“In connection with the Senate affair would it not be well to stop and consider what we are doing?”
The writer stated further:
“Sorry, I, too, had to use explosives (for the last time I trust). It is the export kind, and ought to make enough noise to be heard above the voices that clamor for war and blood money. This explosion is the exclamation point to my appeal for peace.”
Again he wrote:
“By the way, don’t put this on the Germans or Bryan. I am an old-fashioned American...”
And he added, in a penned postscript:
“We would, of course, not sell to the Germans if they could buy here, and since so far we only sold to the Allies, neither side should object if we stopped.”
At half-past nine o’clock the shooting occurred at Glen Cove. About the same time Dr. Charles Munroe, consulting expert of the Bureau of Mines, was called to the Capitol to make an examination of the wreckage of the explosion. He soon arrived at the conclusion that the shock had been caused by no spontaneous combustion, but by a fair quantity of high explosive.
While he was prying about among the débris, Lester was being lodged in the Glen Cove jail. His bonds were loosened, leaving him a very sore set of ankles and wrists, his cut forehead was bound up, and when he was questioned, he gave out the following statement:
“I, Frank Holt, of Ithaca, N. Y., and lately professor of German at Cornell, do hereby freely make to William E. Luyster, justice of the peace, the following statement of the facts concerning my visit to the home of J. P. Morgan at East Island, Glen Cove, N. Y.
“I have been in New York City about ten days and had made a previous trip to the home of Mr. Morgan last week. My motive in coming here was to try to force Mr. Morgan to use his influence with the manufacturers of munitions in the United States, and with the millionaires who are financing the war loans, to have an embargo put on shipments of war munitions, so as to relieve the American people from complicity in the death of thousands of our European brothers.
“If Germany should be able to buy munitions here we would of course positively refuse to sell to her. The reason that the American people have not as yet stopped the shipments seems to be that we are getting rich out of this traffic, but do we not get enough prosperity out of non-contraband shipments? And would it not be better for us to make what money we can without causing the slaughter of Europeans?
“I am very sorry that I had to cause the Morgan family this unpleasantness, but I believe that if Mr. Morgan would put his shoulder to the wheel he could accomplish what I have endeavored to do. I wanted him to do the work I could not do. I hope that he will do his share anyway. We must stop our participation in the killing of Europeans, and God will take care of the rest.”