The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Complete Contents / Dresden Edition—Twelve Volumes

by Robert Green Ingersoll

Yours truly,

E. W. KNIGHT.

Now, gentlemen, they were informed of the existence of that will and of its destruction, and were so informed before John A. Davis filed this will. And when we pleaded this will, John A. Davis pleaded that it had been republished, and yet no evidence was given in of any republication. They knew that under the statute of Montana, when a man makes will number one, and afterwards makes will number two, and afterwards destroys will number two, that will number one is not revived; that the making of the second will kills the first, and the destruction of the second kills that, and leaves the man intestate and without any will. Now, there is the letter of Mr. Knight—full, free, frank, candid, honorable, like the man himself. He says there that he does not remember all the provisions, but he does remember that he provided for some nephews and nieces, and provided for Andrew J. Davis, Jr., twenty-five thousand dollars, for one Jefferson twenty thousand, for the girl about the same, and that he provided also for the executors of the will, and appointed Knight, Hauser, and Dixon as his executors. That is exactly what he says here.

Now, was that will made? Have they impeached Mr. Keith? I tell them now that they cannot impeach him. He has sworn to the making of that will, apart and separate from Mr. Knight. Oh, they say, why didn't they bring Knight in, and prove by him that he then recollected Mr. Keith? What has that to do with it? Mr. Keith recollected Mr. Knight, swore that he wrote the will, and that he was writing it when he came in, and swore that he attested it, that Davis signed it, and Irvine also signed it. What more do we want on that will? I say, gentlemen, that the will of 1880 ends this case. There is not ingenuity enough in the world to get around it, and there was and never will be enough brains crammed into one head to dodge it. That will was made, and every man on the jury knows it. That will was executed by Andrew J. Davis, every man of you knows it, and the will was afterwards destroyed.

Now, the question is, did that second will revoke the first will? Had it a revoking clause in it? E. W. Knight swears it had, and he swears that he copied it from a will made by an uncle of his named John Knight, and he had that will in his possession here and in that will there are two revocation clauses, and Knight swears that he copied those clauses, and right here it may be well enough to make another remark. When he read the will to A. J. Davis, and the passage "hereby revoking all wills," Davis said: "There is no need of putting that in. I never made any other will. This is the first." Knight said to him, "Well, that is the way, that is the form, and I think it is safer to have it that way." And Davis said: "All right; let it go."

How do you fix that? There is no way out of it, that the will was made in 1880, revoking all former wills. What else? The conditions of the will of 1880, with regard to working the mine, with regard to bequests to nephews, with regard to bequests to others, with regard to the twenty thousand dollars given to Jeff Davis, and the twenty thousand dollars given to the girl; these provisions are absolutely inconsistent with the provisions of this will of 1866. So on both grounds the will of 1880 destroys, cancels, and forever renders null and void the will of 1866, even if it had been the genuine will of A. J. Davis, and the Court will instruct you to that effect.

And after Mr. Keith had testified, the proponents in this case subpoenaed Mr. Knight, and if they thought that Knight would swear that Keith was not the man, why did they not put him on the stand? They ran no risk. He is an honest man. He would tell the truth. I never had the slightest fear in bringing an honest man on the stand. Never. I want facts, and I hope as long as I live that I shall never win a case that I ought not to win on the facts. No man should wish or endeavor to win a case that he knows is wrong.

I say there is not a man on this jury but believes in his heart and soul this minute that this will was made. You have to throw aside the testimony of a perfectly good man, and no matter whether what he said about Erwin Davis to Judge Knowles was true or not—and I must say that I never saw a witness on the stand in my life more eager to tell his story than Judge Knowles was. Never. He was bound to get it in or die. He answered questions over objections before the Court was allowed to pass upon the objections. Why? Because he is the President of the First National Bank. Now, without saying that he was dishonest about it, I say he was mistaken. Knight never said one word of that kind to him.

It was impossible that he could have said it. So is Mr. Talbot mistaken. So is Andrew J. Davis, Jr. mistaken, and so is John A. Davis mistaken. Think of the idiotic idea that a will, not signed, was given to Knight to keep, attested by two witnesses, and not signed by the testator. Idiotic! Now, as I understand it, gentlemen, you will have to find that that will was made.

Now, what is the next great question in this case, and the question that will be argued at some length, probably, by the other side? And why? Because it is the first and only point, so far as facts are concerned, that they have won in this case. Just one. And what is that? Our experts said that they thought that the ink was nigrosin ink, and the fact that they wanted a test proves that they were sincere. Their witnesses said they did not think it was nigrosin ink. Mr. Hodges said it had too much lustre, but that there was only one way in which it could be absolutely determined and that was by a chemical test. But, say these gentlemen, or rather said Judge Dixon, "the moment that ink turned red the whole case of the contestants was wrecked." Let us see.