400 Words
by
Melinda Pillsbury-Foster
His last
name was Bushnell, and if his voice had not been raised during jury
deliberations in 1670 William Penn, who had defied the Crown and
preached his Quaker faith, would not have lived to found
Pennsylvania. Many in Ashtabula have roots in the former colony east
of here, which he named.
Bushnell
and his fellow jurors were confined and fined for their temerity when
they defied the royal mandate to find Penn guilty. The lives of Penn
and his friend, Mead, hung by two dissenting votes.
The judge
sent the jury back three times to reconsider their verdict saying, “a
verdict that the court will accept, and you shall be locked up
without meat, drink, fire, and tobacco....We will have a verdict by
the help of God or you will starve for it." MORE
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