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A FULBRIGHT "KILLING"
by Harry M. Cleaver

I want to share a story with you; and ask if you have any further information on two central characters: Fannie Fulbright and Francis Patrick. Judith Ruth Fulbright is my great-great grandmother. The following is an eye-witness account of Judith gunning down her son-in-law, because she thought he killed her daughter Fannie. From a letter to Col. John Hale Walker, Jr. from Mrs. R. G. Benjamin in Harrison, Arkansas [orthography reproduced from original]

"Harrison, Ark.
Feb. 4 - 77
Dear friend.

There is not very much I can tell you of the shooting of Mr. Patrick, only what happened at the Depot at Alvey.
Mr. Jim Cantrell, my brother-in-law was agent.
I went almost every day about train time to stay in Office while he went to post office to get the mail for the train.
Your mother came in while he was gone.
She asked for Jim and I told he[r], where he was at & that he would be back soon.
She told me she wanted him to send a telegram to Mr. John Hale at Harrison that she was going to kill Frank Patrick.
She took the gun out of her raincoat pocket & put it in an egg basket she was carrying on her arm.
Jim come in and she told him what she was going to do.
Jim told her it was time for the train.
Mr. patrick always met the South bound train & mailed his letters.
About this time Jim saw him coming up on platform of Depot.
Your mother saw him, she went out the door & Jim run through the express room to stop him but he could not.
She shot at him and hit him in the wrist.
He jumped of[f] platform & started down the side track behind Depot.
She started back up the tracks, going home.
She looked round & saw Mr. Patrick getting through a fence.
She steped up on a stack of Cedar posts & started shooting again. she hit him in the leg & he fell over the fence.
Jim steped up beside her & told her not to shoot any more that she had killed him.
Everyone thought she had killed him. The men that was there carried him home.
Your mother left. Jim sent telegram when he come back to depot.
That is all I can tell you.
As for the reason she done it, I have heard several reason's which you already know.
[ . . . ]
Best regards,
Mrs R. G. (Mattie) Benjamin"

The only problem with this letter is that in it Mrs Benjamin refers to "your mother" when writing to Col. John Hale Walker, Jr. Well, his mother was Judith Gabriella Hale, Fannie's sister rather than her mother Judith Ruth. The odds have it she was thinking she was writing to Dr. John Hale Walker, Jr. (rather than Col.) who was Gabriella's husband, so Judith Ruth would have been his mother-in-law.

Fannie and Patrick's marriage is listed in the Boone County Arkansas Marriage Index as:

Hale, Fannie E. to Patrick, Frank E ..... I 337 [but I have no access to "I 337" at the moment].

Still no dates on Patrick, but Fannie died 2 Mar 1919 at age 47. Any information anyone can provide would be appreciated. I'd like to check old local newspaper files, but that's not going to happen anytime soon.

----Harry Cleaver; Department of Economics; University of Texas at Austin;
     Austin, Texas 78712-1173;
     E-mail: hmcleave@eco.utexas.edu