LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume IV, Issue 412, 7 October 1875, Page 3

LITERATURE.

A FORGOTTEN TRAGEDY. A REMINISCENCE OF A MURDER PERPETRATED FIFTY YEARS AGO. Wandering among the graves in the ccmetry at Frankfort, a correspondent of the Cincinnati Commercial found a dark grey monument bearing the name of Solomon P. Sharp. The inscription states that he ‘ was assassinated while extending the hand of hospitality, on the morning of Nov. 7th, 1825, in the 38th year of his age,’ with the text added, ‘ What thou knowest now, thou shalt know hereafter. ’ Colonel Sharp was in his clay one of the foremost men of Kentucky. During the administration of James Madison he had served two terms in Congress, at which time he was the room mate and intimate friend of John C. Calhoun, who is said to have declared that Sharp was ‘ the oldest man of his age that had ever crossed the mountains.’ He 1 had previously been several times elected to the Kentucky Legislature, and under Governor Adair was Attorney-General of the State. At the time of his death he had settled in Frankfort, as a very successful lawyer, but had recently been again elected to the Legislature as the champion of the * relief party. ’ The * relief ’ and ‘ antirelief ’ controversy, of which I shall not attempt to sketch a history—had been for some time agitating the State, and the fact that Colonel Sharp was regarded as a chief exponent of the relief movement, and that the session of the Legislature was to begin on the clay following his assassination, lent a peculiar emphasis to the excitement that followed. The story of his death with its cause and consequences, I have learned from several contemporary personal sources. But first let me say, fronting the capital square in Frankfort, on its northern side, and only a few steps eastward from the Frankfort and Louisville railway, is a large dark leadcoloured brick mansion three stories in height, extending far back, with ample accommodation for the slave help of ‘ the good old times.’ This house is perhaps nearly sixty years old, and was the house of Colonel Solomon P. Sharp in 1825.

A few years previous Sharp had met a young lady named Ann Eliza Cook, and

he had seduced her. She was a young lady of good family, of fair cultivation, and some literary talent. He met her at a party, I believe, and it was under the excitement of the dancing and the wine perhaps, that Miss Cook yielded herself to him. After her disgrace became known, she had secluded herself at home, but it seems that a young lawyer, named Jereboam C. Beauchamp, also of respectable family, happened to see her, and falling in love with her, succeeded in obtaining her promise to become his wife on condition that he should kill Col. Sharp. This promise was made—the marriage took place. Some time—a year or two perhaps—passed, and Sharp still remained alive. Perhaps the trouble would have passed and been forgotten, had not the seduction been mentioned as against Sharp’s character during the warm political campaign in which lie was elected to the Legislature. On this charge being brought against him, Col. Sharp treated it slightly, and stated in public, it is said, that a certificate was in evidence that tiiis child born of Miss Cook had a black face. This added insult to the original injury, and the secret writing of Beauchamp’s promise came out distinctly at its breath. The Sunday evening before the General Assembly met, Beauchamp (who lived in another part of the State) entered Frankfort and, finding the hotels full, put up at the private house of a gentleman named Scott, two or three squares south of Sharp’s residence. Late at night he went around to the house in which Sharp resided, the large old brick building which I have mentioned, and, going to a side door (though others say it was to the front door), he knocked. Sharp was awakened, and asked who was there. Beauchamp answered by giving the name of one familiar to Sharp—in another part of the State, where the latter formerly lived—but changing the second initial of this person’s name, saying, ‘John A. Covington,’ and requesting to see him at once on important business. ‘ I know J ohn W. Covington, ’ said Sharp, deliberately opening the door and advancing into the open air and darkness. Beauchamp at once lifted a mask which he wore, saying ‘ Don’t you know me, colonel ?’

‘ My God ! it’s B exclaimed Sharp, but did not succeed in pronouncing his enemy’s name before the latter struck him upon his mouth with his left hand and stabbed him to the heart with the right. Col. Sharp was found dead on his doorstep. Beauchamp returned to his lodging and left town early in the morning, without being suspected, I believe. It is related that on approaching his home he conveyed to his wife the intelligence of the deed accomplished by waving his handkerchief aloft in the distance.

The death of Col. Sharp produced a profound sensation in Frankfort and throughout the State. The Legislature offered SOOOdo’s. for the detection and apprehension of the murderer. There was a disposition to make political capital out of the affair, too, I am told, and to make believe the assassination to have been in the interest of the anti-relief party. One of the Frankfort editors of the time was darkly charged with accessory knowledge—and some were not indisposed, I believe, to have him arrested. It was through this editor I have been told—l think his name was Darby—that Beauchamp was finally pointed out and arrested, Sharp’s family, it is said, showing an indisposition to touch him, and thus make hopelessly public the cause of the act. But Beauchamp was finally brought to trial and sentenced to be hung. During the interval between the sentence and its exeerrtion great efforts were made in his behalf, delegations of ladies dressed in mourning even going to the Governor of Kentucky, and a son of the Governor, Isaac B. Desha, was imprisoned at the time, convicted of a highway robbery near Maysville. It was presumed young Desha would be pardoned —as he afterwards was—and it was urged that the Governor might do a gracious thing, lightening his selfish act of clemency, by pardoning Beauchamp and his son together. But ho was inflexible. Political revenge, perhaps, it is said, had to be gratified. The day of execution came, A short time before the hour designated, request was made by Beauchamp that his wife might be permitted to remain with him alone in his cell (it seems they were very tenderly attached to each other), for the purpose of their last leave-taking, and this privilege was granted After a while, as the time fixed for the execution was at hand, the officers entered the prison cell and found the wife dying with the wound of a pen- knife in her breast, and the husband himself also fatally stabbed. They had determined to elude the law and die together. But, as the time for the execution had come, Beauchamp was taken in his dying condition and hung. The bodies of the husband and wife were removed to their home, and buried together. Subsequently this tragic romance of real life was made the basis of a novel, which was largely bought up, it is said, by Sharp’s friends. Later, about eighteen years ago, a drama was written by John Savage, the Irish poet, founded on the Beauchamp history, and was on the point of being produced at Louisville. ‘ I was at the Louisville theatre that night, I remember,’a lady in Kentucky told me; ‘it was in September, 1859. The theatre was very full. I forget the name of the play, but it was understood that its incidents were taken from the Beauchamp tra-(i-edy, and Avonia Jones was to have the principal part. The curtain was about to rise, everybody was in expectation, when it was announced that a change of the programme had' been determined upon, and the “ Bride of Lammermoor,” I believe—something, at least, from one of Walter Scott’s novels —was played instead. Governor Morehead, it was understood, had come down on the evening train from Frankfort, just in time to prevent the play, offering a large sum of money on behalf of the Sharp family to have it'withdrawn and not produced in Kentucky. There was great excitement ; many insisted on leaving the theatre and having their admission money refunded, I remember.’