Speaker 1: Hold on, here's the kitchen. Yeah, so this is so fascinating.
Speaker 1: Some of it it's really structurally intact, but it's not.
Speaker 1: So that's kind of where we just came from. That
Speaker 1: window in the middle over there takes you to that
Speaker 1: long hallway and then this is the kitchen. So you've
Speaker 1: got the kitchen. You've got another outbuilding that looks like
Speaker 1: it could have been in the eighteenth century, a carriage house, lumber,
Speaker 1: shehd so storage, a dairy based on the ventilation privies in.
Speaker 2: The back.
Speaker 1: A well.
Speaker 3: Historian and interpreter Nicole Brown is given me a tour
Speaker 3: of Colonel John Chisel's home on East Francis Street in Williamsburg.
Speaker 3: There are large bedrooms, many many ornate fireplaces, and several
Speaker 3: outdoor buildings where enslaved people once toiled. Nicole says that
Speaker 3: Chisel's house was the epitome of gentry, wealth and colonial Virginia.
Speaker 1: It's a very large operation. So if you're this wealthy,
Speaker 1: which I mean the Chisels are ultra wealthy, they're going
Speaker 1: to have their own dairy. They're going to have their
Speaker 1: own private wealth. They're going to have, honestly, those two
Speaker 1: privies with the beautiful garden. That's the status symbol, right.
Speaker 1: So all of this, especially now being inside this building
Speaker 1: looks very simple on the exterior, but this screams ultra
Speaker 1: elite gentry, Virginia wealth to me in a very profound
Speaker 1: kind of way.
Speaker 3: Seeing this house gives me historical context for the story.
Speaker 3: Colonel John Chisel must have felt tremendous financial pressure in
Speaker 3: seventeen sixty six to keep up with his family's lifestyle
Speaker 3: their reputation in Williamsburg. I'll quickly summarize where we are
Speaker 3: with this story. Chisel's son in law, John Robinson, had
Speaker 3: recently died, and as his duplicity was revealed, it tarnished
Speaker 3: the Chisel family name. That would have been devastating for
Speaker 3: a member of the gentry in eighteenth century Virginia.
Speaker 1: So the scandal starts to unfold, you know, around May
Speaker 1: people start to say, oh, I think the late speaker
Speaker 1: may have been doing some things in the treasury he
Speaker 1: shouldn't have done.
Speaker 3: Less than one month after John Robinson's death, news of
Speaker 3: his financial scandal was spreading across the colonies and then
Speaker 3: across the Atlantic Ocean to England. The revelations that Robinson
Speaker 3: had loaned hundreds of thousands of pounds to his friends
Speaker 3: had alarmed the gentry, which were the top five percent
Speaker 3: of the population. John Robinson and his cronies had broken
Speaker 3: the trust of the other ninety five percent of the colony.
Speaker 3: And then, because John Chisel was Robinson's primary business partner,
Speaker 3: the scandal had become focused on him, the one who
Speaker 3: had benefited the most from his son in law's fraud.
Speaker 3: So in the summer of seventeen sixty six, John Chisel
Speaker 3: was distraught, but he hoped that perhaps a visit to
Speaker 3: his mines in the country would quell his concerns over money.
Speaker 3: Like most upper class colonists, he was hopelessly in debt
Speaker 3: and the rural mining operation represented promising income. It was
Speaker 3: the afternoon of June third, seventeen sixty six, in western Virginia,
Speaker 3: at a tiny tavern called Moseby's for reference. The tavern
Speaker 3: was originally built as a small one room house by
Speaker 3: Benjamin Moseby in seventeen forty, two decades earlier. He soon
Speaker 3: began using it as a tavern, and when the County
Speaker 3: of Cumberland was formed in seventeen forty nine, the tavern
Speaker 3: served as the County's courthouse. It would later be used
Speaker 3: as a staging area for George Washington's Continental Army during
Speaker 3: the Revolutionary War, but just to be clear, Moseby's tavern
Speaker 3: was small there. John Chisel's jovial conversation with Scottish merchant
Speaker 3: Robert Rutledge had suddenly become tense. Chisel had used some
Speaker 3: obscene language defined as somewhat liberal of oaths in the newspaper,
Speaker 3: and the drunken Ruttledge scolded him for it. When Chisel
Speaker 3: responded irately, Rutledge began to argue back and hiccup. He
Speaker 3: was that intoxicated. John Robinson's descendant, Simon Robinson, reminds us
Speaker 3: of Rutledge's station in life and why insulting Chisel was
Speaker 3: such a mistake. In the seventeen hundreds.
Speaker 4: Robert Rautledge, although he had done very well for himself
Speaker 4: and had land and had done well in trade, he
Speaker 4: wasn't of the right class.
Speaker 5: He wasn't of the ruling class.
Speaker 3: We hear a lot about the honor code, why duels
Speaker 3: were declared, and why so many men died over insults.
Speaker 3: Some of these insults were much more polite than what
Speaker 3: we read on Twitter. By all accounts, Robert Rutledge seemed
Speaker 3: to behave like a gentleman, but he was drinking that afternoon,
Speaker 3: really drinking, and his confrontation with Chisel seemed out of
Speaker 3: the ordinary. But keep this in mind, John Chisel was
Speaker 3: not drinking, or at least not outwardly drunk. So why
Speaker 3: did he react in such a vicious, vile way by
Speaker 3: calling Rutledge a derogatory term for Scottish people. Historian Julie
Speaker 3: Richter says that this was a case of toxic masculinity
Speaker 3: in eighteenth century colonial America.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, maybe part that it's somebody of a lower
Speaker 2: social level, somebody from Scotland, So you've got that on
Speaker 2: one side. Plus I'm a member of the elite.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: I've read through this stuff multiple times again because it's
Speaker 2: just such an interesting intersection of social level identity illinity.
Speaker 3: Here's a reminder of where we are in the story.
Speaker 3: John Chisel had just returned from his minds in western
Speaker 3: Virginia when he stopped at Moseby Tavern for the afternoon.
Speaker 4: Both men were in the tavern and with their respective friends,
Speaker 4: and Chisel was in very high spirits, thinking that a
Speaker 4: mining operation was going to be a solution to some
Speaker 4: of his financial woes. So he was in very high
Speaker 4: spirits but being very loud and rather obnoxious, and this
Speaker 4: didn't go down well with rather drunk Robert Ratlich, who
Speaker 4: effectively said, do you think you could tone down your language?
Speaker 5: It's not befitting of this establishment.
Speaker 3: Colonel Chisel swung around and glared at Rutledge. His entire
Speaker 3: personality changed, anger flashed in his eyes.
Speaker 4: This, of course, was a red rag to John Chisel,
Speaker 4: how dare you speak to me in this way? You're
Speaker 4: a ghastly Scott and you're from a lowly stock. You
Speaker 4: know you're not an aristocrat as i am, and you
Speaker 4: may not speak to me in that way. This, of course,
Speaker 4: with two men who had been drinking, escalated and drink
Speaker 4: was thrown at each other. Chisel then followed it with
Speaker 4: some fire tongs and a candlestick. Robert Routledge got hold
Speaker 4: of a chair, possibly to defend himself. You could argue,
Speaker 4: if there's candlesticks and firetongs coming at you.
Speaker 3: Chisel screamed for the enslaved person who came with him
Speaker 3: to retrieve a weapon from another room.
Speaker 4: Chisel ordered his slave boy to get his sword. He
Speaker 4: threatened death on the boy if he didn't obey his command.
Speaker 4: I mean, it's difficult to understand that today this had
Speaker 4: may have been an everyday occurrence.
Speaker 5: But boy returned with the sword.
Speaker 3: Rutledge was so intoxicated he needed the help of his
Speaker 3: friend Joseph Carrington to drag him along towards the back door.
Speaker 3: Carrington had the keys, but he fumbled with them as
Speaker 3: he tried to unlock the door. To escape, Chisel charged
Speaker 3: toward the table that separated them. The other men in
Speaker 3: the tavern squinted in the hazy, smoky light from the candles.
Speaker 3: They tried to stay out of the way, but there
Speaker 3: was no place to go. The gentleman in the room
Speaker 3: must have assumed that Chisel would just continue yelling that
Speaker 3: eventually he would calm himself. That's not what happened.
Speaker 1: So a lot of the other men in this room,
Speaker 1: they don't assume that the sword's going to come out,
Speaker 1: because the sword is in that other room that he
Speaker 1: and Rutlige were supposedly supposed to be sharing. It's a
Speaker 1: separate house, is what they say. But he threatens this
Speaker 1: man servant so badly that he goes to get the sword,
Speaker 1: and he brings it into the tavern room. Colonel Chisel
Speaker 1: comes back out and says, get Robert Rutledge out of
Speaker 1: this room.
Speaker 3: Seething as Carrington struggled with the keys, Chisel baited Rutledge
Speaker 3: by repeating the phrase Presbyterian fellow. Rutledge couldn't stop himself.
Speaker 3: He smirked and replied that he was just as much
Speaker 3: a gentleman as Chisel. Chisel became even more enraged at
Speaker 3: this last insult. He screamed and gripped the sword. This
Speaker 3: was the wrong thing for a Scottish merchant to say
Speaker 3: to a member of the gentry that was certainly crossing
Speaker 3: a line. Rutledge was so drunk that he didn't seem
Speaker 3: to realize that he was in danger. He stepped toward
Speaker 3: Chisel as Carrington desperately tried to draw him backward. The
Speaker 3: colonel stood with the unsheathed sword in his hand.
Speaker 1: It's probably a pretty long sword, you know. We're not
Speaker 1: talking about a knife, we're not talking about a switchblade.
Speaker 1: We're talking about something that might be a foot two
Speaker 1: feet long. Right. It's a big, heavy object, and the
Speaker 1: point of that kind of sword is that it's meant
Speaker 1: to do damage.
Speaker 3: The men in the tavern looked alarmed as the smoke thickened.
Speaker 3: Some even left.
Speaker 1: There's a scuffle. There's an altercation, you can see from
Speaker 1: the diagram. They move from place to place around the room,
Speaker 1: until eventually you have Colonel Chissel on one side of
Speaker 1: a table, Robert Rutledge on the other.
Speaker 3: Nicole just mentioned a diagram. She's talking about, an artist
Speaker 3: rendering that someone drew of the crime scene, one that
Speaker 3: was later printed in the newspaper. It actually became the
Speaker 3: first crime scene diagram ever publicly published, the blueprint for
Speaker 3: a document that is now staple in so many criminal cases.
Speaker 3: Now the other men in the tavern became more involved
Speaker 3: and tried to de escalate the whole thing.
Speaker 1: Colonel Chisel is apparently being held back by both Moseby men,
Speaker 1: and Robert Rutledge is being held back by a man
Speaker 1: named Carrington, and a man named Swan is pushing him back.
Speaker 3: The men stood across each other with a table in between,
Speaker 3: with Chisels still bellowing insults at the Scottish merchant. They
Speaker 3: were yelling just six feet away from each other. Colonel
Speaker 3: Chisel was livid by this time, no one could stop him,
Speaker 3: not even two large strong men. His hand tightened on
Speaker 3: the grip of the sword. It was a weapon used
Speaker 3: regularly by men in the gentry for protection while on
Speaker 3: the road.
Speaker 4: There was a bit of a dance around the tavern
Speaker 4: with lots of words exchanged, people trying to intervene to
Speaker 4: say calm down, calm down. And the final act happened
Speaker 4: over a table where Chisel raised his sword and.
Speaker 3: Then as Chisel's friend Samuel Swan stood in between the men,
Speaker 3: Chisel lunged.
Speaker 1: Forward and at this point Colonel Chisel's sword goes through
Speaker 1: Swan's coat and into Reutledge's heart. He slumps down onto
Speaker 1: Carrington and then down onto the floor.
Speaker 6: His coat is pierced by the as it goes into
Speaker 6: Robert Rutledge's heart. Robert Rutledge apparently goes immediately silent, is
Speaker 6: caught by a man I think his name is Campbell
Speaker 6: or something along those lines.
Speaker 3: With just one thrust, Robert Rutledge was dead, slumped in
Speaker 3: Joseph Carrington's arms. A man grabbed John Chisel from behind,
Speaker 3: but it was too late for Robert Rutledge. Chisel pulled
Speaker 3: the sword from Rutlige's body as the Scotsman gasped for breath.
Speaker 6: And he dies right there in front of John Chisel,
Speaker 6: who apparently shows absolutely, positively zero remorse. He says something
Speaker 6: to the effect of I aimed at his heart and
Speaker 6: I hit it well.
Speaker 3: First, Chisel said, he is dead, and I killed him.
Speaker 3: The witnesses in the tavern reported that Rutledge died on
Speaker 3: the spot, but that seems unlikely. A stab wound to
Speaker 3: the heart would likely cause excessive bleeding and he would
Speaker 3: have bled out at least That's what Paul Holes told me.
Speaker 3: This was likely a very painful death for Robert Rutledge.
Speaker 3: Witnesses say that Chisel looked at Samuel Swan. The men
Speaker 3: had once been colleagues in the House of Burgesses. Swan
Speaker 3: was also a member of the gentry, a gentleman like Chisel.
Speaker 3: Chisel squinted at the hole in Swan's wool jacket.
Speaker 1: He doesn't ask at all ever about Robert Utledge, but
Speaker 1: he does ask Swan about his coat. You know, is
Speaker 1: your coat fine? It was not.
Speaker 7: He could not be more connected to the powers that be,
Speaker 7: to the establishment, and when he just casually murders this
Speaker 7: man and he doesn't express any concern for Rutledge. Instead,
Speaker 7: he asks if mister Swan was okay the sword went
Speaker 7: through mister Swan's coat, did I injure him?
Speaker 3: Chisel thought so little of the Scottish merchant that his
Speaker 3: life was easily discarded by the gentry. That was the
Speaker 3: message telegraphed inside the tavern that day in seventeen sixty six.
Speaker 3: The room was quiet. Chisel seemed more concerned about the
Speaker 3: coat of a member of the gentry than he was
Speaker 3: about a man dead on the floor of the tavern.
Speaker 3: Chisel looked over at the enslaved person who had come
Speaker 3: along on the trip, the one who had retrieved his sword,
Speaker 3: and certainly must have been traumatized by all of this.
Speaker 3: Chisel calmly and deliberately ordered him to take the sword,
Speaker 3: dripping in blood, to another room. He told him to
Speaker 3: clean it carefully and rub it well with tallow, which
Speaker 3: was beef or mutton fat. Chisel was concerned that it
Speaker 3: might rust. Then, while the body of Robert Rutledge lay
Speaker 3: on the floor, Chisel did something extraordinary and frankly disgusting.
Speaker 3: He ordered the tavern workers to make him a drink,
Speaker 3: a big drink.
Speaker 6: He sits and orders a bowl of punch, even though
Speaker 6: there's a man whom he he has just outright murdered
Speaker 6: laying on the floor.
Speaker 8: Rutledge was drinking, but Chisel did not have a drink
Speaker 8: until after the stabbing, at which time he calls for
Speaker 8: a bowl of punch to calm his nerves.
Speaker 3: I'm not sure if Chisel's nerves were frayed, but who knows.
Speaker 3: He didn't seem contrite over any of this. He sat
Speaker 3: on the floor of the tavern close to Rutledge's body,
Speaker 3: drinking cupfuls of punch. He continued to bellow insults at Rutledge.
Speaker 3: Chisel screamed, he deserves his fate. Damn him. I aimed
Speaker 3: at his heart and I have hit it.
Speaker 6: Anyways, He's sitting there and he continues, even though Rutledge
Speaker 6: is literally dead on the floor, to hurl insults at
Speaker 6: the man whom, prior to this evening everyone would have
Speaker 6: thought was his friend. But you know, this man whom
Speaker 6: he knew and cared for.
Speaker 7: And at no point do any of the primary documentation
Speaker 7: that survives indicate that he showed any concern for his
Speaker 7: firstwhile friend, Robert Rutledge. They had known each other, they
Speaker 7: had been friends previously. So just the kind of casual
Speaker 7: murder of this individual.
Speaker 3: Oh well, none of the men tried to move either
Speaker 3: man for quite a while, but each witness noted where
Speaker 3: they were and what they saw in the moment.
Speaker 1: Nobody takes him out of the room. They eventually removed
Speaker 1: Robert Rutlich's dead, bleeding body from the room.
Speaker 3: So imagine this a room full of witnesses who just
Speaker 3: watched a man murder another man over angry words. The
Speaker 3: killer is sitting on the floor rapidly becoming intoxicated, and
Speaker 3: no one is doing anything about it. Where is the law?
Speaker 3: Why isn't anyone coming to arrest John Chisel for murder?
Speaker 3: That's one of the controversies around this story.
Speaker 6: I cannot help but believe that he was entirely confident
Speaker 6: when he murdered Robert Rutledge that he would pay no
Speaker 6: price for it, or at the very most, that he
Speaker 6: might be charged with manslaughter.
Speaker 3: Nobody him right now.
Speaker 6: No, So you know in the period here, it's going
Speaker 6: to be a magistrate who detains him anyway. So I
Speaker 6: don't recall there being any mention of a magistrate being present.
Speaker 6: You as a as a free citizen, can arrest someone.
Speaker 6: This is where we get the modern misinterpretation of what
Speaker 6: a citizen's arrest actually is. But you can, as a
Speaker 6: free citizen of Virginia lay your hands on someone. That's
Speaker 6: literally what an arrest is, to lay your hands on
Speaker 6: someone to detain them. But he's not going anywhere. It's
Speaker 6: pretty clear he intends to stay.
Speaker 3: Eventually, John Chisel would sober up, and when he did,
Speaker 3: what would he say happen that day? Would he feel remorse?
Speaker 3: Would he admit that he attacked an unarmed man in
Speaker 3: a room full of witnesses? Would he acknowledge that Robert
Speaker 3: Rutledge was innocent, an unwitting victim, and a terrible tragedy? Somehow,
Speaker 3: I doubt it. Other patrons in the tavern had already
Speaker 3: begun recounting their own versions of the story. Remember this
Speaker 3: was a very small room with many witnesses, but a
Speaker 3: lot of those people had been drinking for hours, and
Speaker 3: it might have been difficult for them to even make
Speaker 3: sense of what they had seen. There was smoke billowing
Speaker 3: from the fireplace, the light was dim because the room
Speaker 3: was filled with candles. These were not good circumstances for
Speaker 3: witnessing a murder.
Speaker 8: Basically, if you go back to the scene of the
Speaker 8: crime and we've done this, put all the people in
Speaker 8: the room, put them where they were supposed to be
Speaker 8: at certain times. Plus the lack of light with candlelight,
Speaker 8: and at the moment that the sword actually pierces his heart,
Speaker 8: anything could have happened.
Speaker 3: Gisel's friends were already building a case a very specific
Speaker 3: kind of defense. Self defense.
Speaker 1: People sometimes try to excuse his behavior, saying, well, he
Speaker 1: wasn't drunk. Other people try to say, well, well, we
Speaker 1: don't know, but he's picking up every heavy object he
Speaker 1: can find in this room to inflict damage. And I'm
Speaker 1: sure I don't have to tell you anything. As I
Speaker 1: think I've heard Paul Huls say before, anything can be
Speaker 1: a weapon if used with proper force and intent. You
Speaker 1: can make a candlestick a weapon. So now he's picked
Speaker 1: this very sharp object, this very big, heavy object, that
Speaker 1: is going to be his weapon.
Speaker 3: But then there's the matter of where the weapon struck
Speaker 3: the victim.
Speaker 8: Yeah, he was stabbed, it was a deliberate stabbing.
Speaker 9: You.
Speaker 8: He did not fall into the sword. There are people
Speaker 8: who say that they saw Chisel lunge. There are people
Speaker 8: who say that he didn't lunge, that he was holding
Speaker 8: his sword out. Another thing that people don't consider is
Speaker 8: again the size of the room. The table over which
Speaker 8: these guys are arguing are just three feet five and
Speaker 8: a half inches, you know, take a yard The sword
Speaker 8: was two and a half or three feet, I mean
Speaker 8: the yardstick.
Speaker 3: Eventually, John Chisel's friends, some of those in the tavern,
Speaker 3: would offer the law this story. Chisel did snidely call
Speaker 3: Robert Rutledge a Presbyterian fellow, which was an insult. Ruttledge
Speaker 3: swung around, startling Chisel. Yes, Chisel was still holding the sword,
Speaker 3: but then he felt threatened and he lowered the point
Speaker 3: of his weapon and then held it without lunging forward.
Speaker 3: Ruttledge was the one who had moved forward toward Chisel.
Speaker 3: Because the Scottish merchant was drunk, he accidentally fell onto
Speaker 3: the sword. It went through his heart and Chisel felt it.
Speaker 3: He pulled out the sword and realized what had happened.
Speaker 3: Chisel then told witnesses to take away Rutledge. It had
Speaker 3: all been a horrible mistake. Chisel had not attacked Rutledge.
Speaker 3: Rutledge had attacked him, and he had caused his own death.
Speaker 3: It was self defense, but it was also an accident.
Speaker 3: Chisel's friends admitted that Chisel had been extremely angry. If
Speaker 3: Robert Rutledge had not verbally abused Chisel, they said, then
Speaker 3: none of this would have happened. They were blaming the victim,
Speaker 3: which happens with both female and male victims. It's hard
Speaker 3: to believe that this would be a valid defense, but
Speaker 3: it was. This seems like an extraordinary amount of anger,
Speaker 3: even for a simple insult, right.
Speaker 1: And it's interesting because the first anonymous article published in
Speaker 1: the Gazette on July eighteenth, actually says that I'm paraphrasing here,
Speaker 1: but essentially says, you know, while this is an insult,
Speaker 1: you usually would let it go if it were a
Speaker 1: friend or someone who's extremely intoxicated, of which Robert Bruttledge
Speaker 1: apparently was both. Does this speak to Colonel Chisel's personality maybe?
Speaker 1: Does it also speak to the idea of how important
Speaker 1: status is and having people stay in their place? I
Speaker 1: think so.
Speaker 3: And here's what's complicated about this case. According to the
Speaker 3: law and the Colony of Virginia, self defense could work
Speaker 3: as a legal justification because technically Robert Rutledge threw the
Speaker 3: first punch. He was technically the instigator, not John Chisel Rutledge.
Speaker 6: By the letter of the law, he is the first
Speaker 6: person to assault someone because he throws wine from his
Speaker 6: glass onto Colonel Chisel. And according to the newspaper, I
Speaker 6: think this is a quote some small part did land
Speaker 6: on him, at least to some small part is which
Speaker 6: I read and laughed. But Colonel Chisel returns the favor
Speaker 6: by throwing a bowl of punch at mister Rutledge, and
Speaker 6: then the two continue with their insults. So this is
Speaker 6: a duel. I suppose it's a duel in the same
Speaker 6: way that someone might spit at someone else and that
Speaker 6: person shoots them. Right. If it is a duel, it
Speaker 6: is certainly an ill matched to duel.
Speaker 3: As the story spread, the situation didn't strike most colonists
Speaker 3: as self defense. Colonel Chisel was clearly the aggressor, and
Speaker 3: Robert Rutledge was unarmed. This, said most colonists, was murder.
Speaker 3: The people in the tavern that afternoon all declared it,
Speaker 3: and they told the newspapers that John Chisel had stabbed
Speaker 3: a local merchant. This case should have been easy to prosecute.
Speaker 6: In theory, there is no case more open and shut
Speaker 6: than this. There are multiple witnesses, they're all of good character.
Speaker 6: The one person in the newspaper who is recorded as
Speaker 6: countering what anybody says is a person who is known
Speaker 6: to be of ill character and offers several versions depending
Speaker 6: on who's listening to him at any time.
Speaker 3: So the gentry in the Thirteen Colonies, it was not
Speaker 3: open and shut. After all, being accused of murder was
Speaker 3: scandalous and certainly not befitting of a member of the
Speaker 3: higher class.
Speaker 7: I don't understand why you're holding the accountable for this.
Speaker 7: It seems to be Chisel's reaction to it. And I
Speaker 7: think that kind of casual response to life of individuals
Speaker 7: in the lower sorts, or at least stations in society
Speaker 7: below yours, is pervasive.
Speaker 3: And because that attitude was so pervasive among the elites,
Speaker 3: something else began to happen organically. Some of them changed
Speaker 3: their stories. The witnesses in the tavern began to side
Speaker 3: with their own social class. Remember that on that day
Speaker 3: the tavern had been filled with a mix of classes,
Speaker 3: gentry people as well as merchants and servants and enslaved people.
Speaker 3: Friends of Robert Rutledge claimed that John Chisel was the aggressor,
Speaker 3: but the friends of Chisel said it was an accident.
Speaker 8: It comes down to in the room. Those people who
Speaker 8: again liked Rutledge or are on Rutledge's side, they have
Speaker 8: one view, and the people who are on Chissel's side,
Speaker 8: they have another view.
Speaker 6: The expectation if you are born into a certain station
Speaker 6: is that you will serve in the ruling class of Virginia.
Speaker 6: And I'm speaking specifically of the gentry station. If you
Speaker 6: are a gentryman, especially if you are a first son,
Speaker 6: if you are a property holder, it is your duty
Speaker 6: to serve the people in your jurisdiction, and perhaps that
Speaker 6: includes all of Virginia.
Speaker 3: And John Chisel was a former lawmaker in the House
Speaker 3: of Burgesses.
Speaker 6: As a burgess, as if you're high enough in station,
Speaker 6: as a councilman, as a magistrate, as an alderman, whatever
Speaker 6: you know, vestryman, there you go, and well, here is
Speaker 6: an example of somebody who is the highest in Virginia
Speaker 6: society behaving rather badly. And it gets a lot.
Speaker 3: Worse, That's right, it does get so much worse. As
Speaker 3: news about the murder began to spread, much of the
Speaker 3: public became incensed. The papers described Chisel's nonchalant reaction to
Speaker 3: the stabbing. They detailed his abusive rantings toward the Scottish merchant.
Speaker 3: The reporters concluded by declaring that John Chisel sat on
Speaker 3: the floor of the tavern near Rutlich's body and got drunk.
Speaker 3: Members of the elite seemed to gravitate toward Chisel's explanation,
Speaker 3: but Simon Robinson says that the ninety five percent of
Speaker 3: the colonists who weren't gentry were outraged.
Speaker 4: The main altercation that led to the murder was a
Speaker 4: man of lower class spoke to me in a way
Speaker 4: he shouldn't have done. Now, when that is being read
Speaker 4: by the general populace in the newspapers, I mean that
Speaker 4: must have been enraging to read that. Then to see
Speaker 4: that the families were intertwined, the Chisels and the Robinson's.
Speaker 3: First John Robinson had stolen hundreds of thousands of pounds
Speaker 3: from the colony. This had drilled Virginia further into debt,
Speaker 3: and then his father in law had murdered a member
Speaker 3: of the lower class and assumed he would face no consequences.
Speaker 3: It wasn't a good look.
Speaker 4: The financial scandal was blowing up, looking after his own,
Speaker 4: looking after his friends, looking after other rich people, and
Speaker 4: as you say, linking that in with taxes that were
Speaker 4: hurting or people. I think it was part of a
Speaker 4: process which made the general public feel that these people
Speaker 4: are not fit to governess.
Speaker 5: We need change.
Speaker 3: Nicole Brown says that this hadn't been the first time
Speaker 3: that a member of the gentry had insulted or even
Speaker 3: killed a white working class person. I make that distinction
Speaker 3: because while enslaved people were certainly murdered, they weren't considered people.
Speaker 3: But this murder felt different because of Chisel's reaction.
Speaker 1: It's not to say that the ultra elite have not
Speaker 1: commit crimes prior to this point, or used their privilege
Speaker 1: or their nepotism to get what they want done in
Speaker 1: the colony of Virginia. It's that I think he genuinely
Speaker 1: didn't think he was going to be held accountable for it.
Speaker 6: Virginia exists in a government system that relies on people
Speaker 6: of a certain station behaving to a certain level of quality.
Speaker 3: There had been miscarriages of justice before this case, and
Speaker 3: there would be after. Two of the most famous men
Speaker 3: in colonial America were killed in separate incidents, and their
Speaker 3: killers were both privileged. Both got away with murder because
Speaker 3: of their status in life. John Chisel's wife's family, the Randolphs,
Speaker 3: had been embroiled in countless scandals. One of the most
Speaker 3: dramatic happened in seventeen ninety three, when Richard Randolph and
Speaker 3: his wife Judith went on trial from murder. The wealthy
Speaker 3: young couple had visited the estate of some friends and
Speaker 3: took along Judith's younger sister, Nancy. Randolph had been living
Speaker 3: with them for months before the trip. At the estate
Speaker 3: in southern Virginia, Nancy became very ill, according to several
Speaker 3: enslaved people on the property, but only Richard, her brother
Speaker 3: in law, was able to attend to her. The next day,
Speaker 3: all three Randolphs left the property, but later the rumor
Speaker 3: amongst the enslaved people was that Nancy had been pregnant
Speaker 3: by Richard, and when she gave birth that night, Richard
Speaker 3: and his wife Judith killed the baby and disposed of
Speaker 3: the body to keep the secret. Of course, Richard, Nancy,
Speaker 3: and Judith all denied this, but Richard and Judith were
Speaker 3: charged with murder. Thanks to the family's wealth. They were
Speaker 3: defended by both Patrick Henry and John Marshall, he was
Speaker 3: the future Chief Justice of the U. S. Supreme Court.
Speaker 3: Both men argued brilliantly, and eventually Richard and Judith Randolph
Speaker 3: were acquitted. The enslaved people on the property swore that
Speaker 3: there were remains of a baby there, but by Virginia law,
Speaker 3: black people were not allowed to testify in a court case,
Speaker 3: so it's likely that someone got away with murder. In
Speaker 3: eighteen o six, one of the founding fathers was murdered
Speaker 3: by a member of his own wealthy family. George With
Speaker 3: will actually show up in the next episode of Chisel's story,
Speaker 3: but forty years later, With would become suspicious as people
Speaker 3: in his own household became violently ill after a visit
Speaker 3: from his troubled grand nephew, seventeen year old George Sweeney.
Speaker 3: When With himself also became ill, he suspected he was
Speaker 3: being poisoned, but his physician said it was probably cholera.
Speaker 3: With changed his will, removing George as one of the beneficiaries,
Speaker 3: but now With was dying of what he believed was
Speaker 3: arsenic poisoning. On his deathbed, With begged the doctor cut me,
Speaker 3: which seemed to be a request for an autopsy. But
Speaker 3: when the time came to do the autopsy, the physician
Speaker 3: didn't use the correct test for arsenic and the results
Speaker 3: were inconclusive. George Sweeney used his family's wealth to hire
Speaker 3: well known attorneys when he was charged, and those attorneys
Speaker 3: poked holes in the colony's case and he was acquitted.
Speaker 3: Privilege is power in our courts. In seventeen sixty six,
Speaker 3: the colonists who were angry and disappointed with John Chisel
Speaker 3: were only comforted by the idea that a member of
Speaker 3: the gentry would finally be forced to pay for his crimes.
Speaker 3: John Robinson was dead, and so many other wealthy colonists
Speaker 3: seemed to be above the law, but not John Chisel.
Speaker 3: Not this time. He would not be able to escape
Speaker 3: a trial, they believed, or the noose, So the wheels
Speaker 3: of justice began to grind. A coroner examined Robert Rutledge's
Speaker 3: body and made a determination.
Speaker 6: So a coroner is called in. This is very important.
Speaker 6: A coroner is called in to determine the cause of
Speaker 6: the death. And the cause of the death is a
Speaker 6: pierced heart, and by the testimony or the statements made
Speaker 6: by the people around it is at the result of
Speaker 6: a thrust from Colonel John Chisel.
Speaker 3: It sounds like John Chisel was about to be charged
Speaker 3: with murder. The coroner had declared that Chisel's sword had
Speaker 3: been the weapon, but the coroner didn't declare it a murder.
Speaker 3: That wasn't his job. His job was simply to declare
Speaker 3: a cause of death. Now, let's return to the tavern
Speaker 3: on the day of religious murder.
Speaker 1: And they contact the sheriff of that county, who, if
Speaker 1: my member serves me correctly, is Jesse Thomas. Jesse Thomas
Speaker 1: is called to collect Colonel Chisel.
Speaker 3: Chisel seems surprised as he was ordered to put down
Speaker 3: the punch bowl and get off the floor. He was
Speaker 3: walked out the door and immediately remanded to the county
Speaker 3: jail while the sheriff interviewed witnesses. Chisel remained in jail
Speaker 3: for seven days. That must have been incredibly upsetting for him.
Speaker 3: So rarely had a member of the gentry even visited
Speaker 3: at jail, let alone be imprisoned in one, but the
Speaker 3: owner of the tavern, Benjamin Moseby, kept Chisel well fed
Speaker 3: as he sat behind bars, and even after sobering up,
Speaker 3: he showed no signs of remorse for killing Robert Rutledge.
Speaker 3: Sheriff Jesse Thomas used that week to investigate the case
Speaker 3: against John Chisel. Surely Thomas must have been cautious and nervous.
Speaker 3: The accusation of murder against a member of the gentry
Speaker 3: would be unpopular, but so would the notion that a
Speaker 3: killer had gone free. So Thomas was dutiful and thorough
Speaker 3: as he collected witness statements. When the prosecutor read Thomas's notes,
Speaker 3: they formally declared Chisel with feloniously murdering Robert Rutledge. There
Speaker 3: would be essentially a bail hearing in a nearby court. There.
Speaker 3: Chisel insisted he was not guilty and demanded to be
Speaker 3: released on bail. He sat in the examining court in
Speaker 3: front of a panel of judges. Eight witnesses testified, including
Speaker 3: the men who were standing closest to Chisel and Rutledge.
Speaker 3: Some of them were Chisel's friends. They detailed the argument,
Speaker 3: the escalation of the abusive language, and then the stabbing.
Speaker 3: They were very matter of fact, though none would admit
Speaker 3: that it was clearly murder.
Speaker 8: And then he goes before the examining Court, which is
Speaker 8: held in the court or in the tavern.
Speaker 3: The President of the Court informed Colonel John Chisel that,
Speaker 3: after careful deliberation, they would not allow him to be
Speaker 3: released on bail.
Speaker 6: There is no difference between peers or commoners as to bail.
Speaker 3: Chisel seemed devastated and furious. This was a surprising turn
Speaker 3: for him, as if being kept in a county jail
Speaker 3: weren't demeaning enough. Now he could face a trial in Williamsburg,
Speaker 3: where everyone knew him, and then he would also be
Speaker 3: sent to wait in the jail in the city where
Speaker 3: all of the gentry could see him. But the justices
Speaker 3: really had no choice.
Speaker 7: Wherever the accused crime took place. They're sent to Williamsburg
Speaker 7: to stand trial here in the capitol before the general Court.
Speaker 3: But Carson Hudson says there was likely another reason why
Speaker 3: the justices sent him off.
Speaker 8: Basically, I'm pretty sure the justices there are going, oh
Speaker 8: my god, let's get rid of this. Yeah, I said,
Speaker 8: you know, bump them on up to the governor. Let
Speaker 8: the governor handle this. You know, we're nobody.
Speaker 3: So soon John Chisel was loaded onto a carriage. Sheriff
Speaker 3: Thomas held the examining Court's warrant as he ordered the
Speaker 3: driver to head towards Williamsburg.
Speaker 6: So chisl is going to be brought here into the
Speaker 6: city to attend to the public jail until he can
Speaker 6: be tried at the court of Oya and Terminer.
Speaker 3: John Chisel would be tried before the general Court, but
Speaker 3: not before spending time in the city jail. There seemed
Speaker 3: to be a real possibility that he could be convicted
Speaker 3: of murder, though self defense could potentially create some reasonable doubt. Regardless,
Speaker 3: he had never been in a worse crisis, but perhaps
Speaker 3: there was some hope. After all, John Chisel did have
Speaker 3: some very powerful friends.
Speaker 9: And what we see with this particular case is how
Speaker 9: willing the guys in the status quo, the powerful, the
Speaker 9: wealthy of the gentry are willing to go to protect
Speaker 9: one of their own because in protecting one of their own,
Speaker 9: they're actually protecting their own system. They are able to
Speaker 9: sort of perpetuate it in part through closing ranks around
Speaker 9: this guy.
Speaker 1: So he's on his way to Williamsburg, right, this is
Speaker 1: a felony case. The coroners looked at it and said,
Speaker 1: this guy's been murdered by a sword. And all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, the sheriff in question is intercepted by several
Speaker 1: gentlemen of Williamsburg, also including his attorney, John Wales.
Speaker 3: On the next episode of tenfold more Wicked on exactly right.
Speaker 9: Colonel Chisel. He is as gentry as they come. He
Speaker 9: is kind of a jerk. No one seems to particularly
Speaker 9: care for the guy, but is wealthy, well connected.
Speaker 2: The public jail that you've been in is the place
Speaker 2: where anybody who committed a murder is to be held.
Speaker 2: I certainly cannot think of anybody who received the privilege
Speaker 2: of getting to go back to his own house.
Speaker 6: We're talking about somebody who outright murdered his friend, and
Speaker 6: then his friends tried to give him a privileged position.
Speaker 7: So you're beginning to see those fissures that I was
Speaker 7: talking about. The status quo is under siege.
Speaker 9: And this bigger question always is is who's in charge,
Speaker 9: who matters, and who gets to make those decisions.
Speaker 3: If you love a good, real ghost story, my audiobook
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