Stories of Interest from the Hickman Courier from September 7, 1872
- The Hickman City Council met on the evening of September 4th. The Council passed an ordinance that anyone carrying a concealed deadly weapon withing the city limits could be fined between $50 and $100. The wharf master, W. M. Gwin, reported collecting $130 in fees from May to August. The City Treasurer reported a balance of $282.91. The dog ordinance was to expire in Hickman on September 10th. The City Marshal reported euthanizing over seventy dogs in the past year. W. L. Gardner was awarded $26 for euthanizing twenty-six dogs.
- The Nashville & Chattanooga Railroad Company entered into a contract to add 1400 feet of piling to the Hickman riverfront.
- The Fulton County Fair was scheduled from September 24th to the 28th.
- Charles Wittig’s string band announced a concert to be played at the Hickman City Hall on September 16th.
- Oscar Turner of Ballard County, dubbed the “Brains of the Senate,” visited Hickman on the first week of September.
- A funeral was planned for Peter Hamilton at the Old Republican Church for September 8th by the Hickman Masonic Lodge.
- The Good Templars barbeque held at the Tyler Lodge on August 29th fell short of expectations as the weather prevented many from attending. The event went forth as scheduled with performances by the Hickman Cornet Band and the 16th Infantry Band.
- The Hickman Circuit Court was in session in Clinton. The murder trial of Murty O’Brian moved forward.
- The week prior a train traveling on the Mobile & Ohio Railroad was fired upon by unknow parties near Moscow. Some days earlier stock was killed by a locomotive in the same vicinity. James Bell, Med Young, and H. P. Vaughn were arrested for the shootings, but all were acquitted due to a lack of evidence.
- The Mayfield Democrat finished its first year of publication and was reported as being a success.
- The Mayfield Fair was to commence on the week of October 29th.
- James Constantine was attacked by Creed Roberts, Charles Thomas, Lon Vinston and Sandy Slayden in Mayfield. The men beat Constantine at gunpoint for an undisclosed reason. No arrests were made.
- Sol Vaughn, traveling agent of the Paducah Tobacco Plant, declared he signed 433 new subscribers.
- The Paducah and McCracken County Agricultural and Mechanical Association Fair was to begin on the week of October 15th in Paducah.
- Judge J. M. Bigger would serve as Democratic Elector for the First Congressional District.
- H. Trabue of Livingston was announced as the Republican candidate for Congress in the First District.
- A gun fight took place in Dresden, Tennessee between Richard Johnson and B. Archer. Archer received three serious wounds but was still alive at the time of the paper’s publication.
- A religious revival occurred in Woodland Mills at the Beulah Baptist Church the week prior.
- A wild man was reported to be foraging in the area of Merriwether;s Ferry in Obion County, Tennessee. Hunting parties were organized to capture him but the “very minute a man gets in sight he bounds off like a deer” and defies capture. His appearance was savage in every respect, wearing “flesh fitting clothes, if clothed at all.” The hunt for the man continued.
- Starling and William Bottoms of Kenton Station, Tennessee were arrested and jailed for the attempted robbery and murder of man named Henlon. The victim escaped the two men when the pistol that was pointed at his head misfired, and he raced into the woods.
- A barn full of tobacco that belonged to Joe Denton burned near Union City, Tennessee on August 29th.
- The Union City Fair was set for the week of October 1st.
- The Troy Times reported that hogs were “dying by scores” in the county from cholera.
- The Mississippi Central Railroad pushed forward a contract to construct a roadbed from Jackson, Tennessee to Cairo, Illinois. Expectations were that the road would be open for travel in eight or nine months.
- The drought in West Tennessee was having “very disastrous” results to the corn and cotton crop.