Select Speeches of Daniel Webster | Page 6

authors of
the alleged robbery. He manifested no particular zeal on this subject.
He was in no haste. He appears rather to have been pressed by others to
do that which, if he had really been robbed, we should suppose he
would have been most earnest to do, the earliest moment.
But could he so seriously wound himself? Could he or would he shoot
a pistol-bullet through his hand, in order to render the robbery probable,
and to obtain belief in his story? All exhibitions are subject to accidents.
Whether they are serious or farcical, they may, in some particulars, not
proceed exactly as they are designed to do. If we knew that this shot
through the hand, if made by himself, must have been intentionally
made by himself, it would be a circumstance of greater weight. The
bullet went through the sleeve of his coat. He might have intended it

should go through nothing else. It is quite certain he did not receive the
wound in the way he described. He says he was pulling or thrusting
aside the robber's pistol, and while his hand was on it, it was fired, and
the contents passed through his hand. This could not have been so,
because no part of the contents went through the hand, except the ball.
There was powder on the sleeve of his coat, and from the appearance
one would think the pistol to have been three or four feet from the hand
when fired. The fact of the pistol-bullet being fired through the hand, is
doubtless a circumstance of importance. It may not be easy to account
for it; but it is to be weighed with other circumstances.
It is most extraordinary, that, in the whole case, the prosecutor should
prove hardly any fact in any way but by his own oath. He chooses to
trust every thing on his own credit with the jury. Had he the money
with him which he mentions? If so, his clerks or persons connected
with him in business must have known it; yet no witness is produced.
Nothing can be more important than to prove that he had the money.
Yet he does not prove it. Why should he leave this essential fact
without further support? He is not surprised with this defence, he knew
what it would be. He knew that nothing could be more important than
to prove that, in truth, he did possess the money which he says he lost;
yet he does not prove it. All that he saw, and all that he did, and
everything that occurred to him until the alleged robbery, rests solely
on his own credit. He does not see fit to corroborate any fact by the
testimony of any witness. So he went to New York to arrest Jackman.
He did arrest him. He swears positively that he found in his possession
papers which he lost at the time of the robbery; yet he neither produces
the papers themselves, nor the persons who assisted in the search.
In like manner, he represents his intercourse with Taber at Boston.
Taber, he says, made certain confessions. They made a bargain for a
disclosure or confession on one side, and a reward on the other. But no
one heard these confessions except Goodridge himself. Taber now
confronts him, and pronounces this part of his story to be wholly false;
and there is nobody who can support the prosecutor.
A jury cannot too seriously reflect on this part of the case. There are
many most important allegations of fact, which, if true, could easily be
shown by other witnesses, and yet are not so shown.
How came Mr. Goodridge to set out from Bangor, armed in this formal

and formidable manner? How came he to be so apprehensive of a
robbery? The reason he gives is completely ridiculous. As the
foundation of his alarm, he tells a story of a robbery which he had
heard of, but which, as far as appears, no one else ever heard of; and
the story itself is so perfectly absurd, it is difficult to resist the belief
that it was the product of his imagination at the moment. He seems to
have been a little too confident that an attempt would be made to rob
him. The manner in which he carried his money, as he says, indicated a
strong expectation of this sort. His gold he wrapped in a cambric cloth,
put it into a shot bag, and then into a portmanteau. One parcel of bills,
of a hundred dollars in amount, he put into his pocket-book; another, of
somewhat more than a thousand dollars, he carried next his person,
underneath all his clothes. Having disposed of his money in this way,
and armed himself with two good pistols,