The number of men who are driven to crime through drink is something
terrible, and I should think that no temperance worker could read the
real histories of the murderers who have come under my hands without
redoubling his efforts to save men from the curse of drink. A case in
point was Arthur Delaney, executed at Chesterfield on August 10th,
1888. It may be said that he was naturally a bad, violent man, but
surely he would never have become a murderer if he had not consistently
made himself worse and worse by hard drinking. His victim was his
wife, to whom he had been married four years, and who was spoken of as
a respectable, hard-working woman. Not very long after the marriage,
in a drunken fit, he violently assaulted her, for which action the
magistrates imposed a fine and granted a separation order. His wife,
however, forgave him, and in spite of his bad behaviour continued to
live with him. A few days before the murder he was unusually violent,
and treated his wife so brutally that she was obliged to again appeal
to the magistrates, who again imposed a fine. This raised Delaney's
anger to such an extent that the next time he got drunk he battered his
wife so violently that she had to be removed to the hospital, where she
died. Like many other culprits, Delaney saw the cause of the mischief
when it was done; and a letter written after his sentence, has a ring
of simple earnestness about it that makes it worth preserving. It was
written to some Good Templars who had tried to reform him.
H.M. Prison, Derby,
_August 8th, 1888_.
My Dear Friends,
I write you farewell on this earth, but hope with gods great
mercy to meet you all there, were there will be no more sorrow or
temptation. I do sincerely thank you for your kindness to me, and
hope that my fall will be the means of, with god's help of lifting
others up from a drunkard's grave. Had I followed your advise my
poor wife would been alive now, and we should have been happy, for
she was a faithful and good wife to me. God knows that I should not
have done such a dreadful crime if I had kept my pledge, but hope
it will be a warning to those that play with the devil in solution.
Will you tell ----to give his heart to god, and he will be safe
from his great curse, the drink. Bid him and his wife farewell for
me, and tell him to put all his powers to work to help the Noble
work of Temperance onward, for it is God's work. Oh! do implore
them that is playing with the drink to abstain from it, for it is a
national curse. Now farewell to you all, and may God prosper your
noble work.
From your unfortunate friend,
ARTHUR T. DELANEY.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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