This Week 150 Years Ago in Hickman – November 4, 1871

Stories of Interest from the Hickman Courier from November 4, 1871
• Hickman City leaders issued new bonds to address the city’s debt.
• Every business house in Hickman was believed to be occupied.
• M. S. Dowden, Grand Master of the Order of Odd Fellows of the State of Kentucky, delivered an address at the Methodist Church in Hickman on November 4th.
• The Hickman Free School reported 128 students and the “school is pronounced successful in every respect.”
• The Liberty Seminary at Jordan Station and the Fulton Female Seminary at Fulton Station placed advertisements for students.
• A citizen walking on Clinton Street on October 30th found $130 dollars. The owner of the cash had yet to be found.
• Two gold watches and other valuable articles were stolen from the residence of J. O. Wetherly on October 29th. The thief is believed to be Henry James, an employee of Wetherly. A $50 dollar reward was issued by the victim.
• City workers in Hickman began rebuilding a portion of Carrol Street near Hertwick, Baltzer & Co. Wagon Shop.
• An election for members of the Board of Directors of the Fulton County Agricultural Association will be held at the county courthouse on November 25th. All stockholders were requested to attend.
• Fulton County farmers predict an “immense wheat crop next season” and good prices encourage many to sow more acres than usual.”
• Chestnut growers state “this year will be known as the famous one” and “nothing will compare with the quantity.”
• A Methodist congregation at Fulton Station plan to erect a new church.
• The Mayfield Democrat condemned the Kentucky State Legislature for refusing to grant the Cincinnati Southern Railroad a charter through Kentucky.
• The Methodist Conference for the West Kentucky-Tennessee District set a meeting for November 15th at Trenton, Tennessee. H. C. Bailey agreed to attend as a delegate of the Hickman church.
• James Sinclare, a citizen of Obion, Tennessee, was arrested for being a “Ku Klux” and “taken to Humboldt in irons.”
• A petition was to be submitted to the Obion County Court for a charter to incorporate the Hickman & Tiptonville Levee Company.
• The editor of the Union City Courier supported the Hickman Courier’s earlier proclamations that the Jackson Purchase be annexed to the State of Tennessee. “Tennessee would gladly have the ‘Purchase’ annexed as a portion of her territory,” the editor of the Union City Courier wrote. The Trenton Gazette also favored annexation and declared, “We would like to swap off twice as much territory in East Tennessee for the counties west of the Tennessee River.”
• At the annual stockholder’s meeting of the Nashville & Northwestern Railroad Company in Nashville, H. A. Taylor, a representative of the City of Hickman, placed a condition of sale that the Nashville & Chattanooga Company would “perpetually run and operate” a railroad from Hickman to Nashville. The purchasers accepted the condition.