Executed
John Brown
John Brown, a man held at a jail, was taken by wagon to a gallows and executed by hanging in 1886, according to the Staunton Vindicator and the Semi-Weekly South Kentuckian. The Vindicator's eyewitness account says he climbed the scaffold steps without assistance and made no speech, asking only that he not be kept waiting too long. The witness wrote that his voice sounded unnaturally composed.
Cause of death, as reported: Executed by the state
Reported by: the eyewitness account.