The Bludgeon.
A Strange Man Murdered Last Week near Kingston.

The criminal record of Bartow county is becoming somewhat startling.  Every now and then we are called upon to make reports of criminal occurrences.  The one we are now about to relate is an instance of the foulest murder, as yet veiled in mystery.

On Tuesday night of last week a rather genteel-looking workingman, as his appearance indicated, was put off the train at Kingston.  He was a stranger, it seems, with little, if any, money, and claiming to be from South Carolina.  He was known to have purchased a small bit of cheese and some crackers.  No more was thought of the man until Saturday about noon, when the stark naked dead body of the man was found about a mile Southeast of Kingston, in a thicket of brushwood, and about fifty yards south of the railroad on the plantation of Mrs. Beck.  The body was covered with green pine brush.

Further testimony before the coroner’s jury gave the information that on Wednesday night a light was seen near the spot where the body was found, and low talking was heard and three unknown persons were seen by the light.

The verdict of the jury was to the effect that the deceased came to his death by one of more blows inflicted on his head, entirely crushing the cranium and brain, supposed to have been done by a stick weighing four or five pounds, in the hands of an unknown party.

The deceased was a man about five feet and six inches tall, spare formation, weighing about 125 pounds, blue eyes, red complexion, brown hair and whiskers, bald on the crown of the head; nose sharp and inclined to the right, upper teeth very prominent; under teeth receding, he had a scar on the second finger of the right hand, and was about thirty years old.  Had two scars on the right hip.