John T Duntlin surrendered himself

UPDATES:

December 28, 2025 - I sent this email to The National Archives at Fort Worth

Dear Archivist,

“I am researching a federal criminal matter reported in the New Orleans Daily Crescent, 14 February 1857, involving a seaman named John T. Duntlin who surrendered aboard ship after admitting to a killing during a voyage from Havre. The notice states the case would come before a U.S. Commissioner. I am seeking any U.S. Commissioner examination records or related U.S. District Court criminal case files for the Eastern District of Louisiana, circa February–March 1857.”--

Here is the page from the New Orleans Daily Crescent.

Items appears in the first column.

Thank you for any response,

Michelle Commeyras

I received this reply December 29, 2025

Dear Michelle Commeyras:

Thank you for your email. We have located the case United States vs. John T. Duntlin, case #2716 (Record Group 21, ELA121, U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Louisiana, New Orleans Division). It is a “man slaughter on the high seas” case from 1857.

The case file consists of 33 pages. The pages are handwritten and are somewhat challenging to read. I have attached a sample of the pages to this email. If you are interested in ordering copies, the cost is 33 pages x .80 = $26.40.

Please let us know how you would like to proceed.

Sincerely,

Stacey Wiens, Archives SpecialistOriginal Post

I will order case file #2716 - Hoping in the 33 pages I will be able to determine if this is the same John T Duntlin of the Bark Solon.

Original Post

When I began reading and researching the private journal of John T Duntlin a newspaper excerpt showed up on “My Heritage” family tree that was a big surprise. It was published in the New Orleans Daily Crescent, Louisiana, February 14, 1857. It is from the database titled “In Chronicaling America: Historic American Newspapers, 1791-19631.

Homicide.—A man named John T. Duntlin yesterday surrendered himself to Corporal McFarland, on board the ship Joshua Mauran, admitting that he had killed a man during the voyage of that vessel from Havre. The particulars will come out before the U. S. Commissioners.

Another newspaper item (in New Orleans Daily Crescent) appears on February 16, 1857 that provides more information.

U. S. COMMISSIONER’S COURT.— John T. Duntlin, who surrendered himself to Sergeant McFarland on Friday evening, alleging that he had killed a man on board the ship Joshua Mauran, was put before Mr. Commissioner Lander on Saturday by Recorder Ebb. His statement to the Commissioner was that the mate, whose name was Daniel Spilling, had a frolic with the captain of the ship, which was interfered with and stopped by the mate; when Spilling assaulted him and threatened to cut his head off with a knife. Affiant drew and pointed his pistol at deceased, more to intimidate than to shoot him, but as the threat of cutting him were still persisted in, he fired and killed his antagonist. The Commissioner at first thought it was a case of manslaughter, but on reading the record made and cause of the crew of the ship, they made an affidavit charging Duntlin with murder on the high seas. He was thereupon sent to prison, to await examination this afternoon at 3 o’clock.

I have been searching for more information about the Joshua Mauran ship and found this in The New York Times, Tuesday October 9, 1860.

The ship Joshua Mauran, of Providence, R.I., from New-Orleans, bound to Bremen with a cargo or tobacco, put into Havre previous to Sept. 25, on account of the insubordination of the crew on the voyage.

What is curious is that the NY Times snippet is from 1860 while the other news items about John T Duntlin surrendering are from 1857. I will continue to investigate and if I find more clues I will update this post.

Update:

1 Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers, 1791-1963

(14,728,702 records)

These U.S. historical newspapers originate from the Chronicling America project — a production by the National Digital Newspaper Program in partnership with the Library of Congress and National Endowment for the Humanities to digitize historic American newspapers. Year coverage varies widely by newspaper, but the overall collection dates from 1791 to 1963. A significant number of the newspapers cover major cities such as Washington, D.C., New York City, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Phoenix.