Alexandria Gazette

Robbery and Murder at Rochester
Correspondence of the Jour. of Com.
ROCHESTER, N. Y., Oct. 24th, 1837.
I have to report to you one of the most outrageous transactions ever disgraced any country; and the first of its kind that ever disgraced this county since its organization about 9 o'clock. Mr. William Lyman, as he was returning from the land office and to his house on North Clinton street was shot down dead by in ten rods of his own door in which unnoticed he remained until this after daylight when he was discovered and a Coroner's inquest called immediately, who are now in session on the body. The ball entered under his upper jaw, and remains in the head. Mr. Lyman was calculating to cross the lake to Canada this day, and had with him about $4000, which fact, no doubt, the perpetrators of the foul deed had previous knowledge of. Fortunately, however the money was in his hat, and when Lyman fell, it being extremely dark, the hat rolled to some distance from the body, and was overlooked by the ruffians, and the money saved. The body was evidently dragged a few rods from where it first fell, near to a fence, where the pockets were rifled of their contents, watch &c. The act was committed in a thickly settled part of the city, and the report of the gun was heard by a number, yet no one thought of any thing like what had happened, nor was any thing known by our citizens concerning it until about 6 o'clock this morning The facts above related, may not be exactly correct, but as nearly so as the excited state of things will allow of. Mr Lyman was formerly from Northampton, Mass., and came here three years since.
W.
P. S.-Eleven o'clock, A. M-The supposed murderers, three in number, are arrested. Just as the Western train of cars was about to leave for Batavia this morning, suspicion fell upon three individuals, who had paid their fare and gone on board the cars, and who were instantly secured. They are now before the Police Magistrates, undergoing an examination. Report says Lyman's watch was found on one of them; so that justice is likely soon to overtake these wretches in human shape.