150 years ago this week Dr. Almon Case, a Unionist State Senator in Tennessee, was shot dead by Frank Farris, a former Confederate guerrilla. From The New-York Times January 21, 1867:
Cold-Blooded Assassination of a Tennessee State Senator.
From the Nashville Press and Times, Jan. 17.
We were overwhelmed with grief last evening on hearing intelligence of the brutal assassination of Dr ALMON CASE, Union State Senator from Obiou [Obion] County, West Tennessee, who was shot dead at his residence, a few evenings since, by an assassin. Our present is as follows: Late in the evening a man rode up to his residence and called for him to come out. Mrs. CASE went to the door, and in answer to the man’s inquiry, replied that he had gone to town. The man rode off in the direction indicated, and met Senator CASE on his return, with whom he rode back. On approaching the house the assassin pretended to depart, but immediately afterward wheeled and shot his unsuspecting victim dead, and made his escape.
Senator CASE was a good, brave and faithful man, an advocate of progress and an enlightened public public officer. He was an early friend of colored enfranchisement, and it is worthy of particular note that he was in favor of universal amnesty, and allowing all citizens to vote, irrespective of their political antecedents or color. But his liberal views made him no less obnoxious to rebel malevolence. He has fallen by the hands of one of the very men whom he was ready to pardon and restore. Only a few days prior to the beginning of the present session his son, an excellent lad of sixteen, was shot dead while the family were returning from church, where the young man had just made a profession of religion. The father was wearing crape for his murdered son at the time of his own assassination.
A later article in the The New-York Times provided more information from the Nashville Press & Times. The murderer was identified as Frank Farris, who was a member of his brother Oliver’s guerrilla band during the war. It was said that Senator Case helped out Oliver Farris before the war and treated him like his son. Frank Farris mortally shot Moses Kinman in Troy, Tennessee on the morning of the day he killed Almon Case.
An article about Almon Case at Roots Web provides directions about how to view an interesting 1985 article about the murder of Senator Case. In his paper for the West Tennessee Historical Society Charles L. Lufkin pointed out that contemporary newspaper accounts distorted the motives of Frank Farris to fit their own biases. Unionist papers like the Press & Times conveyed the idea that Senator Case was shot for his Unionist, more liberal views. Conservative publications, such as the Memphis Daily Avalanche, argued that Frank Farris was justifiably retaliating for the killing of his brother John during the war.
Like the death of twenty-two blacks in the Kingstree jail fire, Thomas Nast saw the murder of Senator case as an example of Southern Justice:
Harper’s Weekly, March 23, 1867
murder – left side, upper left
