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Modern Persecution, or Married Woman's Liabilities

From: Modern Persecution
Creator: Elizabeth P. W. Packard (author)
Date: 1873
Source: Available at selected libraries
Figures From This Artifact: Figure 1  Figure 2  Figure 3  Figure 4  Figure 5  Figure 6  Figure 7  Figure 8  Figure 9  Figure 10  Figure 11  Figure 12  Figure 13  Figure 14  Figure 15  Figure 16

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Page 18:

343  

So with Mrs. Packard. There is wanting every indication of insanity that is laid down in the books. I pronounce her a sane woman, and wish we had a nation of such women.

344  

This witness was cross-examined at some length, which elicited nothing new, when he retired.

345  

The defense now announced to the court that they had closed all the testimony they wished to introduce, and inasmuch as the case had occupied so much time, they would propose to submit it without argument. The prosecution would not consent to this arrangement.

346  

The case was argued ably and at length, by Messrs. Loomis and Bonfield for the prosecution, and by Messrs. Orr and Loring on the part of the defense.

347  

It would be impossible to give even a statement of the arguments made, and do the attorneys justice, in the space allotted to this report.

348  

On the 18th day of January, 1864, at 10 o'clock, p.m., the jury retired for consultation, under the charge of the sheriff. After an absence of seven minutes, they returned into court, and gave the following verdict:

349  

STATE OF ILLINOIS,
KANKAKEE COUNTY.

350  

"We, the undersigned, Jurors in the case of Mrs. Elizabeth P. W. Packard, alleged to be insane, having heard the evidence in the case, are satisfied that said Elizabeth P. W. Packard is SANE.

351  

JOHN SYILES, Foreman. H. HIRSHBERG.
DANIEL G. BEAN. NELSON JERVAIS.
F. G. HUTCHINSON. WILLIAM HYER.
Y. H. YOUNG. GEO. H. ANDREWS.
G. M. LYONS. J. F. MAFIT.
THOMAS MUNCEY. LEMUEL MILK.

352  

Cheers rose from every part of the house; the ladies waved their handkerchiefs, and pressed around Mrs. Packard, and extended her their congratulations. It was sometime before the outburst of applause could be checked. When order was restored, the counsel for Mrs. Packard moved the court, that she be discharged. Thereupon the court ordered the clerk to enter the following order:

353  

STATE OF ILLINOIS,
KANKAKEE COUNTY,

354  

It is hereby ordered that Mrs. Elizabeth P. W. Packard be relieved from all restraint incompatible with her condition as a sane woman.

355  

C. E. STARR,
Judge of the Twentieth Judicial District of the State of Illinois.

356  

January 18, 1864.

357  

Thus ended the trial of this remarkable case. During each day of the proceedings the court-room was crowded to excess by an anxious audience of ladies and gentlemen, who are seldom in our courts. The verdict of the jury was received with applause, and hosts of friends crowded upon Mrs. Packard to congratulate her upon her release.

358  

During the past six weeks, Mr. Packard had locked her up in her own house, fastened the windows outside, and carried the key to the door, and made her a close prisoner. He was maturing a plan to immure her in an Asylum in Massachusetts, and for that purpose was ready to start on the Thursday before the writ was sued out, when his plan was disclosed to Mrs. Packard by letters he accidentally left in her room, one of which was written by his sister in Massachusetts, telling him the route he should take, and that a carriage would be ready at the station to put her in and convey her to the Asylum.

359  

Vigorous action became necessary, and she communicated. this startling intelligence through her window to some ladies who had come to see her, and were refused admission into the house.

360  

On Monday morning, and before the defense had rested their case, Mr. Packard left the State, bag and baggage, for parts unknown, having first mortgaged his property for all it is worth to his sister and other parties.

361  

We cannot do better than close this report with the following editorial from the Kankakee Gazette, of January 21,1864:

362  

Mrs. Packard.

363  

The case of this lady, which has attracted so much attention and excited so much interest for ten days past, was decided on Monday evening, last, and resulted, as almost every person thought it must, in a complete vindication of her sanity. The jury retired on Monday evening, after hearing the arguments of the counsel; and after a brief consultation, they brought in a verdict that Mrs. Packard is a sane woman.

364  

Thus has resulted an investigation which Mrs. Packard has long and always desired should be had, but which her cruel husband has ever sternly refused her. She has always asked and earnestly pleaded for a jury trial of her case, but her relentless persecutor has ever turned a deaf ear to her entreaties, and flagrantly violated all the dictates of justice and humanity.

365  

She has suffered the alienation of friends and relatives -- the shock of a kidnapping by her husband and his posse when forcibly removed to the Asylum -- has endured three years incarceration in that Institution -- upon the general treatment in which there is severe comment in the State, and which, in her special case, was aggravatingly unpleasant and ill-favored -- and when at last returning to her home found her husband's saintly blood still congealed; a winter of perpetual frown on his face, and the sad, dull monotony of "Insane! Insane!" escaping his lips in all his communications to and concerning her -- her children, the youngest of the four at home being less than four years of age, over whose slumbers she had watched, and whose wailings she had hushed with all a mother's care and tenderness -- taught to look upon her as insane, and not to respect the counsels or heed the voice of a maniac just loosed from the Asylum, doom sealed by official certificates.

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