034 Page – American State Trials 1918 Volume X Leo Frank Document

Here is the translated text as follows:

2 X, AMERICAN STATE TRIALS.

Upon arriving at the location, they discovered blood all over the mow, which continued to a ravine about fifteen feet from the road. There, they found Gordon's body, covered with brush and snow, with a hole through the head as if made by a large pistol ball. His pockets were turned inside out, and his watch and all his money were gone.

Worrell had been seen in St. Charles leading a horse that resembled Gordon's. From there, he went to St. Louis, remaining there for three days and going to the theater each night. He then traveled on horseback to Vincennes, Indiana.

A published description of the deserter from Fort Leavenworth corresponded with that of the man who was seen with the horse in St. Charles. The chief of police of St. Louis, Captain J. D. Couzins, started for Vincennes in pursuit of him and learned that he had sold Gordon's horse and other articles belonging to the murdered man to the proprietor of a hotel in that place.

From this point, all trace of the murderer was lost for several days, but Captain Couzins finally traced him to Baltimore and from there to Dover, Delaware, where his parents resided. Captain Couzins saw him on the streets during the daytime but feared that he would be taken from him by force by his friends. So, he waited until after midnight and then arrested him in bed at a hotel, gagged him so that he could not give an alarm, and took him twelve miles on a handcar, where he caught a train for the West. On a chair near Worrell's bed, the saddlebags were found, and in his pocket, Gordon's watch. Bruff was taken into custody about the same time at his home in Macon, Georgia.

Both Worrell and Bruff were indicted for the murder of Gordon in Warren County, Missouri, in May 1856, but the case was removed to the town of Union in Franklin County. In January 1857, a few days less than a year after the tragedy, the trial of Worrell began. After a hearing that lasted two weeks, the jury declared him guilty, and he was hanged in June 1857, his counsel having made a fruitless appeal to the Supreme Court.