Wilson.E.K.1899-p1.Laurel.COURT

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			People vs E.K. Wilson
			        1899
			       PART 1
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Reprinted with permission  of the Laurel County Historical Society 
from their book "Excerpts from the Mountain Echo 1899" Copyright 1996
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January 27, 1899

A sensation that had been smoldering and brewing in London the past 
four weeks burst forth with all its hideousness and desolating fury 
upon the peaceful inhabitants of our usually quiet little mountain 
city last Saturday and Sunday. It was the exposure of one of the most 
hideous, black and damnable crimes that ever disgraced our favorite 
town or blacked the record of our court.  It was the story of the 
bewitching conduct of a wiley, cultured, daring and handsome young 
barrister, the betrayal, seduction, ruin and agonizing death of a 
sweet, innocent, confiding, pretty, though unlettered young lady and 
servant girl at the Catching Hotel.

The young man implicated and charged with the crime is none less than 
Mr. E. K. Wilson, who, though he has been a citizen of our county only 
about nine years, has been honored more than once by the good people of 
this county, at one time chosen by the suffrage of the people to preside 
over the interests of the county as its legal adviser and representative 
as County Attorney, and came within a few votes of being called to
preside 
over the county as its chief officer, County Judge.

The young lady who met with such a sad misfortune and tragic death was 
Miss Mary E. Cloyd, daughter of Mr. Thomas Cloyd, who resides near
McWhorter, 
this county, twelve miles north of London, but who has been serving in
the 
capacity of a cook at the Catching Hotel for the past two and a half
years. 

According to the proof advanced at the examining trial the facts and 
Circumstances are about as follows:

About two years ago Mr. Wilson began paying his respects to Miss Cloyd 
in the capacity of a sweetheart and continued to do so regularly about 
once a week, some time not so often, and sometimes oftener, calling on 
her in the parlor of the hotel, where Mr. Wilson was a border and where 
the girl was a domestic, Mr. Wilson, all the while using every means 
known to the wiles of man to accomplish his purpose to have carnal 
knowledge of her and her ruin. Finally, yielding to his persuasive 
genius and under the solemn promise of marriage, she yielded to his 
lusty desires and her ruin and death followed. Mr. Wilson's confession, 
the girls dying declaration, substantiated by a volume of other evi-
dences is insurmountable proof belief the girl was a pure girl up to 
the time of his knowledge of her, that he had given her medicine and 
that with his own hands, after she had refused to use it he had used 
the instrument which caused her death. This interview closed, this 
meeting ended by Mr. Wilson saying that before he would be forced to 
marry the girl he would kill himself. With this Mr. Wilson left the 
room, the town, the county and was never again seen in our county 
until last Sunday morning when he was arrested by the authorities in 
Madison county at Richmond and brought back here under the charge of 
murder. The dying declaration of the girl, made in the presence of 
Mrs. McLear, and  Drs. Ramsey and Pennington was in substance as 
follows: 

That she was 25 years of age, that no other man save Mr. Wilson knew 
her carnally, that he accomplished her ruin under the most solemn 
promise of marriage, that Mr. Wilson was the father of her unborn 
child, that he had given her twelve pills with directions how to use 
them, one three times a day, that she took seven of them, that two days 
later about Dec. 27, Mr. Wilson told her that the pills might bring her 
all right, but that she did not want to run any risk, that he wanted to 
use an instrument, that he inserted it into the uterus by the use of a 
wire, cut it off  leaving a portion of it in the uterus, and by this 
produced abortion ,  caused her  illness and destroyed her life.
Dr. Pennington  assisted by Dr. Ramsey, attended the girl during her 
entire sickness and everything known to medical science was done to 
save her life.

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Contributed by Rita Stanifer Maggard <rmaggard@skn.net>
Date: Tue, 21 May 1997