.  This aroused in him an insane hatred of White, which his marriage, with the approval of all his relatives did not remove.  When he came upon the architect in Madison Square Garden he believed he was there by the direct interposition of Providence, and as the direct agent of Providence he shot and killed him.  Stress and the influences of heredity had turned his brain, and as an insane man he cannot be held responsible for the acts committed under the influence of insanity.

They Call Thaw’s Wife To-day.

It is probable that Thaw’s wife will testify this morning.  The defense is expected to call Thomas McCaleb also.  He was with the Thaws on the night of the shooting.

Truxton Beale, the fourth member of the party, is in California.

PROSECUTION’S CASE SHORT

Thaw Loses Air of Confidence as Witnesses Tell of Shooting.

Harry K. Thaw, who had been bright of eye, smiling, always confident of acquittal during the ten days of tedious examinations of talesmen, changed completely yesterday morning, when he was compelled to sit in the Criminal Branch of the Supreme Court and listen to Assistant district Attorney Garvan tell the jury the story of the killing of Stanford White.  Coming quickly to the scene of the tragedy and its enactment, Mr. Garvan, his voice cold and clear said:

“The defendant walked bout the theatre.  The defendant saw Mr. White.  He returned to his wife and friends, and in the middle of the second act started to leave the theater with them.  As he went out he let the rest of the party go ahead and he fell back.  As he got opposite Mr. White he turned around, wheeled in front of him, and deliberately shot him through the brain, the ball entering the left eye.  Mr. White was dead.  For fear that he had not completely done his work Thaw shot him again.  This time the ball went though the mouth and went through Mr. White’s brain.”

Thaw’s face flushed, and then gradually lost all of its color.  He closed his eyes, and his lean hands were twined tightly together on the table in front of him.

“Still not content,” resumed Mr. Garvan, “he shot him again, this time in the right shoulder.  Mr. White—or rather, the body of Mr. White—tumbled to the floor.  The defendant turned around and faced the audience.  He turned the pistol upside down in his hand, holding it by the muzzle, and faced the audience in that way.  The audience understood that his act was complete, what he intended to do had been done, and the audience understood him and there was no panic.”

Thaw’s air of confidence was not gone.  His demeanor was that of a man trying to hide a great and sudden fear.  He did not even show the courage to watch the effect of the speech on the jury.

“The People claim that it was a deliberate, cruel, malicious, premeditated taking a human life,” said Mr. Garvan, in the same even but painfully clear and cold tone.  Then he asked for a verdict of guilty, and the first step in the actual trial had been made.

Thaw’s wife and mother had been in court as usual when Justice Fitzgerald took his place on the bench.  Mr. Jerome asked that all the witnesses in the case, except the medical experts, be excluded.  The Justice acquiesced, and Mrs. William Thaw, Evelyn Nesbit Thaw, and her chum, May MacKenzie, left the room with the others.  Mrs. George Lauder Carnegie was the only one of the Thaw women allowed to remain, and she seemed on the point of breaking down under the strain.  She was present all through the work of selecting the jury.  Yesterday she did not have the comfort of her mother’s touch at her side.  Her brother, Josiah Thaw sat with her.  He was calm, emotionless, attentive.

In his opening Mr. Garvan had explained to the jury who Stanford White was, and how he had gone from his home at St. James, L. where he had spent Sunday with his family to his work in the city on June 25, and thence to his death at the hands of Thaw.

White’s Son the First Witness.

“Lawrence Grant White!” called Clerk Penny, and a tall, well-built young man faced Thaw and the jury and took the oath.  He was the son of the dead architect.  The eyes of the prisoner and witness did not meet.  Mr. White is 19 years old, and is a student at Harvard.

“Do you remember the night of June 25?” Mr. Garvan asked him.

“I do,” he said.

“Where had you spent the preceding Sunday?”

“At St. James, L.I.”

“Was your father with you?”

“He was.”

The young man showed no trace of emotion.  His voice was soft, but distinct.  His answers were monosyllabic whenever it was possible to make them so.

Young Mr. White said that his father had left St. James between 6 and 7 o’clock on the morning of June 25.  He and a college chum, Leroy King, who was his guest, left later in the day, and reached the city at 4:30 o’clock in the afternoon.  King went to the station to see about his baggage, and young White went to the city house of the family, 121 East Twenty-first Street.  In the afternoon he ordered two seats for the performance of “the Governor’s Son” at the New Amsterdam Theatre.  King joined him at home, and they dressed for dinner and the theatre.

Stanford White went to his city home toward evening, and he and his son and a friend went to the Café Martin for dinner.  The father wanted the young men to come with him to the opening of “Mam’selle Champagne” at the Garden, but they preferred to use the tickets they had bought.  Mr. White took his son and King to their theatre in his electric cab and left them to proceed to Madison Square Garden.

After the performance young White and his chum went to the Harvard Club, where thy remained until train time.  The son of the slain man then went with his friend to the station and afterward went home.

“When you arrived there did you have any conversation with any one?” Mr. Garvan asked.

“Yes, with the reporters who were at the door.”

“And in consequence of this conversation—“

“We will have to object,” broke in Mr. Gleason.

“I was not going to bring out that,” replied Mr. Garvan, referring to the information the young man then received, the first news that he had on the killing of his father.

“In consequence of this conversation did you go anywhere?” Mr. Garvan asked.

“I went to Madison Square Garden,” he replied.

“Did you go on the roof?”

“No, to the office.”

“Did you see your father there?”

“No.”

“I knew that he was somewhere in the building.”

“When did you see your father?”

“Two or three days later at the house.”

The defense made no cross-examination.

Young White left the courtroom immediately.

Tells How White Was Shot.

Warner Paxson, engineer of Madison Square Garden, was the first eye-witness, put on the stand.  He lives at 146 East Thirtieth Street and knew White for sixteen years, the time he has been employed in the building.

He described the roof garden, the arrangement of chairs and tables, the entrances, exits, &c.  Mr. Garvan then put in Exhibit 1 for the people, a large colored drawing of the plan of the roof garden.

Mr. Paxson said that he saw Mr. White enter the Garden about 9:30 o’clock on the night of June 25.

“Mr. White was seated at a table,” the witness said.  “A moment or two before the first shot was fired I saw him; one elbow was on the table and another was thrown carelessly over the other table.  When I heard the shot I glanced immediately and saw Thaw standing about a foot from the table with the revolver pointing down.  My eye got on him in time to see the other two shots.  I watched him so closely that I did not see the body fall.”

“What did you do after the third shot?”

“I started for Mr. Thaw as soon as I could collect my senses.”

“How long a time was there between the shots?”

The witness snapped his fingers three times, a second elapsing between each sound.

“What did Thaw do after the third shot?”

“He turned around and took the revolver by the barrel, holding it a little above the shoulder, and walked directly to the exit.”

Paxson swore that Thaw, with the weapon inverted, walked slowly between the tables to the aisle and then to the back of the Garden.  When Paxson reached Thaw two men had hold of him, Paul Brudi, a fireman on duty in the house, and Edward H. Convey, who was foreman in the building.

What Thaw Said After the Killing.

Convey asked Paxson to take charge of Thaw while he found a policeman.  He did this, and Thaw said to him:

“Can’t you take me down the elevator? I’ve to go down anyway, and I don’t want to annoy these people.”

Paxson said that five people took the elevator in which he escorted Thaw to the street.  One of these, he said, he judged to have been the wife of the prisoner.

“I did it because he ruined my wife,” the witness swore Thaw told him while in the elevator car.

“The lady said, Paxson testified, ‘Yes, Harry, but look at the fix you’re in now’

“All right, dearie,” the witness swore Thaw replied.  “’I have probably saved your life.’”

When the party stepped from the elevator Thaw turned to the men with him and bade them take “her” to the hotel and to telephone Carnegie.

Mr. Delmas declined to cross-examine the witness.

Other Witnesses of the Shooting.

Meyer Cohen, manager for Charles K. Harris, music publisher, of 601 West 142nd Street, was the second eye-witness.  He said that he knew Thaw, and saw him first during the first act of the play.  He stood just in front of him in the middle aisle, and looked over the audience very quietly.  He wore an overcoat.  The witness was with a Mr. Blaese and a Dr. Peckman.  After the first act this party went to a table not far form that at which Mr. White was sitting.  The next time the witness saw Thaw was when he started down the aisle during the second act, or last half of the show.

“Mr. Thaw walked down the aisle quietly,” he swore, “and I said to Mr. Blaese, ‘There goes your friend.’ He walked a distance about as far as from her to that lady, [pointing to Mrs. Carnegie, thirty feet away.]  As he got that far he turned and walked back crossing several tables and fired one, two, three shots.  His left hand went out and his right hand upward, with the pistol turned upside down.  He turned and walked toward the elevator.  A fireman grabbed him and took the pistol from him.”

The witness said that Mr. White was sitting facing the stage.  Thaw walked almost in front of him and turned suddenly on his victim.

“The thing was done very quietly,” he said, as his examination was concluded.Mr. Delmas cross-examined the witness.  His testimony was not in any way weakened.

Henry F. Blaese, also with Charles K. Harris, living at 106 West 139^th Street, testified that he was with the previous witness, and that he saw Thaw standing during a part of the first act at the head of the middle aisle, which separates the reserved-seat section.

Blaese swore that he watched Thaw all the time he stood there.  He pointed out on the diagram where his party sat about a table during the second act.  Mr. Garvan asked him to tell what he saw Thaw do during the second act.

The witness presented the scene he witnessed so abruptly that it was startling.  He told it all in one sentence.

“Thaw went down the aisle, passed around the tables, and fired three shots at a party seated at one of them.”

“In what direction was the man who was shot facing?” asked Mr. Garvan.

“He was facing the stage.  His head was resting on his arm.”

The witness demonstrated, showing that the architect had rested his head on his right hand, his right elbow on the table.

“How long an interval was there between the three shots?”

The witness slapped his hands together three times.

“Can you show in the diagram exactly what the defendant did when he walked down the aisle?” Mr. Garvan asked.

The witness, with his forefinger, traced the course that Thaw took.

“He walked around this table,” he said, “and fired three shots.”

“Was there any conversation between the two men?”

“I heard none.”

“Did you see the moving of lips or anything that would tell of a conversation?”

“No.”

“Did he shoot as he got to the table?”

Mr. Delmas objected and Mr. Garvan asked if there was any interval between the time of his reaching the table and the time he fired the first shot.  The witness replied that there was no interval.

First Conflict in Testimony.

Blaese then testified in contradiction to the previous eye-witness as to what followed the shooting.

 “He [Thaw] walked toward the aisle," he said “and held his pistol up in the air.”

“Did you see which end of the pistol was up? “ Mr. Garvan asked.

“The barrel was up.”

“The barrel?" again asked the Assistant District Attorney.

“Yes."

“Pointing up in the air?" Mr. Garvan asked with incredulity in his voice.

"Up In the air."

Position of White's Left Hand.

On cross-examination Mr. Delmas then brought out the Question of the position of Mr. White's left hand at the time of the shooting.

The witness said that he was sitting behind and to the right of Mr. White. He saw Mr. White resting his head in his right band, but did not see the position of his left hand.

“The left hand was concealed from your view by the Intervening body?" asked Mr. Delmas.

“It was.”  How long did you watch that pistol when Mr. Thaw held it up in the air?' Mr. Delmas asked.

“Just a moment” the witness replied.

“Where was Mr. Thaw then?”

“In the aisle.”

“During the time Mr. Thaw was walking from the place, "Where the shooting occurred to the aisle, did you keep your eye on him?”

“Yes."

“How did he hold the pistol?”

“In the air.”

“Was it pointing upward?"

“Yes.”

“Then you did see him holding it that way for more than a second?”

“During the time it took him to leave the table and get in the aisle," the witness replied.

“Immediately after the shooting did Mr. Thaw make any gesture?"

“No.”

“Did be throw out his arms in any?”

“He did not."

Mr. Delmas was plainly seeking inconsistencies and contradictions in the testimony of the eye-witness. The first witness had testified that Thaw had thrown up his arms after firing the last shot.

“You are positive?" asked Mr. Delmas, to emphasize this contradiction.

"I am.”

Paul Brudi, the fireman who seized Thaw after he had walked up the aisle holding his weapon aloft, was the next witness.  He knew neither the accused nor the slain man.

“Did you see the defendant in the Garden on the night of June 25?" Mr. Garvan asked him.

“I saw him when he shot Stanford White.”

Brudi testified that his attention was drawn to Thaw by his wearing an overcoat. He was walking down the aisle. He saw him fire the first shot. He did not notice how Mr. White as sitting, but did notice that Thaw faced Madison Avenue as he stood near the table of the man he had approached to kill.

“How close was the pistol to Mr. White?

“It was right close to his forehead.”

“How many shoots did you see fired?"

“I recol1ect two.”

Brudi told how he approached Thaw from behind for his own protection and grabbed the upraised hand with the gun.

“Gimme the gun without any trouble,” Brudi says he told Thaw and Thaw gave him the pistol.

“What did Thaw say?" asked Mr. Garvan.

He said, “He ruined my wife"

“Did you hear any one say anything to him?"

“Only his wife. She said, ‘look at the fix you're in.'

Mr. Garvan put in Exhibit No. 2 for the People. It was a short-muzzled black steel revolver. Then he drew from his coat pocket two bullets and three empty shells. The witness identified the pistol as the one he had taken from Thaw. Mr. Delmas asked to look it over and studied it carefully for a while.

Thaw showed further signs of uneasiness. No suggestion of evidence to advance a motive for the killing had been offered, the testimony being altogether to the effect that Thaw had walked up to the architect and had killed him, firing three times, to be sure that the man was killed, and then reassuring the audience that there was no further intent on his part to use the pistol by holding it up in the air.

Delmas, on cross-examination also brought out that this witness was where he could not see the left hand of the architect. In again describing the shooting the witness brought out that Thaw's pistol was right against the head of White.

“When I took the gun from him,” he testified, “”he was looking over his right shoulder, a kind of staring look." Mr. Delmas brought out that Thaw's face was very pale and that his eyes were, staring. The witness said it was a frightened look.

Edward H. Convey, to whom the pistol was handed by Brudi, identified it and testified that he had made no change in the weapon, the cartridges, or shells.

Policeman Patrick L. Debes, into whose custody Thaw was given, also identified the weapon. What conversation did you have with Thaw when you took charge of him?"  Mr. Garvan asked.

“I asked him if he shot Stanford White, and he said that he did." he testified. “Then I asked him why he had shot him and he said, ‘Because he ruined my wife.' He either said ‘wife’ or ‘life.’ He asked me where we were going, and I told him to the station house, and he said, ‘All right.’

Debes turned Thaw over to another policeman and returned to the Garden.

He had known Stanford White and he recognized the body on the floor of the Garden. He put Policeman Martin J. Moore in charge of the body and began to secure witnesses. He was not cross-examined.

After a consultation Justice Fitzgerald decided that witnesses after being examined should be excluded from the court room in case it should be necessary to call them back to the stand. With this ruling the only time a witness will get a glimpse of the trial will be while on the stand. It will apply to the relatives of the prisoner who are to testify.

Coroners' Physician Timothy D. Lehane, who performed the autopsy on the body of White, then introduced the two bullets which he had taken from the brain. Mr. Garvan passed them to Mr. Delmas, who examined them. They were numbered Exhibits 3 and 4.

‘The three wounds on the body were described. One bullet -entered the left eye," another the mouth, both penetrating the brain. The third pierced the inner side of the right arm, making a wound six inches long. This bullet cleared the body and was picked up later. This third bullet was tagged Exhibit 5 for the People.

What was the death of Stanford White caused by?” Mr. Garvan asked Mr. Lehand.

“Cerebral hemmorrhage as the result of pistol shot wounds in the skull." he answered.

He was not cross-examined.

Dr. Marvin Pechner of 8 West 113th Street was the last witness in the prosecution's case. He was with Blaese and Cohen, two other witnesses. He heard the three shots and saw Thaw standing at White's table, his right hand raised. His fingers clasped the barrel of a. pistol and; the butt was raised toward the ceiling. He was certain of this.

“Did you see Stanford White after he was shot?" Mr. Garvan asked.

“I did.”

“Did you go up to him doctor?"

“Yes!”

"Immediately?”

“Yes.”

“Was he dead?”

“He was dead when I reached him."

On cross-examination Dr. Pechner testified that the first thing ha saw Thaw do after the shots were fired was to break the pistol. He said that Thaw was standing just in front of where Mr. White had been sitting when he broke the pistol closed it, and then held it aloft.

Policeman Debes was recalled. The prosecution had forgotten to ask him a question which may prove of importance.

“What did Mrs. Thaw say when you took charge of the prisoner? “Harry, why did you do that?” The  witness answered.

“And what did he say? “It'll be all right.” That's all he said,

Mr. Delmas had no questions to ask the policeman and Mr. Garvan announced that the prosecution rested.

It was then 12:45 o'clock exactly two hours from the time Mr. Garvan began his opening address.

Justice Fitzgerald announced the recess after admonishing the jury not to speak among themselves about the case until finally submitted to them for their verdict.

INSANITY PLEA OUTLINED.

Thaw Suffering from Disease of the Brain Three Years. Says Counsel.

When court convened after the recess John B. Gleason made the opening speech for the defense. It was listened to with the most profound attention, as it was the first authoritative statement of the pleas upon which the defendant relies for escape from the death penalty.  It was already known that some form of insanity would be put forward as an excuse, and there had been hints in the examination of talesmen that more than one line of argument would be followed, but there had been no full exposition of what would be brought forward.

At the very outset Mr. Gleason swept away one idea. The defense has no intention of appealing to the unwritten law. After remarking upon the number of theories put forward about the case, he said:

“The defense, gentlemen, rests entirely upon the Constitution and the laws of this imperial State of New York. Upon these laws alone we rely, and we dismiss entirely from our thoughts and ask you to dismiss entirely from your contemplation that this defendant or his lawyers claim the protection of any other or any higher laws than the laws of the State of New York."

Mr. Gleason then pointed out that it was impossible to obtain jurors who had not formed an opinion beforehand in these days of wide newspaper circulation, and declared the law which allowed the swearing of men who had thus come to a conclusion. Instead of according to the old common law insisting upon jurors entirely ignorant of the facts, was upon trial.

“I have no doubt that you can lay aside your opinions,” he said. “We seriously contemplated taking the first twelve men that came in to the box, though that would have exposed us to great criticism, if the results had not been in accordance with our theories. For myself I cannot help thinking in reference to these opinions of yours in much the same way as that distinguished statesman and poet. Mr. John Hay, thought of marriage—

“Why should you worry in thinking whom you will marry?

Marry whom you may, you will find you’re married some other fellow.”

As his counsel spoke Thaw kept his eyes fixed upon the table in front of him.  He was listening closely, but he evidently was very nervous.  Not a word did he say to Mr. Peabody and Mr. McPike, who sat next to him, and he never once raised his eyes to see what effects the pleading had upon the jury.  The defendant showed a more lively appreciation of his position than at any earlier moment in trail.

Insanity the Main Plea.

Taking up the question of the defense to be put forward Mr. Gleason showed it is to be of the widest.

“The defense will rely,” he declared, “upon all defenses which we may be able to prove, upon all circumstances tending to show that the defendant acted without malice and without premeditation, and in the belief of self-defense induced by the threats of White. But the greater part of our evidence will be to prove to you that the defendant killed White under the delusion that it was an act of Providence, that he was the agent of agent of Providence to kill Stanford White.

“The defendant for three years had been suffering from a disease of the brain which culminated in the killing of Stanford White, and which left its affect clearly observable after the homicide.  When examined after the homicide he was not award of his mental condition, and insisted that he was sane and that the act was an act of Providence.”

The counsel then proceeded upon an elaborate discussion of insanity:  He said:

“I am not going to talk to you in technical language, but I will talk to you in language, if you give your attention to me you will see what you have known before is true.  I will, therefore, compare the brain to a great storage cell, and assemblage of storage cells—millions, hundreds of millions of these minute cells exist in the structure of the brain, and they form, as it were, a great storage battery to which the mind has recourse for its motive power.

“When therefore, gentlemen, disease invades these cells, this structure, what do you find?  Why, you find that, instead of the mind going to its magazine for the purpose of getting direction and using it properly, the process reversed; the battery, the brain cells, by their vibration, throw into the mind exactly the same ideas as the mind, when action logically and on a proper occasion, would take out of those very cells.  The mind, therefore, being in a diseased and enfeebled state by reason of a disease accepts there vibrations of the brain as actual facts and impulses, and under the impulse of those vibrations, as if a piano were worked backward, from the cords, and strike the notes, instead of the performer striking them, there results a discord, there results an explosion, and there may result homicide and death, as here.”

Mr. Gleason denied that the defense intended to argue Thaw’s insanity from one act, although he maintained that it would have been possible to do so.  He went on:

“The case we have here is as far removed form the ordinary defense of emotional insanity of the defendant of the single act as the heavens are from the earth.  What made Thaw insane?  I answer two things, heredity and stress.

“We will show you that in this man’s family to a marked extent were insanity and epilepsy.  We will show you this man’s temperament in which wee the seeds of insanity implanted and liable to spring up.”

As Mr. Gleason spoke of the bad family history of the Thaws all eyes turned to Mrs. Carnegie and her brothers.  They made no sign that they had heard.

Mr. Gleason added: “Therefore, when we know there is insanity in the family history and the act itself is highly irrational, as ‘the act here, the defendant is insane beyond all reasonable doubt.”

In dealing with the other cause to which the defense attributes the insanity of Thaw, stress and strain, Mr. Gleason compared the tortures he had gone through as a result of acts of White to the ancient punishment of fastening a man to a stake and allowing one drop of water after another to fall upon his head.

“No man,” he said, “could be subjected to that simple thing for any length of time without becoming a raving maniac.  He counts the drops, wonder if they will not stop; he cannot sleep; they come, they come, they come.  The man’s mind gives way, and there’s no possibility of avoiding it.  But I need not spend much time of this.  When I have told you the cause gentlemen, you will say whether heredity had influence or not, to make any man crazy.”

Counsel next turned to a technical discussion of what insanity is, and pointed out that an insane man might have a general consciousness that certain acts were wrong, and yet an irresistible impulse to commit a particular one of these acts.  From this he argued that it was the duty of the People to prove that the act of Thaw in killing Stanford White was the act of a sane man beyond all reasonable doubt.  Otherwise the law would not hold him any more responsible than “If I should take the arm of one of you jurors and place in your hand a knife and punch it to the heart of a fellow-juror.”

Mr. Gleason went on to quote the law about murder and endeavored to quote form a paper by Dr. Carlos Macdonald, one of the alienists retained by the People, in order to discuss the difference between medial and legal insanity.

“I object,” said Mr. Jerome, “the paper is not in evidence.”

Mr. Gleason would not press the point, and continued to enlarge at length upon insanity as know to the law.  In doing so he said:

“I presume, gentlemen, you have read the words of that great writer, Robert Louis Stevenson, and have heard of that mysterious organization, the Suicide Club.  I invite you to go with me to the portals of that building—“

“I am always loft to interrupt,” said Mr. Jerome, “but counsel is laying down propositions of law and should verify them.”

Justice Fitzgerald agreed with the District Attorney and warned counsel for the defense that the was trenching upon the matter of the summing  up, and reminded him that in the opening he should only state the evidence and draw inferences from it.

“The defendant for three years had been suffering from a disease of the brain which culminated in the killing of Stanford White, and which left its affect clearly observable after the homicide.  When examined after the homicide he was not aware of his mental condition, and insisted that he was sane and that the act was an act of Providence.”

The counsel then proceeded upon an elaborate discussion of insanity.  He said, “I am not going to talk to you in technical language, but I will talk to you in language, if you give your attention to me, you will see what you have known before is true.  I will, therefore, compare the brain to a great storage cell, an assemblage of storage cells—millions, hundreds of millions of these minute cells exist in the structure of the brain, and they form, as it were, a great storage battery to which the mind has recourse for its motive power.

“When therefore, gentlemen disease invades these cells, this structure, what do you find? Why, you find that, instead of the mind going to its magazine for the purpose of getting direction and using it properly, the process reversed; the battery, the brain cells, by their vibration, throw into the mind exactly the same ideas as the mind, when acting logically and on a proper occasion, would take out of those very cells.  The mind, therefore, being a diseased accepts these vibrations of the brain as actual facts and impulse of those vibrations, as if a piano were worked backward from the cords, and strike the notes, instead of the performer striking them, there results a discord, there results an explosion, and there may result homicide and death, as here.”

Mr. Gleason denied that the defense intended to argue Thaw’s insanity from one act, although he maintained that it would have been possible to do so.  He went on:

“The case we have here is as far removed from the ordinary defense of emotional insanity of the defendant of the single act as the heavens are from the earth.  What made Thaw insane?  I answer two things, heredity and stress.

“We will show you that in this man’s family, to a marked extent were insanity and epilepsy.  We will show you this man’s temperament in which were the seeds of insanity implanted and liable to spring up.”

As Mr. Gleason spoke of the bad family history of the Thaws all eyes turned to Mrs. Carnegie and her brothers.  They made no sign that they had heard.

Mr. Gleason added:  “Therefore, when “Harry K. Thaw,” he said, “is 35 years of age.  Two of the cousins of his father were insane.  Harriet A. Thaw, who is not in a Friends’ asylum—“One moment,” interposed Mr. Jerome; “counsel will state a fact that will not be adduced in evidence.”

“I cannot rule upon the evidence now,” said the court, “but counsel will confine himself to certain limitations.”

“I will not go into details,” said Mr. Gleason, “but we will introduce evidence that on both sides of the defendant’s family, there is insanity.  ‘And we will prove to you that this man was born with what the physicians call a psychopathic temperament; that is to say, a temperament liable to a mind diseased; what we would call in our general way a highly nervous temperament.  The slightest thing would awaken him.  He did not awaken naturally like other children, but with a start.  He had convulsions in his early youth.  From these facts we shall prove beyond a doubt he had a temperament liable to break forth into insanity if the seeds of insanity were applied.”

As the counsel said this, Thaw dropped his head lower and lower on his breast.  From the first day of his imprisonment he has fought against the defense upon there grounds, and he felt deeply the humiliation of hearing mental weakness ascribed publicly to him.  He never lifted his eyes form the table and made no remarks of any sort to his counsel on either side.

Mr. Gleason entered upon his relations with Evelyn Nesbit.

“This young man,” he said, “met Evelyn Nesbit in 1901.  He loved her with as honorable a love as nay one of this room has loved a women he would make his wife.  He went to her mother in 1903 and told her he wished to marry her if he could gain her affections.”

The trip to Europe was explained by counsel as necessary for Miss Nesbit’s health after an operation, and he declared that Thaw accompanied Mrs. and Miss Nesbit abroad as an open and allowed suitor of the latter.  He took her to visit Mrs. Carnegie, his sister, who was then residing in London.

“In June, 1903,” went on Mr. Gleason, “he asked her to marry him, and she refused. Now, gentlemen, the circumstances of that refusal, reasons that she gave for that refusal, you will learn from her own lips.  I will not go into details now.  Suffice it to say that these reasons were connected with an occurrence in the life of that girl with reference to Stanford White.”

Mr. Gleason passed over the history of the defendant until April 4, 1905, when he was married to Miss Nesbit with the full consent of the mother and family, and declared that the defense took the position that form the time Evelyn Nesbit told her story to Thaw, his character and condition was changed and his mind commenced to take on an idea with reference to Stanford White around which many delusions grew until they culminated in the idea that it was right to kill Stanford White.

He promised that he would prove the diseased condition of Thaw’s mind by the evidence of his mother and of his wife, by his own letters, and by communications to the authorities for the prevention of crime.  He stated also that the defense would give an account of the killing, differing from that of the prosecution.

“I will call your attention,” he went on, “to the fact that the defendant had been under the delusion that his life was in danger in the City of New York, and in consequence he had carried a revolver since January, 1904, whenever he was in the City of New York.

“With reference to the killing of Stanford White I may point out that the tables in the Madison Square Roof Garden were pretty near together, with no open space between them.  We shall show you that the defendant, as he walked out of the place had got beyond the tables, and, looking around, saw White glaring at him.

“Under the influence was shall describe to you he acted under the delusion that it was an act of Providence that he should be there and that it was an act of Providence for him to kill Stanford White.  He turned and went coolly down, as a gentleman might walk down to speak to a friend, and shot that man.

“He did not have any idea of evading the consequences of his act.  He did not regard the act as wrong, but regarded himself as the agent of Providence.  He held up his hand with the pistol in it plainly, as a gentleman being taken into custody, and acted entirely under the domination of his insane impulse.

“Gentleman, I say to you that we will show you why he killed this man.  We will show you the evidence that overturned his mind and led to this calamity.  We will show you evidence of this disorder in his mind and the cause of it before and immediately after the homicide.  And, gentlemen, we say that with that evidence before you it will be impossible for you upon your oaths to say that this man at the time he shot Stanford White was sane beyond a reasonable doubt.”

It was 3:20 o’clock when Mr. Gleason finished his address to the jury, and Mr. Delmas at once applied to the court for an immediate adjournment.

“I have no objection,” responded Mr. Jerome, “if the defense will name the witnesses they intend to summon to-mor-row.  Preparation or cross-examination is an arduous matter, and, as the people have examined a large number of witnesses, if we are informed who are to be called it may save us the embarrassment of asking delay on account of cross-examination.”

“I am not in a position to announce whom we shall call,” said Mr. Delmas, “until I have conferred with my associates.”

“Then you may confer,” said the court.

Mr. Delmas, however, declared that he did not see that the defense was in any way bound to furnish the names of its witnesses to the District Attorney, and that it might be detrimental to them to do so.

In reply, Mr. Jerome pointed out that in its opening address the defense had covered so much ground that he would not be prepared to go on until he had conferred with gentlemen familiar with the subjects touched upon and that he would like to reserve the privilege of asking certain witnesses to stand aside before their cross-examination until he could familiarize himself with certain lines of reasoning.

The courts urged counsel to grant each other courtesies with a view to shorten the trial as much as possible and adjourned the court with the usual warning to the jurors.

It was noticeable that Thaw was in a great hurry to escape to the seclusion of his cell.  He sprang to his feet before court was actually adjourned and had taken, two or three strides before he was called back.

As soon as he was allowed to depart, he hastened down the gangway with long strides immensely relieved to escape the crowd.