Beauchamp-Sharp Tragedy

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Jereboam O. Beauchamp murders Solomon P. Sharp
Jereboam O. Beauchamp murders Solomon P. Sharp

The Beauchamp-Sharp Tragedy (sometimes called The Kentucky Tragedy) refers to the murder of Kentucky legislator Solomon P. Sharp by Jereboam O. Beauchamp. As a young lawyer, Beauchamp had been an admirer of Sharp's until the latter allegedly fathered an illegitimate child with a woman named Anna Cooke.[a] Sharp denied paternity of the child, which was stillborn. Beauchamp began a relationship with Cooke, who agreed to marry him on the condition that he kill Sharp. Beauchamp and Cooke married in June 1824, and in the early morning of November 7, 1825, Beauchamp murdered Sharp at Sharp's home in Frankfort, Kentucky.

An investigation soon revealed Beauchamp as the murderer, and he was apprehended at his home in Glasgow, Kentucky four days after the murder. He was tried, convicted, and sentenced to death by hanging. He was granted a stay of execution to allow him to pen a justification for his actions. Anna Cooke was tried for complicity in the murder, but was acquitted for lack of evidence. Nevertheless, her devotion to Beauchamp prompted her to stay in his cell with him, where the two attempted a double suicide by drinking laudanum shortly before the execution. This attempt failed. On the morning of the execution, the couple again attempted suicide, this time by stabbing themselves with a knife Anna had smuggled into the cell. When the guards discovered the attempt, Beauchamp was rushed to the gallows, where he was hanged before he could die of his stab wound. He was the first person legally executed in the state of Kentucky. Anna Cooke-Beauchamp died from her wounds at approximately the same time as Beauchamp's death. Per their wishes, the couple's bodies were positioned in an embrace and buried in the same coffin.

While the primary motive for Sharp's murder was defending the honor of Anna Cooke, speculation raged that Sharp's political opponents instigated the crime. Sharp was a leader of the New Court party during the Old Court-New Court controversy in Kentucky. At least one Old Court partisan alleged that Sharp denied paternity of Cooke's son by claiming the child was a mulatto, the son of a family slave. Whether Sharp actually made such a claim has never been verified. New Court partisans insisted that the allegation was concocted to stir Beauchamp's anger and provoke him to murder. The Beauchamp-Sharp Tragedy served as the inspiration for a number of literary works, including Edgar Allan Poe's unfinished Politian and Robert Penn Warren's World Enough and Time.

Contents

[edit] Background

Jereboam Beauchamp was born in Barren County, Kentucky in 1802. Educated in the school of Dr. Benjamin Thurston, he resolved to study law at age eighteen. While observing the lawyers practicing in Glasgow and Bowling Green, Beauchamp was particularly impressed with the abilities of Solomon P. Sharp. Sharp had twice been elected to the state legislature and had served two terms in the U.S. House of Representatives. Beauchamp became disenchanted with Sharp when, in 1820, a woman named Anna Cooke claimed Sharp was the father of her stillborn infant. Sharp denied paternity of the child. Public opinion favored Sharp, and a disgraced Cooke became a recluse at her mother's estate in Bowling Green.[1]

Solomon P. Sharp, the victim of the Beauchamp-Sharp Tragedy
Solomon P. Sharp, the victim of the Beauchamp-Sharp Tragedy

Beauchamp's father lived only a mile from Cooke's estate, and Jereboam began to seek audience with her. Beauchamp gradually gained Cooke's trust by visiting under the guise of borrowing books from her library. By summer 1821, the two became friends and began a courtship. Beauchamp was eighteen; Cooke was at least thirty-four. As the courtship progressed, Cooke told Beauchamp that, before they could be married, Beauchamp would have to kill Solomon Sharp. Beauchamp agreed to this request, expressing his own desire to dispatch Sharp.[2]

The preferred method of honor killing in that day was a duel. Despite Cooke's admonition that Sharp would not accept a challenge to duel, Beauchamp traveled to Frankfort to gain an audience with Sharp, who had recently been named the state's attorney general by Governor John Adair. Beauchamp's account of the interview states that he bullied and humiliated Sharp, that Sharp begged for his life, and that Beauchamp promised to horsewhip Sharp every day until he consented to the duel. For two days, Beauchamp remained in Frankfort, awaiting the duel. He then discovered that Sharp had left town, allegedly destined for Bowling Green. Beauchamp rode to Bowling Green, only to find that Sharp was not there and was not expected. Thus, apparent disinformation saved Sharp from Beauchamp's first attempt on his life.[3]

Cooke then resolved to kill Sharp herself. The next time Sharp was in Bowling Green on business, she sent a letter to him denouncing Beauchamp's actions in Frankfort and claiming she had broken off all contact with him. She requested that Sharp visit her at her estate before he left town. Sharp questioned the messenger who delivered the letter and suspected a trap. Nonetheless, he sent a response that he would visit at the time appointed. Beauchamp and Cooke awaited the visit, but Sharp did not come. Beauchamp rode to Bowling Green to investigate and found that Sharp had left for Frankfort two days earlier, leaving substantial unfinished business. The plot had been foiled again, but Beauchamp concluded that Sharp would eventually have to return to Bowling Green and finish the business he had left. Determined to await Sharp's return to the city, Beauchamp opened a legal practice there. Throughout 1822 and 1823, Beauchamp practiced law and waited for Sharp to return. He never did.[4]

Despite Beauchamp's inability to kill Sharp, Cooke married Beauchamp in mid-June 1824.[5] Beauchamp immediately hatched another plot to kill Sharp. He began sending letters – each from a different post office and signed with a pseudonym – requesting Sharp's assistance in settling a land claim and asking when he would again be in Green River country. Sharp finally answered Beauchamp's last letter – mailed in June 1825 – but gave no date for his arrival.[6]

[edit] Murder

As a member of Governor Adair's administration, Sharp had become deeply involved in the Old Court-New Court controversy. The conflict was primarily between debtors seeking relief from their financial burdens after the Panic of 1819 (the New Court, or Relief, faction) and the creditors to which these obligations were owed (the Old Court, or anti-relief, faction.) Sharp, who came from humble beginnings, sided with the New Court. By 1825, the New Court faction's power was on the decline. In an attempt to bolster the party's influence, Sharp resigned as attorney general in 1825 to run for a seat in the Kentucky House of Representatives. His opponent was Old Court stalwart John J. Crittenden.[7]

During the campaign, Old Court supporters again raised the issue of Sharp's seduction and abandonment of Anna Cooke. Old Court supporter John Upshaw Waring printed handbills that not only accused Sharp of fathering Cooke's child, but further claiming that Sharp had denied paternity of the child on the grounds that it was a mulatto and the son of a Cooke family slave. Whether Sharp actually made such a claim has never been determined with certainty. Despite the allegations, Sharp won the election.[5]

Word of Sharp's alleged claims soon reached Jereboam Beauchamp, reigniting his hatred of Sharp and strengthening his resolve to kill him. Beauchamp now abandoned the idea of killing Sharp "honorably" in a duel. Instead, he resolved to assassinate Sharp, casting suspicion on his political enemies. To add to the political intrigue, Beauchamp decided to commit the murder on the eve of the General Assembly's opening session.[8]

Beauchamp came to Frankfort on business on November 5.[9] Unable to find lodging at the local inns, he rented a room in the private residence of Joel Scott, warden of the state penitentiary.[10] Sometime after midnight, Scott heard a commotion from Beauchamp's room and, upon investigating, found the door latch open and the room abandoned.[11] Beauchamp, clad in a disguise, buried a set of his clothes near the Kentucky River, then proceeded to Sharp's house.[8] Sharp was not at home, but Beauchamp soon found him at a local hotel.[12] He returned to Sharp's house, concealed himself nearby, and waited for Sharp to return. He observed Sharp re-enter the house about midnight.[12]

Beauchamp approached the house at approximately two o'clock in the morning on November 7, 1825.[9] In his Confession, he described the encounter:

I put on my mask, drew my dagger and proceeded to the door; I knocked three times loud and quick, Colonel Sharp said; "Who's there" - "Covington I replied," quickly Sharp's foot was heard upon the floor. I saw under the door as he approached without a light. I drew my mask over my face and immediately Colonel Sharp opened the door. I advanced into the room and with my left hand I grasped his right wrist. The violence of the grasp made him spring back and trying to disengage his wrist, he said, "What Covington is this." I replied John A. Covington. "I don't know you," said Colonel Sharp, I know John W. Covington." Mrs. Sharp appeared at the partition door and then disappeared, seeing her disappear I said in a persuasive tone of voice, "Come to the light Colonel and you will know me," and pulling him by the arm he came readily to the door and still holding his wrist with my left hand I stripped my hat and handkerchief from over my forehead and looked into Sharp's face. He knew me the more readily I imagine, by my long, bush, curly suit of hair. He sprang back and exclaimed in a tone of horror and despair, "Great God it is him," and as he said that he fell on his knees. I let go of his wrist and grasped him by the throat dashing him against the facing of the door and muttered in his face, "die you villain." As I said that I plunged the dagger to his heart.

—Jereboam Beauchamp, Confession of Jereboam O. Beauchamp

The wound severed Sharp's aorta, killing him almost instantly.[9] Sharp's wife Eliza witnessed the entire scene from the top of the stairs in the house, but Beauchamp fled before he could be identified or captured.[11][9] Returning to the location where he had buried his regular attire, he changed clothes, tied the accouterments of his disguise to a rock, and sank them in the Kentucky River.[13] He then returned to his room at the house of Joel Scott, where he remained until the following morning.[13]

[edit] Arrest, trial, and execution

The Kentucky General Assembly authorized the governor to offer a reward of $3000 for the arrest and conviction of Sharp's killer.[14] The trustees of the city of Frankfort added a reward of $1000, and friends of Sharp raised an additional $2000 reward.[11] Suspicion for the killing rested on three men: Beauchamp, Waring, and Patrick H. Darby. During Sharp's 1824 campaign for a seat in the Kentucky House of Representatives, Darby had remarked that, should Sharp be elected, "he would never take his seat and would be as good as a dead man."[14] Waring had made similar threats, boasting that he had already stabbed six men.[14]

Sharp's wife testified that the assassin's voice sounded like that of Waring.[14] A warrant was sworn out for Waring's arrest, but it was soon discovered that he was incapacitated after being shot through both hips the day before Sharp's death.[14] When Darby discovered that he was under suspicion, he began his own investigation into the murder.[14] He traveled to Simpson County where he met Captain John F. Lowe, who told Darby that Beauchamp had related to him detailed plans for the assassination.[14] He also furnished Darby with a letter that contained damaging admissions against him.[14]

The first night following the murder, Beauchamp stayed at the home of a relative in Bloomfield, Kentucky.[11] The next day, he traveled to Bardstown, where he spent the night.[11] He lodged with his brother-in-law in Bowling Green on the night of November 10 before returning to his home in Glasgow on November 11.[11] He and Anna had planned to flee to the west, but before nightfall, a posse had arrived from Frankfort to arrest him.[15] He was brought to Frankfort, tried before an examining court, but Commonwealth's Attorney Charles S. Bibb confessed that he had not yet collected enough evidence to detain him.[16] Beauchamp was released, but agreed to stay in Frankfort for ten days to allow the court to finish its investigation.[14] During this time, Beauchamp wrote letters to John J. Crittenden and George M. Bibb requesting their legal aid in the matter.[16] Neither letter was answered.[16] Meanwhile Beauchamp's uncle, a state senator, composed a defense team that included former U.S. Senator John Pope.[16]

Beauchamp was indicted in March, and his trial began May 8, 1826.[16] Darby testified that in 1824, Beauchamp had solicited his services in order to bring suit against Sharp for unspecified charges.[14] During the ensuing conversations between himself and Beauchamp, the latter related the story of Sharp's abandonment of Anna Cooke, swearing that he would kill him one day, even if he had to come to Frankfort and shoot him down in the street.[14] Beauchamp himself never testified during the trial.[16] During closing arguments, defense counsel John Pope attempted to discredit Darby, a tactic that provoked Darby to assault one of Pope's co-counselors with a cane.[14] The trial lasted thirteen days, and despite the absence of any physical evidence, including a murder weapon, the jury returned a guilty verdict after only an hour of deliberation on May 19.[16][17][16] Beauchamp was sentenced to be executed by hanging on June 16, 1826.[14]

During the trial, Anna Beauchamp appealed to John Waring for help on her husband's behalf. She also tried to entice John Lowe to commit perjury and testify on her husband's behalf. Both appeals were denied. On May 20, Anna was examined by two justices of the peace on suspicion of being an accessory to the murder, but was acquitted due to lack of evidence.[18] The jailer permitted Anna to stay in the cell with Beauchamp at her own request.[9]

Pope's request to have the verdict overturned was denied, but the judge granted Beauchamp a stay of execution until July 7 to allow him to produce a written justification of his actions.[19] In it, he explained how he killed Sharp to defend Anna's honor.[5] Beauchamp had hoped to publish his work before his execution, but the libelous charges it contained – that prosecution witnesses committed perjury and bribery to see him convicted – delayed its publication.[5]

The Beauchamps were accused of trying to bribe a guard to let them escape, but this attempt failed. They also attempted to get a letter to Senator Beauchamp requesting his help in escaping. A final plea for another stay of execution from Governor Desha was denied on July 5.[19] Later that day, the couple attempted a double suicide by taking large doses of laudanum, but both were unsuccessful.[9]

On July 7, the morning of Beauchamp's scheduled execution, Anna requested that the guard allow her privacy while she dressed.[20] The couple again attempted to overdose on laudanum, but failed.[17] Anna then produced a knife that she had smuggled into the cell, and the couple attempted another double suicide by stabbing themselves with it.[20] When they were discovered, Anna was taken to the jailer's home and tended to by doctors.[20] Beauchamp was rushed to the gallows and hanged before he could die of his stab wounds.[20] On his way to the gallows, Beauchamp passed Patrick Darby.[21] Beauchamp smiled and offered his hand, but Darby declined the gesture.[21] Beauchamp then publicly denied that Darby had any involvement with the murder.[21]

Upon arriving at the gallows, Beauchamp assured the assembled clergy that he had a salvation experience on July 6.[21] Too weak to stand, he was held upright by two men while the noose was tied around his neck.[20] At Beauchamp's request, the Twenty-Second Regiment musicians played Bonaparte's Retreat from Moscow while five thousand spectators watched his execution.[5] It was the first legal hanging in Kentucky's history.[17]

Anna Cooke-Beauchamp and Jereboam Beauchamp died at approximately the same time.[20] Beauchamp's father requested the both bodies for burial.[17] The two bodies were put in a single coffin, locked in an embrace.[17] They were buried in Maple Grove Cemetery in Bloomfield, Kentucky.[5] The couple's tombstone was engraved with a poem written by Anna.[20]

[edit] Aftermath

Beauchamp's confession was published in 1826, the same year as The Letters of Ann Cook – the authorship of which is disputed – and a transcript of Beauchamp's trial authored by J. G. Dana and R. S. Thomas.[5] The following year, Sharp's brother, Dr. Leander Sharp, penned Vindication of the character of the late Col. Solomon P. Sharp to defend Sharp from the charges made in Beauchamp's confession.[5] Patrick Darby threatened to sue Dr. Sharp if the work were published.[22] John Waring went a step further, threatening Dr. Sharp's life if he published Vindication.[22] All copies of the work were left in the Sharps' home in Frankfort, where they were discovered many years later during a remodel.[22]

New Court partisans like Amos Kendall suspected that Sharp's political enemies had incited Beauchamp to violence
New Court partisans like Amos Kendall suspected that Sharp's political enemies had incited Beauchamp to violence

Though many regarded Sharp's murder as an honor killing, some New Court partisans charged that Beauchamp had been incited to violence by members of the Old Court party, specifically Patrick Darby. Sharp was thought to be the minority party's choice for Speaker of the House for the 1826 session. By enticing Beauchamp to murder Sharp, the Old Court could remove a political enemy. Sharp's widow Eliza apparently subscribed to this notion. In an 1826 letter in the New Court Argus of Western America, she referred to Darby as "the chief instigator of the foul murder which has deprived me of all my heart held most dear on earth."[23]

Some Old Court partisans claimed that Governor Desha had offered Beauchamp a pardon if he would implicate Darby and Achilles Sneed in his confession. Shortly before his execution, Beauchamp was heard to say he had "been New Court long enough, and would die an Old Court man." Beauchamp had steadfastly identified with the Old Court, and his claim seems to imply that he had at least considered colluding with the New Court powers to secure his pardon. Such a deal is explicitly mentioned in one version of Beauchamp's Confession. Beauchamp ultimately rejected the deal for fear that he would be double-crossed by the New Court, leaving him imprisoned and deprived of the "chivalrous" motive for his actions.[22]

Darby himself denied involvement with the murder, claiming that New Court partisans such as Francis P. Blair and Amos Kendall were seeking to defame him.[23] He also countered that Eliza Sharp's letter to the New Court Argus was written by New Court supporters, including Kendall, the newspaper's editor.[23] The claims and counterclaims between the two sides reached such an extreme that an 1826 letter in the New Court Argus suggested that New Court supporters had instigated Sharp's murder in order to blame Old Court partisans and affix a stigma to them.[23] Darby eventually brought suit for libel against Kendall and Eliza Sharp, as well as Senator Beauchamp and Sharp's brother Leander.[14] Numerous delays and changes of venue prevented any of the suits from ever going to trial.[24] Darby died in December 1829.[24]

[edit] In fiction

The Beauchamp-Sharp Tragedy inspired a number of fictional works, notably Edgar Allan Poe's unfinished play Politian and Robert Penn Warren's World Enough and Time. William Gilmore Simms wrote three works based on the Sharp's murder and aftermath: Beauchampe: or The Kentucky Tragedy, A Tale of Passion, Charlemont, and Beauchampe: A Sequel to Charlemonte. Greyslaer: A Romance of the Mohawk by Charles Fenno Hoffman, Octavia Bragaldi by Charlotte Barnes, Sybil by John Savage, and Conrad and Eudora; or, The Death of Alonzo: A Tragedy and Leoni, The Orphan of Venice both by Thomas Holley Chivers, all draw to some degree on the events surrounding Sharp's murder.[25]

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ Cooke, pp. 126–127
  2. ^ Cooke, pp. 127–128
  3. ^ Cooke, pp.128–129
  4. ^ Cooke, p. 129
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h Whited, p. 404
  6. ^ Cooke, pp. 129–130
  7. ^ Cooke, pp. 130–131, 134
  8. ^ a b Cooke, p. 136
  9. ^ a b c d e f Kleber, p. 63
  10. ^ O'Malley, p. 43
  11. ^ a b c d e f O'Malley, p. 44
  12. ^ a b Cooke, p. 137
  13. ^ a b Cooke, p. 138
  14. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Lee, Murder on Madison
  15. ^ O'Malley, p. 45
  16. ^ a b c d e f g h Cooke, p. 144
  17. ^ a b c d e O'Malley, p. 47
  18. ^ Cooke, pp. 144–145
  19. ^ a b Cooke, p. 145
  20. ^ a b c d e f g Kleber, p. 64
  21. ^ a b c d Cooke, p. 146
  22. ^ a b c d Johnson, "New Light of Beauchamp's Confession
  23. ^ a b c d Bruce, "The Kentucky Tragedy and the Transformation of Politics in the Early American Republic"
  24. ^ a b Cooke, p. 147
  25. ^ Whited, pp. 404–405

[edit] Further reading

Works inspired by the Beauchamp-Sharp Tragedy

[edit] Notes

^[a] Sources variously give the name as Anna Cooke, Anna Cook, Ann Cooke, and Ann Cook.