The Bitterness of James Jenkins

I have spent the last three days working on a revised and updated version of the book Outlaw Tales of California. Specifically, I have been writing about a murderer named James Gilbert Jenkins. Raised in Gentry County, Missouri, his early childhood could only be described as idyllic. When Jenkins was 9 years-old, however a man named John Forbes approached his father about hiring the boy to race horses for him. Jenkins was going to be traveling with the stranger and caring for his stable of thoroughbreds in between races. In exchange for his work, he was to receive a quality education, $500, a horse of his own and a saddle. James’s father agreed to let him go off with Forbes. Forbes was not what he claimed to be. He was a conman. He had only one racehorse and made his living primarily as a highwaymen and thief. Jenkins’s education consisted of learning how to rob and kill. By the time he was 30 he had murdered 18 people. The law finally caught up with him and he was found guilty of his crimes and sent to the gallows. Days before his execution he wrote a short book about his life. He wanted to warn people about what could happen if they weren’t law-abiding citizens. He took full responsibility for his behavior, but sited the bitterness he felt over his father sending him away as the initial motivation for his crimes. Bitterness is such a destructive emotion. I have been swimming in bitterness for years now and it has taken its toll. It makes you feel empty and angry. The moment I started hating the cowards that lied about my brother I became a slave. Bitterness is rooted in depression, anxiety and destroys relationships. Bitterness is worse than disappointment. It can destroy any possibility of human relationships to continue. I’ve even became bitter toward God. I’m afraid that God will not forgive me for having such strong feelings of bitterness. I know what the Bible says about forgiving others but ironically, I’m too bitter to do it! It’s not fair what these people have had done to my brother, my parents, and myself. I do not doubt God is with me. I pray and pray, but I don’t seem to find any release though. Perhaps that’s what James Gilbert Jenkins was struggling with throughout his life. He admitted his wrongs before he was hung. He told the executioner that he was “willing to die in such way that my doom may benefit others.” Jenkins added, “I had rather die than go out into the world again with my character formed in bitterness as it is.” Before Jenkins was hung, his feet and hands were tied. The trap sprung at seven minutes past three. The pulsation of the heart stopped in thirteen and a half minutes, and in twenty minutes, the body was lowered into the coffin. Bitterness is fatal.