This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Surnames: FORD, CROSSON Classification: Death Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/REX.2ACIB/3863.1 Message Board Post: Not related but may be of interest to someone who is. Vern D Transcribed by : "Dee Sardoc" <[email protected]> ///////////////////////////////////////////////// Stockton Daily Argus Stockton, San Joaquin Co., CA ************************* >>Monday, 20 Feb 1860<< STATEMENT of WILLIAM CROSSON -- We publish, by request, the following statement of William CROSSON, who was executed in the jail-yard in this city on Friday last, for the murder of William V. FORD: I went to Mr. FORD’s house with no bad intention. I would have passed by, but he spoke to me and bid me “good morning,” and then got up and came to the door. I told him I desired to see him about having a settlement, and he then motioned his hand and said in an angry manner, “Go away from here, or I’ll blow your brains out!” and then reached for his gun. I called to him and told him to stop, and that I did not come to harm him or want him to harm me. He would not stop, and when he got near where his gun stood, I drew my gun on him. I had double B shot in the left barrel and small duck shot in the other barrel. I aimed for his left arm and discharged the right barrel. As I did so he turned his breast in full range of the gun, and when I fired he fell. I immediately run to Mr. GREEN’s and informed him what I had done, and told him I wanted to give myself up. Mr. HENDERSON crossed the river with me, and when I got home I was so closely pursued that I rushed for the tules. Mr. HENDERSON met the men in pursuit of me and told them I had given myself up to him. They would have mobbed and hung me without Judge or Jury. I came into Stockton that night and surrendered myself into the hands of the officers. The day before the shooting, Mr. FORD told me that “if I did not sign a note, he would beat me until I *did* sign it,” and struck me 3 blows in the presence of Bill WOODALL. FORD had traded the account he claimed against me to Mr. BOWEN, the correctness of which I acknowledged, but afterwards promised to pay the amount to Mr. HARLAN. Some time afterwards, however, Mr. HARLAN’s hogs broke into my potato field and destroyed a considerable portion of my crop; and then I informed Mr. HARLAN that unless I was paid for my loss I should not pay him the account. About a year afterwards, FORD came to me for this account. I asked him if he would have to lose it. He replied that he would. I then told him to go with me to Mr. BOWEN, and let him clear me of responsibility to BOWEN and I would pay him, but he failed to do so, and I said nothing more to him. Last Fall, he sent for me to come to his house and I went and met him in the field, when he mentioned the a! ccount, and struck me. I had no more conversation with FORD until the day of the shooting, and made no threats of revenge against FORD for his treatment of me. I die conscious in my own heart of the absence of any intention to do FORD bodily injury until I found that in self-defense I was compelled to. I forgive all my enemies and hope they may meet me in a better world. I am reconciled to my fate, and God has had mercy on my soul. The kindest attention has been pid me in this jail by Mr. OVERTON, the jailor, and all the officers under whom I have been placed. I tender to them my dying thanks and hope they may be rewarded in heaven. To the clergy who have so faithfully visited me since the sentence of death was passed upon me, I tender my most grateful acknowledgements. May God bless every one of them. William CROSSON