Doris wasn’t a long-distance traveller like Ella Maillart, Jingzhou Map Tourist Attractions or the Misses Cable and French, she just wanted to see more of China and her Jingzhou Map Tourist Attractions restless spirit drove her into making week-long jaunts into the countryside. She learned to speak Mandarin and, hiring mules, she would go off along trails, taking her camp bed strapped to a mule’s back. At night she’d put up her bed in the courtyards of temples and monasteries. She obviously enjoyed her creature comforts. Travelling with plenty of food, she had eggs and bacon for breakfast and mentions a fat abbot who ate her complete jar of jam, and when empty he put it down with a sigh of regret’. In showing her a temple’s valuables of jade and porcelain, a monk once produced a prized vase which proved to be an old brandy bottle complete with label.
The trial that followed was quite sensational and reported in newspapers throughout the Midwest. People of Holly were enraged over Stison’s unforgiveable actions.
The courtroom was full throughout the duration of the trial. During testimony it was brought out that Theresa, on her deathbed, admitted Philip Stison was the father of her child. Adding to the damning evidence was testimony from a young boy, approximately nine years old, who had been living with the Stisons at the time. Within 90 minutes of the trial’s conclusion, the jury reached a verdict. Guilty as charged.
Stison’s attorney immediately filed an appeal on inadmissible hearsay evidence. They claimed the dying words of Theresa, coming from a secondary source, should not have been allowed.
