(Thanks to Robert Elder of Last Words of the Executed — the blog, and the book — for the guest post. This post originally appeared on the Last Words blog. Fans of this here site are highly likely to enjoy following Elder’s own pithy, almanac-style collection of last words on the scaffold. -ed.)
I don’t hold it against all you folks because you have condemned me without a fair trial. I don’t even hold it against the jury. Ignorance is not the fault of the ignorant. I don’t even have any malice for the courts although they defied all laws in affirming my case. I forgive all of you. You loved the girls. You let your desire for revenge overshadow your sense of justice.
-Earl Quinn, convicted of murder, Oklahoma. Executed November 24, 1933.
Quinn was described as a “one-time alcohol runner” by the Associated Press, but few other details survive except the names of his victims: schoolteacher sisters Jessie and Zexia Griffith.
On this day..
- 851: Saints Flora and Maria of Cordoba, militants
- 1793: Francois de Laverdy, former Controller-General
- 1883: The martyrs of Quequeña and Yarabamba
- 1440: The Black Dinner
- 1950: Norman Goldthorpe, knot botch
- 1964: Glen Sabre Valance, the last hanged in South Australia
- 1879: Phra Pricha
- 1868: Giuseppe Monti and Gaetano Tognetti, by the Papal guillotine
- 2009: Zhang Yujun and Geng Jinping, for tainted milk
- 1326: Hugh Despenser the Younger, King Edward II's lover?
- 1922: Robert Erskine Childers, for carrying the gun of Michael Collins
- 1740: Not William Duell