Text: Anonymous, “[Pym and the Mignonette],” Freeman's Journal and Daily Commercial Advertiser (Dublin, Ireland), vol. CXVIII, December 10, 1884, p. 5, col. 1

[page 5, column 1, continued:]

THE case of murder and cannibalism on board the Mignonette has resulted in the sentence of the captain and mate to death. The sentence will not, however, add another horror to a tragedy already sufficiently terrible, for the Queen's Bench backs up the recommendation of the jury that mercy be extended to the prisoners Thomas Dudley and Edwin Stephens killed and ate the flesh and drank the blood of the boy Parker while castaways from the wrecked Mignonette. They were all dying of thirst and starvation. They had exhausted the miserable can of turnips which they had succeeded in bringing aboard their little boat. In their extremity they killed the boy Parker, who was at the time dying from exhaustion, and the story of the deed recalls rather a hideous dream than anything which ever before was chronicled. A correspondent of the Times reprints the “Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym,” by the imaginative author, Edgar Allan Poe, and it seems to be a picture of what is deposed in a court of justice to have happened in the case of the crew of the Mignonette. Pym and others are dying of starvation in a castaway boat; and at last the crisis comes, and the dread question is put, which of them shall die to save the rest from death. Poe's description is worth reproducing in order to help to a realisation of the feelings dominating men at such a juncture. “Delay was no longer possible, and with a heart almost bursting from my bosom I advanced to the region of the forecastle, where my companions were awaiting me. I held out my hand with the splinters, and Peters immediately drew. He was free — his at least was not the shortest; and there was now another chance against my escape. I summoned up all my strength, and passed the lots to Augustus. He also drew immediately, and he also was free; and now, whether I should live or die, the chances were no more than precisely even. At this moment all the fierceness of the tiger possessed my bosom, and I felt towards my poor fellow-creature, Parker, the most intense, the most diabolical hatred. But the feeling did not last; and at length, with a convulsive shudder and closed eyes, I held out the two remaining splinters towards him. It was full five minutes before he could summon resolution to draw, during which period of heartrending suspense I never once opened my eyes. Presently one of the two lots was quickly drawn from my hand. The decision was then over, yet I knew not whether it was for me or against me. No one spoke, and still I dared not satisfy myself by looking at the splinter I held. Peters at length took me by the hand, and I forced myself to look up, when I immediately saw by the countenance of Parker that I was safe, and that he it was who had been doomed to suffer. Gasping for breath I fell senseless to the deck. I recovered from my swoon in time to behold the consummation of the tragedy in the death of him who had been chiefly instrumental in bringing it about. He made no resistance whatever, and was stabbed in the back by Peters, when he fell instantly dead.” It is a singular coincidence that in the story and the grim reality now concluded the names of the victims should be the same — Parker. The law holds that the men who killed the boy on this occasion were guilty of murder. They might, for instance, have hailed a passing vessel the next minute after they killed Parker, and he and they might have been saved, as they without him eventually were. But, under the terrible circumstances, although the men have been sentenced to death that sentence shall not be carried out. However, a term of imprisonment shall probably be inflicted, in order that the law, which holds human live inviolable, save in self-defence of the most extreme kind, may be vindicated.