Stone, Courier Journal, November 28, 1896

Feeling At Mayfield

Has Not Abated Against Stone--Little Doubt of His Guilt.

Mayfield Ky., Nov. 27.--(Special)-- The feeling here against Jim Stone, held for the outrage Monday night on Mrs. J. M. R. Green, one of the most highly respected women in the city, is still very strong, and if the negro is brought back here there will surely be a hanging. The story told by Stone to Pr--- effect that Mrs. Green says he is not the man who outraged her is wholly without foundation. The Courier-Journal correspondent has just had a conversation with C. H. McNutt, Chief of Police here, and he says “Mrs. Green has never made any such statement. There was no light in the room when the deed was committed, and she can not positively identify him as her assailant, but the circumstantial evidence is so strong and he has contradicted himself so often as to his whereabouts on the nihgt [sic] of the assault that few here doubt his guilt. Although he lives three miles from town, he was seen only a short time before the crime was committed by at least six persons. He has served a term in the prison for forgery and is known and recognized as a thoroughly depraved negro. The citizens here are not anxious to hang him merely as an example, as reported, but because they believe that he committed the deed with which he is chaged [sic]. 

If he is brought back here there is little doubt he will be summarily dealt with.