Assassination of Carter Harrison III

Carter Harrison III (victim) Carter Harrison III was an American politician who served two tenures as mayor of Chicago: the first between 1879 and 1887 and the second beginning in 1893. Harrison unsuccessfully ran in 1891 to become mayor again. Harrison was returned to office in early 1893, winning election to an unprecedented fifth term as mayor. His fifth term overlapped with the city's hosting of the World's Columbian Exposition, a significant world's fair that was scheduled to hold its closing ceremonies on October 31. Harrison was a well-liked mayor. Dubbed "the common man's mayor". he made himself accessible to citizens. He was described as a peculiar child, solitary, irritable and excitable, with a poor memory who did poorly in school. Prendergast had a fixation with writing postcards. In order to support Carter Harrison's pursuit to regain the mayoralty, Prendergast sent rambling postcards to prominent Chicagoans urging them to vote for Harrison. Among those who received such a postcard was prominent lawyer A. S. Trude, who would later prosecute the case against Prendergast in the murder trial that followed the assassination. Prendergast sent these postcards in support of Harrison for more than two years before Harrison was successful in winning the 1893 Chicago mayoral election. Prendergast believed that his letters had been responsible for Harrison's success in the election. After Harrison had spent six months in office without appointing him corporation council or granting him any recognition, Prendergast began to desire revenge against Harrison for the perceived slight. Prendergast wrote threatening letters to both Harrison and Kraus, a fact which was quickly discovered by investigators following the assassination. One letter to Kraus read, "I want your job. Do not be a fool. Resign. Third and final notice." ==Earlier activities of Prendergast on the day of the assassination==

On October 28, 1893 (the day of the assassination), Prendergast purchased a six-chamber .38 revolver manufactured by Smith & Wesson. He would use this weapon to carry out the assassination. Because this model often misfired, he opted to keep the chamber under the hammer empty. Per press reports, on the day of the assassination (prior to traveling to Harrison's residence and assassinating Harrison), Prendergast had visited Kraus at his office at City Hall and issued a threat if Kraus did not resign from his office. The news reports stated that Kraus tricked Prendergast into thinking he was about to resign, before escaping by ditching Prendergast in the building's crowded lobby. ==Earlier activities of Harrison on the day of the assassination==

On the day of the assassination, Harrison delivered a speech shortly before noon at the Music Hall American Cities Day saw Harrison host 5,000 mayors and city councilmen of U.S. cities at the fairgrounds. Afterwards, Harrison toured exhibits at the exposition and mingled with the crowds. Harrison retired to his residence for the evening, ==Assassination==

Prendergast rang the doorbell of Harrison's home. Harrison's maid, Mary Hanson, answered the door, and requested that Prendergast return in a half-hour. When Prendergast returned, she asked him to wait in the hall. Hanson went to retrieve the mayor. After shooting the mayor, Prendergast ran out of the residence through its front door. Harrison's coachman, Paul Elliason Risberg, having heard the gunshots from the level of the House below, had quickly run up the stairs to the entrance level with a handgun. Noticing Risberg emerging into the front hall, the fleeing Prendergast shot into the front hall. Risberg returned fire. Neither were wounded in this exchange. The noise of the commotion attracted the Harrisons' neighbor William Chalmers (the president of the Allis-Chalmers steel company) to quickly run into the residence. Household servants also ran to Mayor Harrison's side. Harrison had pulled himself through the dining room and into a butler's pantry that led to the kitchen before collapsing. William Preston Harrison, who was upstairs, signaled for help by activating an emergency signal in the upstairs, then ran outside to ask a passing bicyclist to get the family doctor. When he came to his father's side William Preston Harrison asked, "father's not hurt, is he?" to which the mayor responded, "Yes. I am shot. I will die." Mayor Harrison was bleeding from his mouth and remained conscious for roughly twelve minutes. Chamlers and William Preston Harrison carried the wounded mayor to a sofa. Chalmers placed his folded coat underneath Harrison's head. He argued that Harrison was wrong in his belief that he had been shot in his heart. Harrison responded, "I tell you I am, this is death." Chalmers would later remark, "he died angry because I didn't believe him. Even in death, he is emphatic and imperious." As doctors and police arrived, Harrison remarked, "doctors are no good now," as he was nearing death. His last words were reported to be, "Give me water. Where is Annie," referring to his fiancé Annie Howard, who had been visiting the nearby home of Harrison's son Carter Harrison IV at the time of the assassination. Howard arrived around the time that the mayor succumbed to internal hemorrhaging. His death came approximately twenty or twenty-three minutes after he was shot. ==Prendergast's surrender to police==

After fleeing the Harrison residence, the assassin ran further to escape pursuers. He was taken from the Des Plaines Street police station to the central police station, located downtown, where the building was quickly surrounded by a crowd of 5,000 people. Fearing potential mob violence, at 11:15 PM, Prendergast was stealthily hurried into a wagon and taken to another station located on the North Side of the city, where he was lodged in the county jail pending trial. When interviewed by police, Prendergast gave varying stories as to his motive, including the failed appointment and the mayor's failure to elevate train track crossings. In a formal statement, he declared that Harrison, "deserved to be shot. He did not keep his promise to me." A mere twenty minutes after his arrest, Michael Brennan, the general superintendent (head) of the Chicago Police Department, spoke with him. When speaking to news reporters, Brennan characterized Prendergast was insane, idiomatically calling him, "as crazy as a bed bug " and "mad as a March hare". Other police shared with the press their belief that Prendergast was mentally unwell. Joseph Kipley, the assistant chief of police, remarked that, "Prendergast had talked and acted like a crazy man." ==Autopsy, coroner's inquest, grand jury decision, and arraignment==

The autopsy of Harrison was conducted by Dr. Ludvig Hektoen and Dr. Louis G. Mitchell. The morning following the assassination, James McHale (the Cook County coroner) conducted the coroner's inquest at the Harrison residence. During the inquest, Prednergast (accompanied by guards) stood in the foyer where the assassination had occurred while witnesses gave testimony in the south back parlor of the residence. The jurors agreed with the testimony of the witnesses as to the manner of Harrison's death, and decided to remand the matter to a grand jury that had been impaneled. Prendergast was then returned to the Cook County Jail, and placed in cell 11 (the same cell where Louis Lingg had famously committed suicide only years earlier). ==Reaction==

Harrison's assassination was met with an immense national reaction, Parallels were quickly drawn between the assassination of Harrison by Prendergast and the 1881 assassination of U.S. president James A. Garfield by Charles J. Guiteau. Similarly to Prendergast, Guiteau was a deranged office seeker whose motive was a failure to be given a patronage appointment that he perceived he was entitled to as a reward for his campaign support to Garfield. Harrison's assassination was regarded to possibly be the most sensationalized news item since Garfield's assassination, Soon after Harrison's death, flags across the city were lowered to half-mast, An outpouring of messages were delivered by officials, including from President Grover Cleveland, former president Benjamin Harrison, and Illinois Governor John Peter Altgeld. ==Funeral==

, with the (then-new) Art Institute of Chicago Building at the left and the Auditorium Building visible in the far back Harrison's corpse was initially displayed at his private residence for visitation by mourners. After a private funeral service held at the residence on the morning of October 31, Harrison's remains were transported to lay in state at the Chicago City Hall building, escorted by an honor guard of city officials. More than 100,000 waited to pay respects to his coffin while it laid in state. The funeral ranks among the most-attended in history. ==Prendergast's legal proceedings==

Arraignment On November 2, the grand jury approved an indictment of Prendergast for first-degree murder. Thereafter, on the same day, Prendergast was arraigned before Jude Oliver Horton. Prendergast plead "not guilty". He was described as heavily sweating, trembling, "cowering in terror", and having spoken in a near-whisper when giving his plea. and marked the start of a storied criminal law career for him. Joining Darrow in his representation of Prendergast was James S. Harlan and Stephen S. Gregory. Trude continued as the case's prosecutor. Sanity proceeding Also on March 22, Prendergast's brother filed a petition on Prendergast's behalf citing Illinois' section 285 of the (then-current) Illinois Criminal Code, which barred the trial or execution of individuals who become "lunatic or insane" after the commission of a crime for as long as they remain in such a mental state. If he were to be deemed insane, this would forbid Prendergast's death sentence from being carried out until such a point that he would be deemed sane. The statute required a sanity hearing to take place if it appeared that the condemned may have become insane since the verdict sentencing them to death had been delivered. It created a problematic appearance that Chetlian had previously been a legal partner of Stephen S. Gregory, who was now one of Prendgergast's attorneys. The proceedings received renewed public interest after French president Sadi Carnot was assassinated on June 24. Many had already been concerned after Harrison's assassination that it was part of a perceived trend of violent crimes being committed against officials, with other examples in then-recent years including the assassination of President Garfield and the assassination of Russian Tsar Alexander II. Gill was unpersuaded, arguing that Prendergast had been given fair and due process and a jury had found him sane. (pictured, circa 1894) declined to grant a writ of habeas corpus or a stay of execution A request was made on July 12 to federal judge Peter S. Grosscup (of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois) for a writ of habeas corpus and a request for a stay of execution. in order to permit an appeal to be made to the Supreme Court of the United States under a claim that Prendergast's rights under the Due Process Clause in the Fourteenth Amendment had been denied, pointing to Judge Horton having presented an opinion of his own concerning Prendergast's sanity during the trial and allowed certain evidence regarding the facts of the murder. The request also falsely claimed that Prendergast had not been permitted to speak on his own behalf. In the hearing before Grosscup, strong arguments were made by Prendergast's lawyer. With hours left before Prendergast's scheduled execution, Grosscup refused to stop the execution in a detailed opinion. Grosscup opined that the Fourteenth Amendment was not applicable to "any particular trial but to the action of the Legislature and state polity." ==Execution of Prendergast==

in which Prendergast was hung Prendergast was hanged on July 13, 1894. A gallows had been constructed in the north corridor of the jail and seats placed between the row of cells along the north side and the high building wall. About 500 ticketed witnesses assembled to watch the execution, which included the members of the jury which convicted Prendergast. Prisoners whose cells faced the corridor where the gallows were erected were removed from their cells 11:00 AM and brought to a location where the execution would not be visible to them. At 11:11, attendees were instructed to extinguish any cigars. At 11:43, the Cook County sheriff gave an order for Prendergast to be escorted to the gallows. When he got to the top of the platform, Prendergast briefly raised his hands, recognizing the crowd that gathered to view his execution. Prendergast walked to the edge of the trap without assistance, where his hands were fastened. Although having previously planned to make a last statement to the crowd, he had been dissuaded by Father Berry, to whom he quietly delivered his last words, "I had no malice against anyone." Prendergast's feet, knees, and chest were bound with straps and a white shroud placed over him and he was taken onto the trap, where the noose was placed around his neck. A white muslin hood was placed over his head and the noose, obscuring both from view. A signal was given and at 11:48 the rope holding the heavy trap in place was cut. Prendergast's neck was broken by the six-foot drop and his body did not move after the fall. His pulse was taken several times. Before the hanging, his pulse stood at 120 beats per minute (BPM). Prendergast's heart continued to beat for about ten minutes after the trap was released. It decreased to 58 BPM within a minute after the trap was released, but rose to 100 the second minute, 148 the third minute, 160 the fourth minute, before declining gradually thereafter to 100 BPM in the eighth minute. It stopped some time before the twelfth minute. Five minutes later his body was taken down and placed in an awaiting coffin for burial. The Chicago Daily News reported, At 12:30 PM, Prendergast's hearse containing the coffin departed from the jail. He was buried at Calvary Cemetery in Evanston, Illinois in an unmarked grave located next to his father's grave. ==Aftermath==

, sculpted by Frederick Hibbard|220px Harrison's death created a void in Chicago city politics that allowed Roger Charles Sullivan and John Patrick Hopkins to grow their political machine within the Democratic Party. Harrison's son, Carter Harrison IV, would run a rival faction of the city's Democratic Party. The Sullivan-Hopkins political machine would, however, grow into the city's dominant political machine, later being headed by Richard J. Daley. In December, Democratic nominee John Patrick Hopkins defeated Bell in the special election to serve the remainder of Harrison's term. Harrison's namesake son, Carter Harrison IV, would later also be elected mayor of Chicago five times. Harrison IV held similar politics to his father. Harrison's assassination inspired Chicago priest Casimir Zeglen to begin developing his design for a bulletproof vest. Harrison is the first of two Chicago mayors to be assassinated: the second being Anton Cermak, who was assassinated in 1933 while standing near (then-U.S. President-elect) Franklin D. Roosevelt at an event in Miami, Florida. That assassination is speculated to have possibly been meant to instead target the president-elect. In a 2003 journal article published in The Journal of Criminal Law & Criminology, Chicago politician Edward M. Burke described speculation about the broader ramifications Harrison's assassination may have had on the course of American history, == Media depictions ==

On occasion, the assassination and its aftermath has been depicted in media. In the 1991 made-for-TV movie Darrow (which starred Kevin Spacey as Clarence Darrow) Prendergast's sanity hearing was dramatized and Prendergast was portrayed by actor Paul Klementowicz. The assassination is one of the subplots in Erik Larson's 2003 best-selling non-fiction book The Devil in the White City. ==Notes==