Hong Di Dead

Hanged by an Infuriated Mob in Barbarous Colusa.

Shocking Lawlessness on the Part of the Populace—A Case for Investigation.

COLUSA, July 10.—The jury in the Hong Di case brought in a verdict of murder in the first degree, fixing the penalty at imprisonment for life. There was an exciting scene in the court‐room when the verdict was announced, the Judge being obliged to place his hand on his pistol to protect himself. The Court‐house was finally cleared and Hong Di taken to the bridge leading to the jail. The jail door at the further end of the bridge was opened and the criminal told to run for his life. He needed no second bidding, but glided with lightning rapidity into the jail. Persons below intended to shoot him as he crossed the bridge, but he was too quick for them.

HONG DI HANGED.

A mob was formed which finally captured the jail and took the prisoner out and hanged him. The following account of the affair is told by an Associated Press dispatch: A mob of 150 men attacked the jail at 12:10 this morning. They entered the jail, surrounded Sheriff Beville and demanded Hong Di.

FINDING THE PRISONER.

The doors of the Sheriff’s office were closed and search was begun for the prisoner. In the bed‐room a trap‐door was found and food and Chinese shoes were at once discovered. Hong Di was immediately found in this cellar and was brought forth. He was greeted by scores of excited voices and a hundred puffs, the barrels of which gleamed in the moonlight. The Chinaman was taken a little over a block to the west of the jail, where a stop was made at Tim Sullivan’s livery stable and a rope procured, which was tied by a hangman’s knot around Hong Di’s neck.

WEAVER QUESTIONS THE DOOMED.

A buggy was in waiting, and as the mob proceeded from this point the buggy followed. They proceeded through Chinatown, which was as quiet as the grave. Weaver was in the crowd which followed and came forward with considerable excitement.

“Did I not give you a razor and many other things?” asked Weaver, in a tone of surprised passion.

“Yes,” said the Chinaman, as though he were repeating a lesson he had learned by rote.

“What did you shoot me for then?”

Without pause or emotion to give the Chinaman time to reply, then he asked sharply, “What did you shoot Mrs. Billiou for?”

The wretched convict stammered a few unintelligible words and then gasped out: “I was drunk with whiskey.”

Weaver then said: “What did you tell Mrs. Billiou for, that when you threw some clothes on the floor and she said ‘Hong, shall I whip you for that,’ and you told her if she did you would kill her?”

Promptly Hong replied: “I never said it.”

NO ACCOMPLICE.

“Who helped you to kill Mrs. Billiou? Did you tell any one beforehand what you were going to do?”

The terror-stricken Chinaman replied: “No one.”

“Did you tell Mrs. Billiou that J. H. Coster was going to be killed?”

“No,” was the answer; “I never said that.”

The Mongol looked a moment at the rope, set faces of the crowd, and the rifles which gleamed in the moonlight.

The captain of the vigilantes now stepped forward and demanded room in order to swing the rope. When the leader saw that he had the attention of the crowd, he said: “Now, gentlemen, the rope goes up, but don’t shoot until I give the order.”

THE LAW OUTRAGED.

There was a quick, strong pull, and the body of Hong Di swung in the air. As his feet cleared the ground he threw his hands up and clung with desperate grip to the rope just above his head. He hung in this way for several moments, his face showing the terrible fear that possessed him; but his weak arms soon relaxed, his hands fell and he remained hanging, swinging slowly from side to side.

Several excited men made attempts to fire bullets into the body of the murderer, but they were prevented from accomplishing that purpose. After hanging about seven minutes he was lowered and calls were made for a doctor. Dr. Gray stepped forward and said that his heart was still beating. He was again hailed up and allowed to hang for ten minutes longer.

CHEERS FOR THE LAW-BREAKERS.

Meanwhile three cheers and a tiger were given for Weaver. Groans continued were given for the jury, and several protests were uttered in favor of the guilty were enthusiastically received, but the material was lacking, and it was suggested that he had already been whipped by a woman, and that was glory enough for one day.

Soon after he was fired until the captain ordered it. When the Chinaman was suspended three cheers for W. T. Beville, the Sheriff, were proposed for the faithful performance of his official duty and were responded to by the representative men of not only the town, but the county also.

THE CORONER’S JURY.

A verdict that, in effect, the jury should also have been hanged.

Special to the Mail

SACRAMENTO, July 14.—A Colusa special to the Bee says: Colusa went wild with joy after the lynching. The jury were hanged and burned in effigy, and crowds paraded the streets singing and cheering. There is but one feeling in the community this morning, and that is of unqualified approval of the act and universal condemnation of the jury. The Coroner’s jury this morning found that Hong Di came to his death by hanging at the hands of unknown men, and that the deed was brought about without the verdict of the jury brought in yesterday, which outraged the memory of a Christian woman; which prostituted law and savored of perjury. The Coroner’s jury condemns the system of trial by jury as lacking in moral elements. The verdict is the strongest ever returned in this county and exalts universal adulation.