[Newspaper]
Publication: The Chicago Daily Tribune
Chicago, IL, United States
vol. 42, p. 7, col. 5
STARVING TO DEATH.
A Negro Woman in a Kentucky Jail
Refuses to Eat, and Declares Her Intention
to Starve Herself to Death.
Special Dispatch to the Chicago Tribune.
CINCINNATI, O., Dec. 15. - Confined in the Covington, (Ky.) jail is a colored woman named Mary Cross, who has eaten nothing since the 27th of November. She says she has been treated very badly for a long time, and that she is going to end her life by starving herself to death. She is serving out a two years' sentence for shooting at Robert Hemingray, of the Covington Glass-Works. She was born the slave of Noah Patterson, about six miles from Cynthiana, where she remained during the War, when she, in company with several other slave women of the neighborhood, dressed herself in men's clothes and came to Covington, where she has ever since resided. While working for Robert Hemingray as a servant in the house last summer she one day remarked to his little boy: "What would your ma say if she thought I stole a diamond pin?" It was then found that the pin was gone, and she was accused of the theft. She became very angry, and threatened to burn the house down and kill the children, and she was jailed in default of bail to keep the peace. Being released she demanded of Hemingray wages for the time she had been imprisoned, which he refused. Nov. 7, she shot at him five times, but failed to hit him, for which she was sentenced Nov. 27 to twelve months in the county jail and $500 fine. From that time to the present, the Turnkey says, she has taken no kind of nourishment. To a reporter today she said: "For a long time I have lived in Covington, but the peace nillcers and citizens won't leave me alone. They keep persecuting me to such an extent that I am bound to kill myself. They won't give me a chance to do it with a pistol, so I will starve to death. They can't prevent me from doing that. The last thing I eat was a piece of turkey that my sister brought me. That was on the evening of Nov. 27, and I then made up my mind that I would not eat any more, and I won't." The reporter asked her if she would not take some oysters, or something nice to drink, when she became furious, saying: "No, sir; you can't tempt me. I tell you I won't eat." Dr. Fenley, of Covington, called to see her yesterday, and tried to get her to take some medicine, but she refused. All efforts to get her to take nourishment have been unsuccessful, and her case is now given up as hopeless. Different physicians have visited her, and they all affirm that she will not live long unless she can be made to eat. When she was first confined she weighed about 200 pounds. Since that time she has lost over fifty pounds, she drinks a small quantity of water every day, which she seems to enjoy.
