Prince of Darkness by Shane White

Author:Shane White
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Published: 2015-08-17T16:00:00+00:00

Nine

The Trial

Ostensibly, the article Moses Beach published in his New York Sun on August 7, 1843, was about the Atlantic Insurance conspiracy case, but its content and language were so overwrought even the most casual of the paper’s many readers had to have sensed that a personal grudge was being settled. Two days previously the paper’s reporter had ended his account of the arrest of Hamilton and Bergen by promising “to ascertain who bailed the negro, that the public may be advised”—the person in question, as he now knew, was Benjamin Day, founder of the Sun and Moses Beach’s brother-in-law. Having reported this, the Sun’s man raised the then-vexing issue of “straw bail,” or whether the guarantor indeed had the wherewithal to pay the sum set by the judge. After glancing through court records, he estimated that Day had committed himself, in several different causes, to being liable for some $30,000 and “one thing is certain, if he should have the whole amount to pay, it might puzzle him a little to raise the ready cash, and would at all events, make something of a hole in his fortune.” As if this stricture about the newspaper founder’s promiscuous role as bail guarantor was not pointed enough, the writer offered Day very public advice about how he should behave.

The course lately pursued by Mr Day has given his friends no little pain. His intimacy and constant intercourse with this black fellow, and with a former police reporter by the name of Horatio S. Bartlett, the reciprocal sympathies and bosom friendship existing between the three, have caused deep regret on the part of the friends of Day. He has respectable connexions, and might by pursuing an elevated and honorable course of conduct, and being more careful about the company he keeps, maintain a respectable stand in society. But for some months past, Day, the negro, and Bartlett have been like the Siamese Twins, or perhaps we should say, like Siamese triplets. . . . Morning, noon, and night, have often found these loving friends together. The black fellow would call on his chaste friend Bartlett, and they both together would call on Day. Sometimes the order of calling would be reversed, and then again the three would be seen locked arm-in-arm and marching to and fro in the streets. Few hours ever passed over their heads without a meeting.

According to the article, Day’s relatives were grieving over his conduct, fearing that his honor would be “blunted” and his habits “contaminated” if he did not “cut loose from such associates.” Feigning concern, the reporter added: “We would in all kindness appeal to him as one not yet wholly lost, to have respect for the feelings of his friends and for himself.” In one final revelation about the events of the previous Friday after Hamilton’s arrest, he disclosed “Mr Day, the negro’s bail, also became the negro’s messenger,” delivering very late on that night Hamilton’s “impudent” letter to the Sun Beach had published on that Saturday.

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