The Prison Diary and Letters of Chester Gillette
Contact: Gregg A. Tripoli
Executive Director, 315 428-1864, x 311
Or gregg.tripoli@cnyhistory.org
Judge Jack Sherman, co-editor of The Prison Diary and Letters of Chester Gillette, presents a public program at 2 p.m., Sunday, May 4th at the Onondaga Historical Association Museum, 321 Montgomery St., Syracuse, NY 13202. Cost of the program is $3.00 for members and $5.00 for non-members.
Relive the trial of Chester Gillette, convicted in 1906 for the murder of his pregnant lover, Grace Brown, during an excursion to Big Moose Lake in the Adirondacks. Gillette was sentenced to death in Herkimer County and was executed at Auburn Prison in 1908. Considered one of the most notorious murder mysteries of the 20th century, the Chester Gillette/Grace Brown case continues to intrigue many to this day. The Gillette case became the basis for Theodore Dreiser’s 1925 novel An American Tragedy. Interest in the case continued with the 1951 Academy award winning film A Place in the Sun. In 2006, the Adirondack murder mystery generated an opera performed at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City.
In late 2006, Gillette’s grandniece, Marlynn McWade-Murray, revealed the existence of a diary that Gillette kept during the last six months of his life at Auburn Prison. She donated the diary and twelve letters written by Gillette while in prison to Hamilton College. Eleven of the letters are to Bernice Ferrin, a young friend of the Gillette family for whom Chester seemed to have romantic feelings. Gillette wrote the twelfth letter to his sister Hazel the day before his execution. Published by Hamilton College’s Couper Press in late 2007, The Prison Diary and Letters of Chester Gillette was co-edited by Judge Sherman and Craig Brandon, a researcher and author of Murder in the Adirondacks: An American Tragedy Revisited.
At OHA’s presentation, Judge Sherman will discuss the 1906 case, as well as Gillette’s diary. Sherman says, "The diary provides a fascinating view of Chester as he slowly comes to face his death in the electric chair on March 30, 1908."
Copies of The Prison Diary and Letters of Chester Gillette will be available for purchase and signing by Judge Sherman.
