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[[embossed seal]] VICTORY [[embossed seal]]
5
The Grand Jury find those bills and present them to the Judge in Court, and they, the Grand Jury, are sworn to secrecy as to their proceeding. The bills thus presented, are in the custody of the Judge, the Clerk & the Sheriff. Common prudence would dictate that these bills of indictment should be kept concealed & secret until the parties are arrested & placed in safe custody.

The parties indicated at this term of the court for murder, near three weeks ago now, have not only not been arrested, except one, but most of them have fled from the county after first being informed by others of the fact of their being indicted. To whose charge this indiscretion, or guilt, whichever it may be, of giving information to those parties indicted, in order that they might escape from the clutches of the law, is to be laid, I do not certainly know; but one thing is evident, the officers of the Court are not blameless. Many of these persons were indicted for the murder of various union men during or directly after the late war.

The Court, Clerk, Sheriff, the numerous deputies, the bailiff of the Court and all the bailiffs of the Grand Jury, and there were a dozen or more of them, belonged to the class that could not take the oath required by Circular order No 13. How far these facts might point out how it happened that these men were warned of the