Morgan County monstrosity, Part II

After Professor Allison, principal of the Allison Home School in Syracuse and minister in the Presbyterian Church, was revealed to have molested his 10-year-old niece, the members of the community and the parents of the children in his school met to discuss with him the charges against him.

The professor acknowledged his indiscretion, claimed that he truly “loved” children, wept and pleaded that his family be spared the shame of his exposure. The community, without further investigation of the incident, agreed to “have confidence” in Professor Allison’s apology and in his promise never to touch a child again.

The professor, however, was actually less than contrite. He implied that he had been vindicated following a thorough investigation, and his statement was repeated by the Rev. McBride. At this point, the community became angry, noting the professor had “resorted to unfair means” to prevent witnesses from testifying against him.

Professor Allison then wrote to the Session, the governing body of the Presbyterian Church, and presented a letter in which he resigned from his position as Elder of the church. He stopped short of admitting guilt, stating that he could not continue to minister to his congregation as the “reports in circulation calculated to injure my character” might prove to be a “stumbling block to a mortal on earth.”

Allison wrote that “public investigations bring so much harm to a community,” but he said that he had called a meeting for the purpose of such an investigation. However, he described the meeting with the community in a way that did not quite match the accounts of the meeting given by those who attended it. Allison said that only “eight or ten patrons” attended the meeting, though he had invited all of them to attend.

He further noted that “no witnesses appeared against me,” ignoring the efforts he had made to make sure that no children attended to testify to what they had seen. He finished his account of the meeting by pointing out, “Not a word was said to injure the reputation or wound the feelings of any one.”
In his letter of resignation, Allison continued to deny what he had done, pointing out that in 25 years of teaching, “if” he had done anything that caused harm, he never intended to harm anyone. He closed the letter by citing two stanzas of the hymn “Jesus, Lover of my Soul,” in which the speaker begs Christ to “hide me … till the storm of life is past.”

The Sedalia Democrat sent a reporter to interview Allison and residents of Syracuse. Though the reporter questioned Allison privately “with delicate regard for the Professor’s feelings,” Allison squirmed and writhed but refused to answer the reporter’s direct question as to his guilt, asking instead, “How could I be guilty of such things?”

When the reporter continued his questions, Allison again steadfastly refused to admit his guilt, saying only that “for the sake of harmony and peace in the neighborhood I will not deny them.”

Allison followed this statement with the plea that he loved children; in fact, he said, “I fondle them like lambs.” The reporter reminded that fondling a child was exactly what Allison had been accused of, but Allison remarked that his “reason must have been dethroned.”

The reporter, thoroughly disgusted with the professor, noted that Allison “raved in this way” for half an hour, and begged the reporter not to publish the interview, but instead to invite the residents of Syracuse to a second public meeting.

A few of the “more charitable” residents simply considered Allsion to be a “maniac,” and begged that the “mantle of charity may cover his atrocities.”

Most of the folks of Syracuse refused any further investigation, stating that the professor had “violated the laws of the land and of nature, … had scandalized and outraged the neighborhood, … and had tried to whitewash by a mock investigation.” They refused to have anything more to do with Allison.

A few angrier folk, noting that the victim had been seen touching some neighborhood boys as her uncle had taught her, recommended a “coat of tar and feathers.”

The entire incident, editor Jonathan Edwards noted, was presented in the Democrat with the “stern facts … expected of a newspaper.” The language of his presentation, however, was so emotionally charged that it read more like the Police Gazette, a nationally circulated scandal sheet recognized for its salacious coverage of crime.

In addition to the overstated, melodramatic language with which he wrote the story, Edwards began the three full-length column story with three-quarters of a column of editorializing about the “revolting and improbable nature” of the incident.

He wrote of Allison’s high position in the community, noting that only “hard-heartedness and perversity” would prompt an editor to publish anything that would “drag a man from his high position and blast his future.”

But, Edwards noted, a man who has “outraged society’s law” by “premeditatedly, in cold blood, slaughters innocence and converted the whole life of a mere girl into a living hell” deserves “no sympathy.”