The Wheeling Repository

Zanesville, Ohio, April 30.

The trial of Johnson, who was indicted last term for Manslaughter, came on this day before the court of Common Pleas. It appeared from the testimony on the part of the state, that the prisoner and the deceased [Anthony Sills] were planting corn in the same field, but in different parties, and in different parts of the field. The deceased, about noon, had a quarrel with a small boy, brother-in-law to the prisoner, and had chased him with a hoe to beat him. There had been a previous quarrel between the prisoner and the deceased, and when the deceased pursued the boy, he shook the hoe at the prisoner, damned him for a poor C--d, and said that hoe should do for him yet. As the prisoner went to his dinner, the deceased damned him for a pitiful C--d, to keep out of his sight,—he hated to look at him; and in the afternoon hallooed across the field, and repeated the same expression. About two hours before sun-down, the deceased observed to his company that the other party were quarrelling, and he would go over, and have a fight. They advised him to stay where he was; but he swore that when he had a mind to do any thing, the Almighty himself should not stop him; and immediately went over to the party where the prisoner was, began to abuse him, called him a pitiful C--d, and challenged him to fight.—

The father of the prisoner forbid the deceased coming into the field; but the deceased immediately jumped over the fence, and swore he would go where he pleased. He then seized a fence stake, and made towards the prisoner's father, old Johnson. The old man threatened him with his hoe; but the deceased swore he wanted no weapon for such an old man, threw down the stake, and walked towards the old man, who struck at him with the hoe as soon as he came within his reach. The deceased wrested the hoe from old Johnson, threw him down, and made at the prisoner, who during all this time had stood still at his plough.

The prisoner then snatched a hoe, and about two steps from the plough met the deceased. They struck several times at each other with the hoes; but which made the first attempt to strike, was not ascertained. The prisoner at length struck the deceased on the head, and made him stagger. As he fell, the prisoner gave him two more strokes on the head. Of one, or all, of these blows he died.—It was stated by one witness, that after the quarrel had commenced, but before the day on which Sills was killed, the prisoner had said, that he would never fight Sills, but if Sills attacked him he would kill him.

The prisoner examined two or three witnesses, who proved that the deceased was a most turbulent, quarrelsome, and dangerous man, a pest to every neighbourhood where he had lived. It appeared also in evidence, that the prisoner was a man of a mild, peaceable, and unoffending disposition.

The defence of the prisoner was rested on two grounds: First, that from the nature of the attack, and the character of the deceased, he could not have retreated without manifest danger. Secondly, that the provocation he had received was so great, as to excuse a man for not acting with that scrupulous caution which in ordinary cases is required.

The jury were out about an hour, when they returned with a verdict of not guilty.