ame time had good reason to believe that his
accusers would never venture to meet him before a court of justice; and
a proper regard for his own character made him resolved to obtain a
legal investigation of his conduct by some process. In the second place,
Mr. Darg had subjected Barney Corse to a great deal of trouble and
expense; and Friend Hopper thought it no more than fair that expenses
caused by his own treachery should be paid from his own pocket. In the
third place, David Ruggles, a worthy colored man, no way implicated in
the transaction, had been arrested, and was likely to be involved in
expense. In the fourth place, the police officers, who advised the
arrest of Barney Corse, made themselves very conspicuous in the
persecution. He believed they had been actuated by a desire to obtain
the reward for themselves; and as they had no just claim to it, he
determined to defeat them in this attempt. He therefore sued for the
reward himself, though he never intended to use a dollar of it. This was
manifested at the time, by a declaration in the newspapers, that if he
recovered the reward, he would give all over the expenses to some
benevolent society. It was frequently intimated to him that there should
be no further proceedings against him, if he would withdraw this suit;
but he constantly replied that a trial was what he wanted. Finding all
overtures rejected, a complaint was laid before the Grand Jury; and such
was the state of popular prejudice, that twelve out of nineteen of that
body concurred in finding a bill against men of excellent moral
character, without any real evidence to sustain the charge. Barney Corse
had never taken measures to prevent the arrest of Thomas Hughes. He
simply declined to render any assistance. He believed that he was under
no legal obligation to do otherwise; and he knew for a certainty that he
was under no moral obligation; because conscience would not allow him
to aid in returning a runaway slave to his master. Nevertheless, he and
Isaac T. Hopper, and James S. Gibbons, were indicted for "feloniously
receiving, harboring, aiding and maintaining said Thomas, in order that
he might escape from arrest, and avoid conviction and punishment."
Friend Hopper was advised that he might avail himself of some technical
defects in the indictment; but he declined doing it; always insisting
that a public investigation was what he wanted.

The trial was carried on in the same spirit that characteri