Volume 10 , Issue 7

Last Man Executed Under Tribal Laws of Choctaw Nation

Deputy Marshal James Ennis, tells the story of the last man executed under the tribal laws of the Choctaw Nation, was William Going, a member of the tribe by blood and a baseball player of considerable prominence.

William Going was shot in 1898, by Sheriff Tom Watson of Nashoba County at Alikchi, the old Court Town of the Third Judicial District, of the Choctaw Nation, after having been convicted of murder of Ishtimihoke, a Choctaw woman, whom Going thought was practicing arts of witchcraft upon him.

The execution of William Going... occurred about the time Congress gave its approval of the Atoka Agreement, and the passage of the Curtis Act, which abrogated the Choctaw Government to a great extent and deprived its court of Jurisdiction to try cases.

The attorneys for Going made application to Judge Clayton, United States judge for the Central District of the Indian Territory, which included the territory in which the Going case was tried, for a writ of habeas corpus, to stop the execution of Going, Judge Clayton heard the case and after a thorough investigation decided that he had no jurisdiction to interfere in the matter, and delivered Going to the Choctaw authorities.

The judge of the Choctaw District court re-sentenced Going and about the time for the execution an effort was made in Antlers to forestall the execution, and telegrams were sent to Judge Thomas that Judge Clayton was out of the district and that Going was going to be unlawfully executed.

Judge Thomas upon said telegrams issued an order staying the execution until the matter could be investigated, and sent the order to Antlers by telegram. The telegram was conveyed to the Choctaw authorities at Alikchi on the day set for the execution.

When this telegram was taken before the Choctaw judge he declined to be controlled by the order of Judge Thomas, saying that Judge Clayton had decided that the United States courts had no jurisdiction in the case and decided to let the Choctaw law and judgment of the court be enforced.

Abner Clay, an educated and brilliant young Choctaw was district attorney. Abner Clay told the court that in his opinion the execution should proceed.

Shortly before 2 o'clock on the execution day, Going was stripped to the waist and made to kneel on a blanket spread on the ground. His heavy irons having been removed in the jail, he walked down between two lines of men to the site of the execution. Every safequard was placed around the execution, for Going had the reputation of being a desperate man.

When he had knelt a medicine man of the Choctaws painted a black spot on his left chest, supposedly over his heart, a deputy sheriff held each hand and Sheriff Watson, thirty paces away, after careful aim fired his Winchester. The ball hit the center of the painted spot and passed through the Indian's body. Going threw up his hands, screamed and fell backward, but he was not dead.

Sallie Durant, an Indian woman, recalling similar occurrences of earlier years, suggested the use of water to complete the death job, and the suspicion had since been current that Going would not have died had it not been for the use of water.

Warrants were issued at Antlers charging the sheriff, the prosecuting attorney and clerk with violation of the order of Judge Thomas, and James Madison Ennis, then deputy United States marshal under Col. John Carroll at Fort Smith, were charged with their arrest.

Sheriff Watson came to Antlers and surrendered and the others were brought in. Charges against them were dismissed when it was learned that Judge Clayton was yet in his district when the order was issued by Judge Thomas. This fact invalidated the order. Judge Thomas was killed in 1914 by prisoners in the State Penitentiary at McAlester during an uprising of convicts. At the time Judge Thomas was sitting in the office of the warden.

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