Publications
The Prison Diary and Letters of Chester Gillette: September 18, 1907 through March 30, 1908
By EDITED BY JACK SHERMAN AND CRAIG BRANDON
January 1, 2007
Tags Occasional Publications
193 pages with 32 black and white illustrations, 2007. ISBN: 978-0-9796448-1-8 ($25)
Chester Gillette was accused of the murder of Grace Brown in 1906. After a sensational trial, covered by newspapers across the country, Gillette was convicted of first degree murder and sentenced to die in the electric chair. This case was the basis for Theodore Dreiser’s classic novel An American Tragedy, the 1951 Academy-award-winning movie A Place in the Sun, and a 2006 opera. Revealed here for the first time are Chester’s private thoughts in his final months as he recorded them in his diary from September 1907 through March 1908. The diary was believed lost for nearly a century and only came to light in 2007 when Marlynn McWade-Murray, the grandniece of Chester Gillette, donated it to Hamilton College. In addition to the diary, the publication contains twelve letters Chester wrote from prison: eleven to Bernice Ferrin, a friend of the family; and one to his sister Hazel, written the day before his execution.
