Taliaferro County GaArchives News.....Edwards, Thomas Killed 1869 ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/ga/gafiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Dr. Rem B. Edwards remb@utk.edu and Thomas Edwards December 17, 2004, 10:09 am Advocate Democrat A MAN SHOT AND KILLED AT CRAWFORDVILLE We are advised by a special correspondent that a most unfortunate occurrence took place in Crawfordville on Saturday. The facts, as detailed by our correspondent, are: Mr. Columbus Reese came to the village in the afternoon, (the same man who was tried soon after the war at Washington, Wilkes county, by a court martial, for killing a negro,) and began to drink, as is his custom. It was not long before he began a quarrel with Mr. Thos. Edwards, a quiet, peaceable man, though in the habit of drinking sometimes; yet he was never known to injure any one, and was much thought of in the community. The quarrel continued for a few moments, when Edwards, turning to walk away, Reese threatened to shoot him, having drawn a pistol in his hand. Edwards was unarmed and had made no threats or any demonstrations. When the threat was made he (Edwards) fronted Reese, opening his shirt, and, as a brave man will do, told him to shoot. Reese, standing on his feet (unclear), shot, the ball entering Edwards' breast near the heart. Edwards fell upon the ground, and in a few moments had breathed his last. Reese remained in town for some hours, walking the streets and threatening to kill any man who attempted to arrest him. He is still at large, and up to this hour no efforts have been made for his arrest. [Augusta Constitutionalist] I am indebted to my cousin, Charlotte Vaughn, another descendant of the second "Dred" Edwards, for this article and for the reward poster below. This news article makes no mention of the cause of the quarrel, but John Stone's oral tradition was at least partly correct: It was over Thomas's kindness to and defense of a young black man. We have already seen some evidence that the Edwards family did not enthusiastically support the Civil War, even though, like Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, they were slave holders. This may seem too idealistic, but perhaps our Thomas J. Edwards understood the wrongness of treating blacks as they were treated in the South, both during slavery and after it ended. After all, what was he doing going into a saloon in Crawfordville, Ga., the Vice-Capitol of the South, with a young black man as a friend and buying him some candy just over four years after the Civil War ended? Now I will give a complementary perspective on Thomas J.'s murder from a different source. In the mid 1990's, Charlotte Vaughn, I, and my wife Louise, went to Nashville, Tenn. to interview Neva Portwood Patrick, then in her mid 90s, about our ancestors, all of whom (back to, but not including, Thomas) she knew personally. According to the notes I made at the time on what she said about Thomas and his murder, Neva told us, "Thomas drank like everything. He had a colored boy with him in the tavern. He bought the boy some candy. Reese called him a 'Nigger lover,' and said 'I could just shoot your heart out.' At that point, Thomas opened his shirt and was shot." The Governor of Georgia was so outraged over the murder of Thomas J. Edwards that he offered the following thousand dollar reward, the second listed below, for the capture of his killer: Monday August 2nd 1869 Executive Department Atlanta Georgia August 2nd, 1869 Ordered: That the Secretary of State record and issue a Proclamation offering a Reward of One Thousand Dollars for the apprehension of and delivery to any Sheriff of this State, with proof sufficient to convict C. C. Reese, charged with the murder of Thomas Edwards, of the county of Taliaferro, on the 24th day of July 1869 Rufus B. Bullock Governor By the Governor R. Paul Lester } Secy. Ex. Dept =============== The following short item or abstract from a longer article, originally published on Wed. June 14, 1871, appears in a volume of abstracts from the Baldwin County Union Recorder, 1870-1877, p. 74. TO HANG Charles C. Reese, who killed a man named Edwards in Taliaferro County last year, has been sentenced to be hung in Crawfordville on the 4th of next August. Additional Comments: Columbus "Lum" Reese, Thomas's murderer, was eventually captured, tried, and convicted. From Neva Portwood Patrick I learned that this trial was in Hancock County (Sparta), Ga., and that none other than Alexander H. Stephens himself, who was indeed a close friend of the Edwards family, was the prosecuting attorney. Lum Reese seems to have been a very bitter Confederate veteran from Warren County, Ga. In the 1860 Census, a C. C. Reese, age 23, was listed as living in Warren County. He served as an infantryman, a Private in Company B of Georgia's 48th Regiment. My cousin, "Coot" Johnson, told me that Lum Reese and Thomas J. Edwards actually were very close personal friends, and that after he shot Thomas, Lum said, "My God, I have just killed my best friend." File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/ga/taliaferro/newspapers/nw1894edwardst.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.poppet.org/gafiles/ File size: 5.5 Kb