Free our blacksmith ... he's the only one!

Deseret News (Salt Lake City), Apr 29, 2008 by Andrew Kirk Deseret News

Many of them were just looking for a ride.

The newly digitized Board of Pardon's Prisoners' Application Case Files from 1892 to 1949 allow quick and easy access to nearly 9,000 files from prisoners and their advocates requesting a pardon. One of the most common crimes was larceny, usually for stealing a horse -- sometimes with a buggy in the case of women. A modern equivalent might be grand theft auto, but considering the difficulty of reselling an animal, a better parallel might be stealing a bike out of a yard.

This newest edition to the Utah State Archives and Records Service's Digital Collections includes formal applications for pardons, letters to the governor, petitions and letters of support from the public and public officials connected to the case. During the first 40 years, court transcripts, biographical sketches, prison evaluations and a wide variety of related documentation such as personal data about the prisoner, criminal activity, family background and evaluation of the prisoner's adjustment to incarceration might be included. Cases illustrate the board's review process to determine if prisoners should be released before their regular sentence ended.

One example is 16-year-old "John Doe Indian," son of "Blind Jim" from near Kanosh in Millard County. John Doe and his friend stole a horse in 1894 while under the influence of "essence of ginger." Each was sentenced to a year, but after two or three months the Provo judge who sentenced them wrote the state explaining that nothing more could be gained by their imprisonment and the chief of the tribe, "Hunkup," requested their return.

The files offer a snapshot into life in Utah during the first 50 years of statehood. A blacksmith in Loa, Wayne County, was apparently imprisoned for six months for fornication, and the people of his town sent the governor nearly 10 pages of double-columned signatures requesting his release since he was the town's only blacksmith.

Names in the files demonstrate the state's diversity and cover the globe: Lee Gim and Ling Lee from China, C.H. Hong from Korea, Max Paul Graeske from East Prussia, Trefle Doutre from France and Gustaf Gustafson from Scandinavia.

"(Digitizing archives) makes primary source documents accessible for research and allows voices that often get forgotten to be available to a much wider audience," said Utah history professor Paul Reeve. "These offer little glimpses or traces. They open up a shot in time of what life was like for people who might otherwise be left behind in history."

The files also reveal a different set of moral values. Other men were imprisoned for fornication besides the blacksmith. But whereas the residents of Loa claimed he had intended no harm, another man's was crime was described as "bastarding." Graeske of East Prussia worked at the Salt Lake City Brewing Co. in 1916 when convicted of "carnal knowledge." His petitioners said they believed he had not adequately been taught "the importance of virtue."

It can be tough to be pardoned for murder, but Trefle Doutre had a grand jury request his release after having only served three years of an 18-year sentence. The reason given: He was more than 50 years old and it was considered inhumane for him to serve any longer at his advanced age.

Among the case files is an application for the pardon of Joe Hill (aka Joseph Hillstrom), the "Wobblie" activist for the Industrial Workers of the World who was convicted of murder in a dubitable trial and executed by firing squad at the state prison on Nov. 19, 1915. Supporters considered him a martyr of the labor movement, and the tribute "I Dreamed I Saw Joe Hill Last Night" was turned into a popular folk song that was even performed by Joan Baez at Woodstock. The lengthy case file includes 62 pages of documents.

"Since these records have long been indexed by name, they often provided a starting point for research into historical crimes or criminals by including important details such as dates and places. By making them available online, we hope to reach more people interested in researching such materials," said Gina Strack, digital coordinator for the Utah State Archives.

Archivist Rod Swaner said the collection is also popular with family history researchers. People like to look up names to find more about the lives of their relatives. In the past, researchers had to pay fees to print items or gain access to digitized copies. Now the online database makes all this information easily accessible and free, he said.

Many of the stories are downright heartbreaking. One man imprisoned for fraud requested a pardon to be with his ailing wife in a Los Angeles hospital. Sometimes neighbors wrote on behalf of teenagers with impoverished parents who relied on their children for survival. In most cases, the files don't include any replies from the state, leaving the reader to wonder what happened.

The prisoners' applications can be found at historyresearch.utah.gov/digital/328.htm. The database consists more than 54,000 digital images scanned from 53 microfilm rolls representing 27 cubic feet of paper records. Following digitization, archivists spent another six months preparing the case files for online display.