Page:History of Southeast Missouri 1912 Volume 1.djvu/250

 190 HISTORY OF SOUTHEAST MISSOURI difficulties. Gentlemen were supposed to settle their own troubles. The slightest ground for quarrel was sufficient to bring the parties face to face in a duel. These duels were not such as are said to exist in France today ; they were not arranged for show, and there was nothing of the spectacular in them ; the meeting was almost certain to result in the death of one or the other of the par- ticipants. The weapons most commonlj' used were pistols. The meeting between two per- sons was arranged by seconds and at the ap- pointed time they met and proceeded to shoot at one another. Ordinarily the exchange of one or more shots or the wounding or killing of one or the other of the antagonists was looked upon as satisfying the code of honor which governed the duel. Not infrequently after an exchange of shots the parties shook hands and the quarrel between them was at an end ; very many duels, however, resulted fatall.y. It was a time when men were ac- customed to firearms. Most of those who en- gaged in duels were expert shots with the pistol and there were very many chances of being at least woimded in one of these duels. Some of them are famous. There came to be recognized dueling places that were resorted to frequently. One of the.se places, not, how- ever, in Southeast Missouri, but one to which persons from this part of the state sometimes resorted for the purpose of dueling was Bloody Island, in the Mississippi river near St. Louis. In 1811 a duel was fought in Ste. Genevieve between Dr. Walter Fenwick and Thomas T. Crittenden. Crittenden was a lawyer and had. in the course of a trial, denounced Ezekiel Fenwiek, who was a brother of Dr. Walter Fenwick. Ezekiel Fenwiek thereupon chal- lenged Crittenden, who, however, refused a meeting on the ground that Ezekiel was not a gentleman. The challenge had been carried to Crittenden by Dr. Walter Fenwick and this reply affronted Dr, Fenwick, who, there- upon, issued a challenge on his own behalf. The duel was fought on Moreau Island just below Ste. Genevieve. Dr. Fenwick was killed at the first fire. This duel was fought with pistols. In 1807 Jo.seph McFerron and William Ogle fought a duel on Cj'press Island oppo- site Cape Girardeau. McFerron was an Irish- man, possessed good education and was clerk of the court in the Cape Girardeau district. He had been a teacher, but before accepting the position with the court he was a merchant in Cape Girardeau, For some reason there arose difficulty between these men and Ogle challenged McFerron to duel. It seems that AIcFerrou had never even fired a pistol, but accepted the challenge. Ogle was killed, while McFerron was luihurt. The most famous duel, perhaps, fought in this period was not between citizens of Southeast Missouri, Imt took place between Thomas H. Benton and Charles Lucas. The first duel between them wa.s fought in August. 1817. At this meeting Benton was wounded in the knee and Lucas in th6 neck. According to the usual ciistom of duels this exchange of shots would have ended the matter, but when Benton was asked if he were satisfied he declared that he was not and demanded a second meeting. Efforts were made to bring about a reconciliation be- tween the two men but all of them were futile. Benton seems to have been determined to fight another duel with Lucas. The second meet- ing was held on Bloody Island on the 27th day of September, 1817, and resulted in the death of Charles Lucas. In 1819 John Smith T. and Lionel Brorae, the latter a nephew of Aaron Burr and a lawyer of Potosi, fought a diiel on an island