This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Classification: Query Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/4kB.2ACI/1870.1 Message Board Post: While going through my moms Dittie Parker Lewis' records I found this which might be connected. The first case in which the death penalty was used was Feb 1887. The affidavit reads: "The District Court of Henderson County and State of Texas upon this oath presents that Robert Giles alias Chinah Giles, on the first day of October AD 1886 did then and there with malice aforethought kill one Albert Williams by striking him with an axe, club, bludgenon or some kind of instrument to the grand jurors unknown and against the peace and diginity of the state." J J Faulk District Attorney