AND LYNCH LAW.

Auckland Star, Volume I, Issue 190, 18 August 1870, Page 2

AND LYNCH LAW.

WIFE-MURDER We learn the particulars of a savage and brutal affair, which occurred at Medoc, a small town in Jasper county, Missouri, from a correspondent of the Kanzas City Journal. The man's name who perpetrated the foul deed is A. D- Taylor. He was taken from the custody of the constable by the citizens ot Medoc and hung about 10 o'clock on the evening of the 29th of May. The following are the facts as stated by this correspondent: " For some months past Taylor has been almost daily in the habit of whipping and otherwise abusing his wife (who is said to be a most estimable lady). His abuse of his wife has been growing more and more aggravated and severe, until Friday night last, when it seems he turned a fiend, and began to abuse her in a most brutal and outrageous manner—first by kicking and cuffing ; then he struck her to the floor, and stamped her with his heels. " After punishing her in this way until he was tired, he took a butcher-knife an i cut her hair short. Still growing more and more devilish, he broke a gridiron to shivers over her head. Then with a knife, he began to torture her by hacking her in the face and breast, until ho had literally cut her breast and face into slices, and, to make the tortures more severe, stabbed her in different parts of the body with an old pair of scissoi*3. He seemed to kill her by degrees. During all this time he kept up his kicking, cuffing, and stamping, and by the time his fury was abated he had inflicted such horrible wounds that life was almost extinct. " Several of the citizens, hearing the cries of the woman, were attracted to the place. On finding that they had discovered what ho had been doing, and fearing that they would take measures to punish him, he fled to the woods near by, where lie kept himself concealed until Sunday morning, when he called at Mr. Robert Wallace's farm house, and asked for some breakfast. Mr. Wallace, having beard what hadjoccurred on Friday night, in I knowing that there was a writ in the hands of the constable for his arrest, took it upon himself to arrest him, took him to town and delivered biin into the hands of the constable.

"The citizens, in the meantime hearing of the outrage and of the critical condition of his wife, became more and more enraged, arid by evening begau to show signs of violence, Several citizens were summoned to assist to guard him from violence. About half-past nine, the constable decided to move the prisoner to Justice Anderson's house, some two miles distant, for safe keeping, and for trial on the morrow. After having gone about a mile with the prisoner, a 2)oSse ot about thirty armed men came up, took Taylor and hanged him to a tree, where he remained until this forenoon. He wa3 then taken down and brought to town. When I saw his body, it was lying in his own office. " His wife, all cut and bruised from head to foot, was still alive on Monday. It is nrobable that she will not recover."