This week in 1913

“Four perjurers sent me to this. I did not have a fair trial. I am a Socialist and would rather die than live under the present oligarchy. It was a long, hard fight I made, but I lost. I surrender, but am not conquered. I will take my medicine. There have been none in my family who would not take his medicine.”

— John Goodwin, convicted of murder, hanging, Arizona.
Executed May 13, 1913

After he deserted the army at Fort Apache with his friend William Stewart, Goodwin killed two men who had gone to the San Carlos Reservation to hunt deer. One of the deer hunters had kicked Stewart’s dog after it bit him. Goodwin and Stewart were sentenced to life imprisonment for the murders, but their lawyer thought he could reduce the sentence with a retrial.

The new verdict led Goodwin to the gallows.