On Jan. 31’st, 2020 I published a story asking “Who Murdered the Patterson Family?”. It was an attempt to find out who could have murdered Confederate Officer William Patterson and his entire family outside of Dallas (current day Marble Hill, Missouri).
As I stated in the previous article I had found information in a clipping from the June 28, 1866 Daily Union and American newspaper reporting Bollinger County Sheriff James Rogers was appointed by Missouri Governor Fletcher and that he was being charged with murder for acts he committed during the Civil War. The paper reported:
“General J.R. McCormack, who is a candidate for the Conservative nomination for Congress in the third district, delivered a speech in Dallas, Webster County [Editors note: mistake by newspaper, Dallas present day Marble Hill, Missouri is in Bollinger County] on the 14th inst. , and he was attentively listened to. Shortly afterward a squad of five or six ruffians surrounded him, when one of them, named James Rogers, without provocation, knocked the Doctor down, the blow for a time rendering him speechless.
On recovering , he found the ruffians had left. Rogers is Sheriff of Bollinger county, an officer of the peace, appointed by Governor Fletcher. He is also charged with committing murder during the troubles in Southeast Missouri, and to have been guilty of swindling the Government in some lead and beef contracts down there.”
served as from the later part of
Civil War-Reconstruction.
I wondered how James Rogers was “appointed” the Sheriff of Bollinger County, Missouri or how Erich Pape was “appointed” sheriff after Rogers. These questions were answered when I stumbled upon a March 18, 1865 issue of the Chicago Tribune which reported:
“The State Convention passed an ordinance today, vacating all offices of Circuit Judges, Circuit Attorneys, Criminal Judges, Sheriffs, Probate Judges, and clerks, and All Courts of Record, from and after May 1’st, by a vote of forty-three to five. The offices are all to be filled by the Governor. By this ordinance, eight-hundred offices eight hundred offices are made vacant at one blow. Governor Fletcher promises to reappoint all the loyal men, elected by the people, the object being to get rid of the disloyal.”
I get the distinct feeling that disloyalty was a very weak excuse and that the main object was to get rid of all forms of Civil Government in order to insulate and protect themselves from being prosecuted for war crimes.
Governor Fletcher vacates all courts, judges and sheriffs. Sat, Mar 18, 1865 – 1 · Chicago Tribune (Chicago, Illinois) · Newspapers.com
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