"I was insulted and I stabbed him."
The murder of Michael Gleason
The very simple entry in the Record of Interments of the City of Troy notes the death of Michael Gleason on January 19, 1851. Michael was a sailor, aged 21, with his parents listed as Abram and Ann Westcott. He was buried in the Catholic Burying Ground. However, the cause of death which was given as “murdered by Charles Quin” opens a fascinating tale. I was first struck by the straightforwardness of the recorder of the information of the event — Michael was murdered by Charles.
A search of the Troy Times Record revealed a much more complicated story, but with the same ending: Michael Gleason was murdered by Charles Quinn. Charles was arrested peacefully the day after the incident on January 10 by William Wells, a city constable. The case came to trial in the Rensselaer County Court of Oyer and Terminer (Criminal court) beginning on October 30,1851 with Judge Malbone Watson presiding. Lawyers for the prosecution were District Attorney Robert A. Lottridge, Rufus W. Peckham, and George Gould. The defense lawyers were Job Pierson and A.B. Olin.
These men were all well-known. Judge Watson, age 45, was from Greene County and had been appointed to the NYS Supreme Court in 1847. District Attorney Lottridge, 43, held that office several times before he died in 1868. Rufus W. Peckham, 40, was from Albany. He went on to be a US Congressman from 1853-1855, then judge of the NY Court of Appeals. George Gould, 42, was a Yale graduate from Connecticut. He was mayor of Troy from 1852-1853, then elected to the NY Supreme Court from 1855-1863.
On the defense, Job Pierson, age 57, had returned to the practice of law after serving as Rensselaer County DA from 1824-1833, U.S. Congressman from 1833-35, then Surrogate of the county from 1835-1840. Abram Baldwin Olin, 41, from Vermont, and his wife Mary were new to the area at the time of the trial, living in the Troy House. They stayed in Troy, where he was Recorder of the city from 1844-1852, then U.S. Congressman from 1857-1863. Abraham Lincoln appointed him a Justice of the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia in 1863. He served until 1879.
Public interest in the case must have been high, as the Times gave a verbatim account of the proceedings for the almost nine days of the trial. The Times reported that the court room was packed each day with spectators, both male and female, city and country people. The testimony and statements of the defense and prosecution not only record the events of the case and the decision-making process, but also give many insights into the social life and racial attitudes of Troy in 1850.
Jacob Street is the street at the right on the portion of the 1858 map included. There is one building on 13th St., almost at the corner.
The murder — or at least the first act of the murder — occurred during a dance held January 9 at the house of Harry Thompson at “the head of Jacob Street” at 13th Street. When I mentioned this to Kathy Sheehan, Troy City historian, she immediately said that there were no structures there at the time. But close examination of a city map of 1858 reveals that while the city of the era ended at 13th Street, with an open side hill leading up to Troy University, now RPI, the lots were all plotted out, and there were two buildings in the vicinity, one on 13th, and one on Jacob, near 13th. The building on 13th was especially small, and the testimony records that this building was two stories high, measuring just 15 feet wide and perhaps 20-25 feet deep. It had a front room for dancing, measuring just 15x15 feet, and a temporary bar room measuring perhaps 7x7-9 feet. A stairway to the second floor took up some of the space in the dancing room.
This diagram of the house of Harry Thompson was in one of the newspaper articles about the trial.
Sometimes the word “house” refers to an inn or tavern, but I believe that this was Harry Thompson’s home, though I could not find a deed for the property in the County Clerk’s office. From about 1860 to 1880, this Black man is listed in the city directories as a butcher, living at 13th and Jacob Streets. It seems he converted his home into a dance club for the night. According to his testimony, John Wickes was hired to be the bartender for the night. Wickes also said he was Thompson’s son-in-law. Their two families lived in the house at 13th and Jacob as of the 1860 US census. Thompson was listed as aged 48, with wife Mary, 47, and Wickes as 38, with wife Sarah, 26.
Returning to the night of January 9, Thompson had hired a fiddler for the dance, also Black. Apparently, all of the patrons were white — or at least, no one else was described as Black. It cost $1 to get into the dance, which began about 9pm, though the victim didn’t arrive until 11. This was a steep price, worth about $40 today, and must have included all the drinks. William Hunter, who ran a “porter house” — a bar that would serve beer — brought a sleigh full of “girls” to the dance, perhaps all of the females in attendance. It was well-known that Hunter in fact ran a brothel. The US Census of 1860 lists his occupation as “keeps house of prostitution” and included eight women with the occupation “prostitute” living there. Each dance (think of set dances like square dances) lasted twenty minutes to a half hour. In between, the ladies retired upstairs to drink lemonade, while the men had alcoholic drinks at the bar. It has been suggested to me that they did more than drink lemonade upstairs, but none of that was mentioned in the testimony.
The men listed in the court case were what we would call blue collar workers — Heman Lane, who testified, was a 19-year-old iron moulder. John Farrell, another witness, was a 19-year-old butcher. Joe Cushing, 26, who was standing next to Gleason when he was stabbed, was a boatman, and the son of gunsmith Alvin Cushing. Paul Kavanaugh, who testified, said he was a moulder, but the 1860 US Census lists him as a saloon keeper. Quinn left the dance after his first confrontation with Gleason and came back with friends who were described as firemen.
As mentioned above, Gleason, though only 21, had already been a sailor, away from home for the previous two years serving on the USS St. Lawrence according to his sister, Mary Hogan. The frigate had just returned from a two-year cruise to Europe and Scandinavia (Wikipedia). Quinn, 25, lived with his mother Rosanna, brother Phillip, and sister Margaret. Interestingly, he was also a butcher. Was that how he knew Harry Thompson? He worked at the Fulton St. Market, down near the river. From the testimony, it seems Gleason and Quinn had not met before this night.
The basic outline of the case is clear. Michael Gleason and Charles Quinn had some sort of argument about Quinn’s tobacco box, which had gone missing. Quinn left the dance, but returned some time later with some friends. He went into the bar room and asked John Wickes, the bartender, if could borrow the knife which he was using to cut lemons to cut a slice for himself. Knife in hand, he turned around and stabbed Gleason in the side. The men grappled and fell out into the dance room. Gleason was taken upstairs and tended by doctors.
After a cold night spent at Thompson’s house, Gleason was moved to the Troy Hospital, where he was seen by several doctors. He died nine or ten days later. The first doctor on the scene at Thompson’s was Charles Freiot (1821-1879). He testified that Gleason died of an infection along the course of the wound, but felt that the victim had gonorrhea, which made the effects of the wound much worse. Dr. James Thorn (1802-1876), who said he had been a doctor for 19 years, saw Gleason in the hospital daily, and testified it was a dangerous wound, but not necessarily fatal. Dr. T. C. Brinsmade (1802-1868), a physician for 26 years, felt it was a very dangerous wound, and the symptoms that Dr. Freiot felt were from venereal disease could have been caused by the wound and subsequent infection.
The jury’s decision in the case revolved around a few points: was it deliberate murder? Or an incident in a drunken brawl? Both men had certainly been drinking. Shortly before he died, Gleason stated that the affair had been a drunken brawl and he would lick Quinn when he recovered.
Were the prosecution witnesses reliable? One of them was William Hunter, proprietor of a house of prostitution. Another was John Wickes, who was, according to Job Pierson, prejudiced in favor of the prosecution as “he was given $100 for his evidence.” There was no proof of that payment given in the transcript of the trial, but Wickes did say had been put in jail by the prosecution before the trial, to make sure that he didn’t run away before he could testify. Defense council said “the Negro was not sufficiently acquainted with the case,” despite the fact that he gave the most detailed testimony about the actual stabbing, as he witnessed it right in front of him.
A third witness was Michael McDermott, a bar tender for William Hunter, who had ridden to the event with Hunter and the ladies. Michael Gleason had frequently gone to Hunter’s “to talk to him in the bar room”, so certainly knew Hunter and McDermott. There were a number of other witnesses, all young men who knew one or both of the disputants. Their testimony varied a bit in details, but not in the basic story. Several of the men at the dance were good friends of Quinn, but not called to testify. Why not?
Did Michael Gleason actually die of his wound? This would seem obvious, but one or two of the doctors who testified stated that the fact that he spent a night or two in a very cold room at Thompson’s house before being taken to the hospital caused his death, plus he may have been suffering from gonorrhea, which would have caused his death soon without a wound. Another said that he died of peritonitis, not the wound.
The defense, represented by Pierson, concluded that there was no evidence that the wound inflicted caused the death, but if a mortal wound was inflicted by Quinn, the act was not premeditated, and that the testimony was variable. After Gleason was stabbed, he cried out, “Oh my heart!!” Or maybe he had said, “Oh my hearty, I have got you!”
The prosecution, represented by Peckham, said it was clear that Quinn had stabbed Gleason and that Gleason died of the wound. His uncle and sister testified that he had never been sick a day in his life. Perhaps murder was not intended, but bartender Wickes had grabbed Quinn’s arm to keep him from stabbing Gleason again.
The jury was not swayed by the supposed bad character of the witnesses, nor the medical evidence to the contrary, and in two hours reached the verdict that Quinn was guilty. On the first vote of the jury, one person did vote innocent, but just to ask if Quinn could be sent to prison for life rather than condemned to death. Quinn was allowed to speak and said, “Your honor, I am not guilty of Murder. It was a drunken broil [sic]; I was insulted and I stabbed him.”
Quinn was sentenced to be hung on the 26th of December, 1851. However, the story has an unexpected ending. The defense must have appealed the conviction because on May 17, 1852, the Times reported that Quinn was to have a new trial. But on July 1, 1852, Quinn left for Auburn State Prison, “overcome with emotion,” sentenced to life. Sadly, the newspaper didn’t report on the next four years, but on June 28, 1856 the Daily Whig reported that Quinn had been pardoned by the Governor, no explanation given in the small paragraph. Clearly, someone had been working behind the scenes on his case.
Tombstone for Charles Quinn and his sister and brother in St. Mary’s Cemetery, Troy.
The 1860 US Census listed Quinn, now 38, living in the large boarding house of Ann Diver in the 4th Ward, back to being a butcher at the Fulton St. Market. In the 1875 NY Census, he was sharing an apartment with his sister Margaret, still in the 4th Ward. The July 4, 1876 Times reported that “Charles Quinn, the well-known butcher” was out and about after six months recuperation from “tongue paralysis,” almost certainly a stroke, which had also affected his left arm. He had recovered and could speak again. Charles died in 1878 and is buried in St. Mary’s Cemetery with his sister Margaret and brother Phillip, known on his tombstone as “Charley.”
This story leaves much to ponder: Black home ownership and enterprise in mid-19th century Troy by an illiterate man — a house on the very outskirts of the city, converted to make extra cash on a January night. Communication with the owner of a brothel about a mile away, but in the city, to arrange for the ladies to come to the dance. And communication in the city about the time and place of the dance. Lower middle class social life — lots of single men in their 20s and a sleigh full of prostitutes. The seemingly easy incitement to violence, but the lack of a weapon except the knife of the bartender, who perhaps was using a butcher knife as the owner of the house was a butcher. The primitive nature of medicine and the wide disagreement among the doctors over the wound and the general health of the patient. The keen interest by the public in the case and the quick guilty decision, but then the seemingly easy integration of the convicted felon back into his community after his pardon.
Blog post and research by Schaghticoke Town Historian and HCM Volunteer, Christina S. Kelly.