This Week 150 Years Ago in Hickman – March 9, 1872

Stories of Interest from the Hickman Courier from March 9, 1872

• The driving of piles at the Hickman wharf was fully underway. The piles were made of cypress logs, thirty, forty, fifty and sixty feet in length and an average of ten inches thick. 400 piles were needed to be driven before completion of the project.
• A freight blockade at Hickman continued as railroad cars backed up in the railyard. The yard managers claim it was “now absolutely compulsory on them to erect an elevator.”
• Building sites in East Hickman were offered to “bona fide settlers.” Every fourth lot in the division would be available for purchase.
• H. Dodds and Rube Chapman commenced work at their new brickyard in Hickman. They proposed to make one million bricks by seasonally.
• Joseph Amberg, a dry goods merchant, was constructing a brick two-story business building in Old Hickman.
• Citizens of Clinton and Moscow visited Hickman to promote the extension of the railroad from the Tennessee River to Hickman.
• Marion Ray, of Clinton, was in Hickman selling grapevines. He proclaimed that the “Ray Victoria Grape” would not rot or drop off the vine.
• The Hickman Musical Society gave a performance at the Hickman City Hall on March 9^th.
• The Fulton County Court planned to adjourn by the middle of next week.
• Alex Willingham, of the Graves County Bar, attended the first session of 1872 Circuit Court in Hickman. He was noted as being the “venerable brush breaker and democrat of West Kentucky.”
• John F. Tyler declared himself candidate for sheriff of Fulton County. Six men were sentenced to the State penitentiary, all for grand larceny.
• The German School in Hickman, under the charge of Professor Snider, began spring classes.
• A number of serious cases of pneumonia were reported in Hickman.
• Sidney Towle, a member of the Hickman Cornet Band, died at the Planter’s Hotel in Hickman on March 3^rd of “congestion of the brain.” He was twenty-two years of age.
• Judge A. R. Boon planned to deliver a temperance lecture on March 13^th at Woodland Hills.
• Bishop George D. Cummins of the Reformed Episcopal Church planned to visit Hickman on May 6^th and 7^th.
• A shooting occurred across the river from Hickman in Missouri between Theodore Roper and George Irvine. Roper was shot and slightly wounded by Irvine. Roper reportedly took a stick and beat Irvine “unmercifully” in response. Irvine was the brother-in-law of Roper and recently separated with his wife.
• An act passed by the State Legislature called for an election in Ballard County to confirm whether a section of the county desired to be attached to Hickman County. The object of the act was to transfer the county seat from Clinton to Columbus.
• S. Arnold, State Representative from the counties of Hickman and Fulton, proposed a resolution for “retrenchment and reform” in State Government.
• Republicans of West Kentucky planned not to attend a convention of Liberal Republicans that was to be held in Cincinnati later in the month. The Liberal Republicans declared opposition to the corruption of the Grant Administration.
• The owners of property in the Mississippi bottom between Hickman and Madrid Bend were scheduled to vote on the construction a levee.
• 1872 was announced as the year for the “thirteen-year locusts” and that numerous farmers had discovered them in the ground. The destruction of crops and trees was predicted.
• The Columbus Dispatch reports that the community would likely not pay to have the Mobile & Ohio Railroad extend the line to Cairo, Illinois.
• Hickman County contains 232 sections of land composed of 148,480 acres.
• Sheriff of Calloway County, Billy Bourland, quit a few months after being appointed following the resignation of Lilburn Lynn who was elected a year earlier. Hamp Swift was appointed the new sheriff, the third in less than a year.
• Certain land speculators in Paducah had been searching for locations to sell the State should the new State Asylum be built near the city.
• The Paducah Kentuckian announced they would publish a thirty-six-column weekly newspaper.
• The Paducah News report that wheat and rye “look decidedly well and give promise to a bounteous crop.”
• William D. Johnson, a carpenter and former Confederate officer, died at Tiptonville, Tennessee on March 5^th.
• A young lawyer by the name of Boyican committed suicide by jumping into the Mississippi River near Tiptonville, Tennessee on March 5^th. He was said to have been under the influence of liquor.
• Colonel Egbert Tansil, of Dresden, Tennessee, reportedly died on March 6^th. The report was later proved to be false.
• William D. Lannom, of Paris, Tennessee, was shot and killed during a street fight with a man named Cook on March 4th. Lannom was a prominent attorney and former Lieutenant Colonel of the 7^th Kentucky Cavalry of the Confederate Army. Cook escaped.