Retta Dixon's speech, Jimmy Governor - Chief of Sinners, is published on this blog with the permission of the copyright holder, the Long family. Not to be republished elsewhere without the permission of the Long family.
... Now I had a new charge. Jimmy now realised and confessed himself the Chief of Sinners and he had to be built up in the faith and prepared for the onslaughts of Satan, and again I was much cast upon God.
Of course it was easier to deal with him. The new life in Christ Jesus soon manifested itself. At first it seemed necessary to talk much of the exceeding sinfulness of sin and what it cost the Son of God to put it away, but as the days went by a sweet deep consciousness came to Jimmy that through Jesus Christ, the Son of God, his Saviour his many sins were all forgiven and we could turn our thoughts to the joy just before him of being in the presence of God forever and ever, undefiled by sin.
"Clothed in His righteousness alone
Faultless to stand before the throne."
He would say, "O Miss, forever! forever! Wonderful!" He would tell me each day how many days until he would see the King in His beauty, and his face would be aglow with joy at the prospect.
He found that prison bars could not keep Satan our, and often he was tempted and cast down. I taught him the verse and its great truth - "The Name of the Lord is a strong tower. The righteous runneth into it and is safe," and he soon learnt some of the worth of that Name - the Name of Jesus.
He sometimes tole me bits about the murders, but I never questioned him, although I would have liked to have done sometimes, but I was not there to satisfy my own curiosity but to point him to the Lamb of God.
He told me of the taunts and sneers he had been subjected to (in common with all our poor dark people), and that he could not bear anyone to say anything ill of his wife of whom he was very fond, and then he would come back to realise that it was against God he had sinned, for he had learnt with David to say, "Against thee, thee only, have I sinned and done this evil in Thy sight."
He would sometimes touch the bullet, still in his neck, which had passed through his jaw and lodged there, and say, "If I had died even when that struck me, I would have gone to hell, and that's what I deserved. Hell's too good for me. Oh, I am the blackest, worstest sinner that ever lived, but Jesus died for me".
His wife visited him each alternate day. Poor little thing! how my heart ached for her. She was just eighteen years of age and had been Jimmy's wife for three years. They had one child, one year and nine month's old at his father's death.
She also had been committed for wilful murder, as she was thought at first to be an accessory to the crime and was afterwards acquitted, as it was proved that she had nothing whatever to do with it. But she was imprisoned for over three months until Jimmy's capture, and now she was being cared for by the Benevolent Institution, where another little one was born a couple of months after Jimmy's execution.
The first day I met her a feeling of deep compassion caused me to say, "Poor girl, I am sorry for you". She looked up with such earnest tear-dimmed eyes and said, "Are you?"
"Yes, and I want to be your friend."
Breaking down she sobbed, "Oh, I've got a friend at last."
Others said she did not care, but in my presence she was always a broken-hearted girl. She hid her feelings as so many others do from a hard, condemning world.
I was able to show her some little kindness and also her blind mother and family, removing them from a district where they were unable to live because of their connection with Jimmy, to another where at first they were not known.
Jimmy pleaded with his wife each time he saw her to give herself to the Lord as she had her life before her and He would help her and comfort her. During his last week he had the joy of hearing her say that she had trusted the Lord Jesus as her Saviour. When Jimmy told me he said, "I can hardly speak for joy. I do thank God."
Continued on a new page RETTA DIXON'S JIMMY GOVERNOR SPEECH 4
... Now I had a new charge. Jimmy now realised and confessed himself the Chief of Sinners and he had to be built up in the faith and prepared for the onslaughts of Satan, and again I was much cast upon God.
Of course it was easier to deal with him. The new life in Christ Jesus soon manifested itself. At first it seemed necessary to talk much of the exceeding sinfulness of sin and what it cost the Son of God to put it away, but as the days went by a sweet deep consciousness came to Jimmy that through Jesus Christ, the Son of God, his Saviour his many sins were all forgiven and we could turn our thoughts to the joy just before him of being in the presence of God forever and ever, undefiled by sin.
"Clothed in His righteousness alone
Faultless to stand before the throne."
He would say, "O Miss, forever! forever! Wonderful!" He would tell me each day how many days until he would see the King in His beauty, and his face would be aglow with joy at the prospect.
He found that prison bars could not keep Satan our, and often he was tempted and cast down. I taught him the verse and its great truth - "The Name of the Lord is a strong tower. The righteous runneth into it and is safe," and he soon learnt some of the worth of that Name - the Name of Jesus.
He sometimes tole me bits about the murders, but I never questioned him, although I would have liked to have done sometimes, but I was not there to satisfy my own curiosity but to point him to the Lamb of God.
He told me of the taunts and sneers he had been subjected to (in common with all our poor dark people), and that he could not bear anyone to say anything ill of his wife of whom he was very fond, and then he would come back to realise that it was against God he had sinned, for he had learnt with David to say, "Against thee, thee only, have I sinned and done this evil in Thy sight."
He would sometimes touch the bullet, still in his neck, which had passed through his jaw and lodged there, and say, "If I had died even when that struck me, I would have gone to hell, and that's what I deserved. Hell's too good for me. Oh, I am the blackest, worstest sinner that ever lived, but Jesus died for me".
His wife visited him each alternate day. Poor little thing! how my heart ached for her. She was just eighteen years of age and had been Jimmy's wife for three years. They had one child, one year and nine month's old at his father's death.
She also had been committed for wilful murder, as she was thought at first to be an accessory to the crime and was afterwards acquitted, as it was proved that she had nothing whatever to do with it. But she was imprisoned for over three months until Jimmy's capture, and now she was being cared for by the Benevolent Institution, where another little one was born a couple of months after Jimmy's execution.
The first day I met her a feeling of deep compassion caused me to say, "Poor girl, I am sorry for you". She looked up with such earnest tear-dimmed eyes and said, "Are you?"
"Yes, and I want to be your friend."
Breaking down she sobbed, "Oh, I've got a friend at last."
Others said she did not care, but in my presence she was always a broken-hearted girl. She hid her feelings as so many others do from a hard, condemning world.
I was able to show her some little kindness and also her blind mother and family, removing them from a district where they were unable to live because of their connection with Jimmy, to another where at first they were not known.
Jimmy pleaded with his wife each time he saw her to give herself to the Lord as she had her life before her and He would help her and comfort her. During his last week he had the joy of hearing her say that she had trusted the Lord Jesus as her Saviour. When Jimmy told me he said, "I can hardly speak for joy. I do thank God."
Continued on a new page RETTA DIXON'S JIMMY GOVERNOR SPEECH 4
