Life and bloody career of the executed criminal, James Copeland, the great Southern land piratePitts, J. R. S. (James Robert Soda)
History
Life and bloody career of the executed criminal, James Copeland, the great Southern land pirate
Pitts, J. R. S. (James Robert Soda)
Copeland, James, 1823-1857; Criminals -- Gulf States -- Biography
At the September term of said Court, in the year A. D. 1857, on
Wednesday of the term, it being the 16th day of the month, James
Copeland was taken to the Bar of the Court and arraigned upon an
indictment, found by the following Grand Jury at the March term,
1857, to-wit: John McCallum, Lemuel Strahan, John W. Carter, Allen
Travis, Lewis H. Watts, James Chappell, G. W. Rawls, Wm. Jenkins,
Peter McDonald, Malachi Odom, Joseph G. Young, James M. Bradler, Sr.,
Stephen Smith, Wm. Hinton, Edmund Merritt, Sidney Hinton, Joseph T.
Breeland, Henry Dearman, Lorenzo Batson and John Fairley, Foreman—which
indictment was as follows:
STATE OF MISSISSIPPI, }
PERRY COUNTY. }
_In the Circuit Court of Perry County—At March Term, 1857._
The Grand Jurors for the State of Mississippi, summoned, empanneled,
sworn, and charged to inquire in and for the State of Mississippi, and
in and for the body of the county of Perry, upon their oath, present,
that James Copeland, late of said county, on the 15th day of July, Anno
Domini, one thousand eight hundred and fifty-eight, with force and arms
in the county of Perry aforesaid, in upon one James A. Harvey, then
and there being in the peace of God and the said State of Mississippi,
feloniously, wilfully and of his malice aforethought, did make an
assault; and that the said James Copeland, a certain shot gun, then
and there loaded and charged with gun powder and divers leaden shot,
which shot gun, so loaded and charged he, the said James Copeland, in
both his hands, then and there, had and held, to, at, against and upon
the said James A. Harvey, then and there feloniously, wilfully and of
the malice aforethought of him, the said James Copeland, did shoot
off, and discharge; and that the said James Copeland, with the leaden
aforesaid, out of the shot gun aforesaid, then and there by force of
the gun powder, shot and sent forth as aforesaid, the said James A.
Harvey, in and upon the left side of him the said James A. Harvey, then
and there feloniously, wilfully and of the malice aforethought of him,
the said James Copeland, did strike, penetrate and wound, giving to
the said James A. Harvey, then and there, with the leaden shot so as
aforesaid, discharged and sent forth, out of the shot gun aforesaid,
by the said James Copeland, in and upon the left side of him, the said
James A. Harvey, a little below the left shoulder of him the said James
A. Harvey, divers mortal wounds of the depth of three inches, and of
the breadth of one quarter of an inch, of which the said mortal wounds,
the said James A. Harvey, from the fifteenth day of July in the year
aforesaid, until the twenty-fifth day of July in the year aforesaid,
languished, and languishing did live; on which said twenty-fifth day
of July in the year aforesaid, the said James A. Harvey in the county
of Perry aforesaid, of the mortal wounds aforesaid, died; and the
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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