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SYNOPSIS:
On a frigid day in 1843, Amasa Sprague, a wealthy Yankee mill owner, left his mansion to check on his cattle. On the way, he was accosted and beaten beyond recognition, and his body was left facedown in the snow. What followed was a trial marked by judicial bias, witness perjury and societal bigotry that resulted in the conviction of twenty-nine-year-old Irish-Catholic John Gordon. He was sentenced to hang. Despite overwhelming evidence that the trial was flawed and newly discovered evidence that clearly exonerated him, an anti-Irish Catholic establishment refused him a new trial. On February 14, 1845, John Gordon became the last victim of capital punishment in Rhode Island. Local historian Paul F. Caranci brings this case to life, graphically describing the murder and exposing a corrupt judicial system, a biased newspaper and a bigoted society responsible for the unjust death of an innocent man.
On a frigid day in 1843, Amasa Sprague, a wealthy Yankee mill owner, left his mansion to check on his cattle. On the way, he was accosted and beaten beyond recognition, and his body was left facedown in the snow. What followed was a trial marked by judicial bias, witness perjury and societal bigotry that resulted in the conviction of twenty-nine-year-old Irish-Catholic John Gordon. He was sentenced to hang. Despite overwhelming evidence that the trial was flawed and newly discovered evidence that clearly exonerated him, an anti-Irish Catholic establishment refused him a new trial. On February 14, 1845, John Gordon became the last victim of capital punishment in Rhode Island. Local historian Paul F. Caranci brings this case to life, graphically describing the murder and exposing a corrupt judicial system, a biased newspaper and a bigoted society responsible for the unjust death of an innocent man.
Below - Presentation of The Hanging & Redemption of John Gordon at the Ceilidhe Club in Cranston, RI - April 29, 2022
Radio Show:
Blogtalk Radio
with Host Sherri Rabinowitz (below)
Rhode Island Public's Radio
Mosaic: A Podcast With Host Ana Gonzalez
Who Killed Amasa Sprague
Part 1 December 13, 2020 (below)
Who Killed Amasa Sprague
Part 2 December 20, 2020 (below)
Back Cover: (Pictured) Scott Molloy (Historian and U.R.I. History Professor), Governor Lincoln Chafee, RI State Representative Peter Martin. In 2011, Governor Lincoln Chafee signed the legislation that pardoned John Gordon into law (June 29th, 2011) at the Old State House on Benefit Street. The ceremony took place in the same courtroom where Gordon's trial had taken place 166 years earlier; the very room in which he was condemned to death.
On March 28, 2019, Paul was invited to speak to a group from the North Providence Chapter of the AARP. He presented on The Hanging & Redemption of John Gordon: The True Story of Rhode Island's Last Execution, always a crowd favorite.
Paul discusses the Execution of John Gordon during a presentation before an enthusiastic crowd at the Salvadore Mancini Union Free Library in North Providence.