The Early History of Floyd County...Organization of the Courts

2nd in a series of articles... ...April 24th, 1822, Joseph Ash was convicted of larceny, and sentenced to the penitentiary for six months, being the first man sentenced to the penitentiary from Floyd county...April, 1823, James Edwards, for adultery, was fined $100, being the first case of the kind tried in the county...At this term of the Court Henry Reineking made application for naturalization as a citizen of the United States...25 May 1824, Samuel Hawley filed his petition for bounty and pension, as a Revolutionary soldier...The Court met in the new Court House for the first time on the eleventh day of October, 1824. This was what would now be considered a very plain and homely building--the court room on the first floor, the jury rooms above. The ceilings were low and without ornament. The seats were of the old fashioned box kind, and unpainted. From the bar railings they were raised one above the other, the elevation of each being about nine inches above that one forward. The bar was separated from the balance of the room by a pine railing, very plain and high, and painted red. The tables were as plain as the railing, and the jury and witness-boxes were supplied with high, old fashioned benches, originally painted blue. The house was built in the centre of the square, and the square was surrounded by a plain pailing fence....The building cost three thousand dollars, and was then regarded as one of the best and finest of its kind in the State. The contractor for it was Caleb Newman. This Court House stood forty-one years, when it was torn down to give place to the splendid new edifice now nearly completed....On 15 Oct. 1824, 11 people filed a recognizance bond for the appearance of Joseph Carter to answer a charge of murder. ...Carter surrendered and was taken to the Clark county jail, "there being no jail in this county."...May, 1825, the trial of Joseph Carter was commenced; the trial occupied two days, and Carter was acquitted...Not long after his acquittal, he was found dead in a pond not far from the scene of the murder; but whether he was killed and thrown into the pond, or was accidentally drowned, we have no means of knowing....