Daniel W. Squires

Released
Gender:Male
Era:1800s
State:New York
Support
Tenant Rights Anti-Rent War
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Biography

Daniel W. Squires was a Delaware County, New York tenant farmer imprisoned after the August 7, 1845 killing of Undersheriff Osman N. Steele at the Moses Earle farm in Andes, Delaware County, New York, where a rent-distress sale on a patroon-system leasehold drew hundreds of disguised "Calico Indian" Anti-Rent militants. Indicted for murder over the confrontation, he pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter and received a life sentence, and was freed by Governor John Young's mass Anti-Rent pardon on January 27, 1847.

Case

Charges: Murder of Undersheriff Osman N.
Arrested: August 1845
Incarcerated: August 1845
Released: Jan 27, 1847
Sentence: Life imprisonment on the first-degree manslaughter plea. Freed by Governor John Young's mass Anti-Rent pardon of January 27, 1847. One account says eighteen Anti-Rent prisoners were still in the state prisons at that point, so one of the nineteen recorded here had already left custody — the surviving lists do not agree on which — and the pardon date recorded as the release may overstate one man's term. Accounts differ on where the Anti-Rent prisoners were held: some say the Delaware County men went first to Sing Sing, while later accounts place at least Boughton and Earle at Clinton Prison before the pardon, transfers likely explaining the disagreement — so no institution is asserted here. Verdict as recorded: Yes — by guilty plea to first-degree manslaughter at the Delhi sessions, 1845. Charges as recorded: Murder of Undersheriff Osman N. Steele (Andes, Delaware County, August 7, 1845) — resolved by a guilty plea to first-degree manslaughter.
Convicted: Yes
Plead: Guilty — to first-degree manslaughter, having been indicted for murder

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