The last act in the drama is finished. Charles H. Goslaw is no more. The stern demands of the law have been satisfied, and the crime of last January has ben terribly expiated.
Goslaw was the emodiment of physical strength. He looked more like a prize-fighter than anything else. Standing 5 feet, 5 inches in his stocking feet, his weight when in ordinary condition, was over 200 pounds. Around the waist he measured 37 inches. Broad-shouldered, deep-chested and short-necked, with square, massive jaws, and aggressive chin, a low, broad forehead, slightly retreating, and closely cropped black hair, he have one the impression of being a man who would resent a real or fancied injury by a sudden appeal to his muscular energies. And yet his countenance bore such an expression of good nature as to warrant a belief in the minds of many that he would not premeditate nor carry out any plan of revenge by which the life of a human being as a possible sequence, might be sacrificed. His very strength was his curse and the cause of his troubles. Had Grant been a man of ordinary build and muscular development it is more than probable that the assault would have had no fatal or even dangerous effect. The whole career of Goslaw, as well as the character of the man, say his friends, goes to show that the bare contemplation of the murder of a fellow being was foreign to his thoughts. But words upon this subject are useless; regrets are vain. In a moment of passion, with a brain crazed by liquor he forgot his power, he ceased to remember the weakness of the man who opposed him. Let his sad ending point its own moral.
IS IT FATE?
Some Very Peculiar Cases in the Annals of Crime.
Was it fatality that he should meet his death in much the same manner as the Mexican who was flung from the bridge? Or is it mere coincidence, and are all the cases above cited a series of coincidences? Let those answer who can.
HIS WONDERFUL NERVE.
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Smiling In the Very Shadow of Death
--His Belief.
...At 11 o'clock the cell was filled with people, officers, reporters and friends of the man about to die. At 11:15 he remarked to County Recorder Owen: "This is but a dream. I shall awake a few moments afterward and then all pain and trouble will be over."
...The noose was adjusted by Sheriff Sweigert, and then in a twinkling the black cap was drawn over his head. No sooner had this operation been performed than Goslaw instinctively moved one foot off the trap. At this moment he was fighting for his life. Quick as a flash Sheriff Sweigert had replaced the foot. "Lord Jesus, I love you," called the priests, and then there came a rough, grating sound as the body shot downward. One convulsive movement of the chest and then the earthly remains of Charles Goslaw hung limp, motionless, inanimate. Everything had worked to the satisfaction of the officers. Sheriff Sweigert and his deputies had performed an unpleasant duty speedily and well. At 11:47 o'clock, three minutes earlier than programme time, the sentence of the law had been carried into effect.
Goslaw dropped six feet nine inches, and his neck was broken instantly. County Physician Hammond seized his right wrist and Dr. Curnow his left, while Drs. Seifert and Pierce with their watches timed the pulse. At the end of the first minute the pulse was 80, the second, 83; the third, 95; the fourth, 66; the fifth, 143; the sixth, 160, and almost imperceptible: the seventh, uncertain and could hardly be counted; the eighth, 80; the ninth, 82, and very faint; the tenth gone from the left wrist; the eleventh, beat very slow and faint; the twelfth dropped; the thirteenth, heart almost entirely still; the fourteenth, the stethoscope placed on the chest as near as possible to the heart failed to detect the slightest pulsation. At the expiration of the fifteenth minute the Doctors pronounced Goslaw dead.
Sheriff Sweigert -- Let him hang three minutes yet.
Dr. Seifert -- It could not have been done better. I think his neck is broken.
Dr. Carnow -- Yes, I think it is.
At this juncture Jailor Caldwell unstrapped his hands.
Sheriff Sweigert -- Let him hang a couple minutes yet.
Several drops of blood ran out of his left ear, trickling down his neck, and those standing very close and in front of him observed that his throat was cut by the rope. Having been tightly drawn it had kept the black cap from covering the left side of his neck and the left ear. The flesh thus exposed to view was of a pale, ashen color, while the rim of the ear was blue. His hands, which were also exposed were ashen and clammy and the nails assumed a dark blue, almost black. A by-stander lifted the black cap a little and it was observed that the lips were much swollen and discolored. At the expiration of the twenty first minute the rope was cut and the inanimate body laid upon a stretcher, provided by Messrs. Trueman & Woodrow, the undertakers who were employed to take charge of the body. The rope was removed from his neck and a large ghastly cut about three inches long was plainly visible across the throat, from which the blood gushed out, running in a stream from the stretcher to the ground. The black cap was removed entirely and, with the exception of the mouth, the face appeared natural. The doctors examined the neck and pronounced it broken.
The stretcher was picked up and carried into the jailer's bed room, where Dr. Curnow had in readiness an apparatus to experiment on his resuscitation, but it was deemed useless to carry it out....
GOSLAW'S CAREER.
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The First of a Large Family to
Break the Law.
When he reached the age of two years his father moved to a farm in Franklin county, the same State, where Goslaw's early life was spent. When he was 18 years of age he left the farm and began braking on the railroads in northern New York, at which he worked continuously until he started for California, in the year 1878.
In 1876 Goslaw married Miss Emma Loraine McAbee of Malone, New York, and in 1878 they moved to Los Gatos in this country, where they have ever since resided, with but two brief exceptions, one being about a year and a half's residence in San Francisco, and the other a six months residence at Boulder Creek, in Santa Cruz county.
During his stay in California Goslaw was engaged in various kinds of business, chiefly carpentering, hotel-keeping and the moving of buildings, being engaged in the latter prior to his unfortunate attack on H. A. Grant.
He has two brothers residing in San Francisco, one, James Goslaw, now working in the Washington Brewery, and the other, John Goslaw, a driver on the Sutter-street car line. The rest of his brothers and sisters reside in Franklin county, New York.
Besides his wife, Goslaw leaves two children, a girl of eight and a boy of two years of age.
To a MERCURY representative Goslaw declared that he was the first of the family, as far back as he could recollect, that had ever been brought before a Court of Justice or accused of any crime whatever, and that this was his first experience as a law-breaker, unintentional though it was.
...The fatal difficulty for which Goslaw has paid the death penalty occurred in the town of Los Gatos at 7:30 o'clock on the evening of Wednesday, the 19th day of January of the present year, in the house of Henry A. Grant, the murdered man, who lived alone in a small frame building on Johnson avenue. Grant was over 60 years of age, of small and feeble frame. He had lived for years in San Jose prior to his taking up his residence in Los Gatos, and at one time had been associated with Con Brown in house moving business.
Exactly what took place between Grant and Goslaw there was no one but themselves to explain...
Its unfortunate in all of this, that there are not the details about H. A. Grant's life to the extent that there are about his attacker's.
