MORE ON THE EXECUTION
On that fateful day, May 1, 1846, Lonz Pennington stood in front of a large crowd of onlookers.  Newton Allen was jailer at the time and it was his job to tie the rope around the condemned mans neck and spring the trap that would send him to his death.

 Being a man of kindly feelings, the thought of tying that rope around Pennington’s neck made the jailer ill.  When the time came actually to do the job he found it necessary to turn the unsavory task over to a deputy.  However, Jailer Allen rallied in time to spring the trap under the limb of a post oak tree.  When the trap dropped, the rope broke, and it all had to be done over again.  The relatively young man, (age between 35-40) died bravely.