Mrs Nobles took an ax...

 My special interest in early Watch Tower history includes the different individuals we come across. There is a wide variety of the good and not so good in the overall story. Separate Identity volume two has a whole chapter on one representative character, Maria Jourdan Westmoreland (1838-1900). She became interested in the Millennial Dawn message and held meetings in her home. Although her name does not appear in Zion’s Watch Tower, a newspaper article from The New York Sun for December 13, 1891 is entitled “The Church in the House of Maria.” It takes a swipe at both Charles Taze Russell and Maria for supporting him. It is thought that Maria may have attended the first Watch Tower convention in Chicago in 1893.

Maria was “a character” – who wrote novels and espoused various causes during her lifetime. The Separate Identity chapter “The Church in Maria’s House” covers this extensively. However, one account that failed to make the cut is the research below. It has no bearing on Watch Tower history as such, but gives a bit more insight into a very forceful proponent of what she believed in. In her day, Maria was a difficult person to avoid.

For want of a better description, the account is called MRS NOBLES TOOK AN AX…

("Mrs Nobles took an ax...")

In the summer of 1895 Maria became involved in a cause célèbre known as the Nobles murder case. An Elizabeth Nobles encouraged a black farm worker, Gus Fambles, to kill her husband. It was a particularly gruesome crime, Gus used a hatchet and Elizabeth was accused of finishing the job before they buried the body – one newspaper claimed this was done while he was still alive.

Both were found guilty and sentenced to death. The thought of a white woman and a black man being hanged together caused consternation and a campaign was started to save her. Maria added her thoughts in The Atlanta Constitution for August 11, 1895.

Billed as “Mrs Maria Jourdan Westmoreland, the well known writer and missionary” her comments basically covered women’s rights and responsibilities. She was not against the death penalty as such, but if Elizabeth was to be spared then surely Gus should be spared also.

She argued with a fine turn of phrase: “If women desire to usurp the place which God, in His infinite wisdom has seen fit to accord to man by making him ‘the head of the woman,’ why, then to be consistent, they must use the prerogative of men, not only in commonplace every day affairs, but if convicted of murder, they must be content to die like men for the privilege.”

After supporting capital punishment with reference to scripture, she argued (with a fine flourish of alliteration): “If the death sentence on Mrs Nobles is commuted to life imprisonment, then a similar clemency must of necessity be extended to her accomplice, the poor, forlorn, forsaken, forgotten, and seemingly friendless negro, Gus Fambles.”

She said that if Mrs Nobles was reprieved she would raise funds for a new trial for Gus. She concluded: “Clemency for one means clemency for both.”

The matter rumbled on through various courts until 1897 when just before the scheduled execution, Mrs Nobles was reprieved. She died in prison in 1916. It was too politically sensitive to hang Gus Fambles without her, so he was reprieved too. He died in prison in 1914.

Below from the Tifton Gazette (Berrien County), February 11, 1916.

Note: Elizabeth was actually 71 not 85.