“From the epoch of the hoax,” wrote Poe, “the Sun shone with unmitigated splendor. Its success firmly established the ‘penny system’ throughout the country, and (through the Sun) consequently we are indebted to the genius of Mr. Locke for one of the most important steps ever yet taken in the pathway of human progress.”
CHAPTER IV
DAY FINDS A RIVAL IN BENNETT
The Success of “The Sun” Leads to the Founding of the “Herald.”—Enterprises and Quarrels of a Furious Young Journalism.—The Picturesque Webb.—Maria Monk.
The usefulness of Richard Adams Locke as a Sun reporter did not end with the moon hoax. Far from expressing regret that its employee had gulled half the earth, the Sun continued to meet exposure with a calm and almost flippant front, insisting that it would never admit the non-existence of the man-bats until official contradiction arrived from Edinburgh or the Cape of Good Hope. The paper realized the value, in public interest, of Locke’s name, and was proud to announce, in November of 1835, that it had commissioned Locke to write another series of articles, telling the story of the “Life and Adventures of Manuel Fernandez, otherwise Richard C. Jackson, convicted of the murder of John Roberts, and to be executed at the Bellevue Prison, New York, on Thursday next, the 19th instant.”
This was a big beat, for the young men of the Courier and Enquirer, and perhaps of the Herald, had been trying to get a yarn from the criminal, a Spaniard who had served in foreign wars, had been captured by savages in Africa, and had had many other adventures. Fernandez was convicted of killing another sailor for his attention to Fernandez’s mistress, a Mrs. Schultz; and for about three weeks Locke spent several hours a day in the condemned man’s cell. The “Life and Adventures,” which was printed on the first page of the Sun, ran serially from November 14 to November 25, and was read with avidity.
It was ironical that the hero of the story, who had expressed to Locke an eagerness to have his career set before the public in its true light, was prevented from reading the later instalments; for the law, taking no cognizance of the literary side of the matter, went about its business, and Fernandez was hanged in the Bellevue yard on the 19th, a morning when the Sun’s narrative had wrecked the sailor off the coast of Wales. Mr. Locke reported the execution and drew upon the autopsy to verify the “Adventures.”
It is an interesting fact that the corpse of Fernandez exhibited marks of all those serious injuries which are recorded in the course of our narrative of his life, more particularly that dreadful fracture of his vertebræ which he suffered in Leghorn.
The mere word of a “medical gentleman immediately from Scotland” was no longer to be relied upon!
The Sun’s story of the great fire of December, 1835, sounds like Locke, but it may have been written by one of the other bright young men who worked for Benjamin H. Day. Among them were William M. Prall, who succeeded Wisner as the court reporter, and Lucius Robinson.