THE DAY SNELL WAS KILLED

The records show Snell was killed January 10, 1880, only forty years old or a little more. Late that afternoon Mr. Snell had his horse hitched at the old liveoak tree that used to be on the south side of the square, and he was bout to mount and start home, when he saw Grandma Pierson sitting on the veranda of her hotel (about where we were sitting when we were talking). He either walked over or rode over there to talk to Grandma. Mr. Williams saw him, but left and went over to Cropper’s livery stable, where it seems he looked after some animals. Mr. Snell rode on off, probably a handsome figure on the prancing horse, and with his Spencer or Henry rifle, also wearing a coat of mail under his coat.

That night at the hotel they were waiting for Old Man Cook to come in with the stage coach from Bosque County. They key the horses and fed them back of the hotel. The stage changed horses there before going on toward Comanche and Bud Tatum’s stagestand on Waring Creek. Mr. Williams and Uncle Tom Pierson helped look after the stage horses, and Uncle Tom had a man named Torian to take care of them.

When old Man Cook rolled in with the stage about eleven that night he told them he thought he had seen a dead man by the road beyond Second Crossing on the Pecan Creek.

But then he was probably just a drunk. Then he went on toward Comanche.

Uncle Tom Pierson, Mr. Williams, and Torian hitched up a hack and drove out and found Mr. Snell’s body about thirty yards to the other side of Second Crossing near a clump of sumacs. He had been shot in the chest or front and in the side of the head, and had powder burns there, showing that he was shot there after he was down. He was lying with his head on his arm, the right he thought.

Doctor Perry told it the next morning that he had come by earlier from a call that night and saw a body but thought it was a drunk and didn’t say anything about it.

Earlier in the evening down at Cropper’s livery stable one Bush came and took out his horse, was gone about thirty minutes and came back with the horse foaming with sweat. It was surmised that he had gone out on the east trail to tell Highsaugh and Kemp that the deed had been done. Compare Uncle Sid Ross about the boys making a show of looking at their watches around the saloon for an alibi. They were arrested, probably taken to Stephenville, and he didn’t know why nothing more was done about it.

A nephew of old Squire Loyd was watering his horse at Second Crossing when Mr. Snell came riding by pretty fast for he had a good horse, and it wasn’t thirty yards further that he was killed. Some people passing through, strangers were bedding down a herd of cattle on the hill just a little further along. He said these people must have heard the shots, but were never called as witnesses. (He said it was my father who located Ferguson and brought him back about 1892.

WILLIAM SNELL

BACK TO THE SNELL STORY

MORE ABOUT MR. SNELL

SNELL  and CLAUNCH

MR. WILLIAM SNELL

WILLIAM SNELL, AGAIN

THE SNELL CASE

MR. SNELL, A GOOD MAN

WILLIAM SNELL, AGAIN

THE ASSASSINATION OF MR SNELL

AFTER THE ASSASSINATION OF MR. SNELL

ASA LANGFORD

CROCKETT HENDRIX

CROCKETT HENDRIX

GEORGE W. WHITE

ALEXANDER PERRY WHITE

 TOMBSTONE OF WILLIAM SNELL

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