"A MAN HUNG FOR KILLING A SOLDIER-A JUST RETRIBUTION"
"Major Capehart, 1st West Virginia Cavalry, who is now in Wheeling, relates an incident in connection with the late raid of Hunter. It appears that in the month of November last a prominent citizen of Greenbriar county, named David Crea, killed one of General Averill's soldiers, who belonged to a company on picket duty near Crea's house. Crea first shot the soldier with a revolver and then struck him on the head with an axe and carried the body to a well on the place and tumbled it in with a view of concealing his crime. When the army passed through Lewisburg recently, on its way to Lynchburg, a negro man informed some of General Averill's officers of the facts mentioned above.
The General at once ordered the arrest of Crea, who was staying at his house about six miles from Lewisburg, and he was taken along with the army. On the way to Staunton a court-martial was called in the case; and Crea upon being brought up for trial, made a full confession of the murder. The sentence of the court was that he be hung by the neck until he was dead, and that all his combustible property be destroyed. The dreadful sentence was approved the General Crook, and put in execution the day after the army left Staunton, at a little place called Brownstown, in the pressence of a large number of soldiers.
It was the opinion of all that Crea richly deserved the terrible punishment he received, as the murder was without provocation. Crea at one time represented Greenbriar county in the Richmond Legislature."