Melancholy and Fatal Affray - Rankin Murder
John Murphy Murders Samuel S. Rankin
September 26, 1860 page 2 Central Illinois Gazette
An affray occurred at the Fair Ground Thursday, which terminated in the death of Samuel S. Rankin, who held the office of Supervisor at St. Joseph township. A difficulty grown out of some misunderstanding between Wm. White, of St. Joseph township, and John Murphy, a blacksmith who has been at work for Mr. Sullivant, near Homer. Mr. Rankin came up and proposed to settle the difficulty. Insulting words were followed by blows between Murphy and the deceased, when Murphy inflicted on the body of the deceased four wounds with a knife, one just above the hip on the left, one on the back, and two on the breast, one of the latter penetrating the heart causing instant death. Murphy has been arrested, and is now in jail.
The above, which we clip from the last week's Hickory Boy, contains, so far as we know, a correct account of this melancholy affray. Mr. Rankin, not by any fault of his own, we are informed, is added to the terribly long list of victims to the whisky fiend. If we continue, year after year, to exercise the vocation of a journalist in Champaign county, we shall inevitably, until the final suppression of the whisky traffic, be compelled from time to time to publish such records as this. Every one of them is an unanswerable argument in favor of Prohibition, every one should be an irresistible appeal to an intelligent and order loving community.
Since the above was in type we have been reliably informed that the quarrel which resulted thus fatally, was an old difficulty between John Murphy and Barney Rankin, a cousin of the murdered man, and that it was not connected in any way with the Fair or its surroundings. The murdered man, Mr. Samuel Rankin, was endeavoring to prevent an affray and to keep the peace, thereby drawing upon himself the anger of Murphy. After his brutal and cowardly act, Murphy attempted to escape, but was overhauled just west of Urbana by Mr. John P. White, assisted by W. P. Satterwhite. He is now in jail at Urbana.
Transcribed by the Homer Historical Society
John Murphy Murders Samuel S. Rankin
September 26, 1860 page 2 Central Illinois Gazette
An affray occurred at the Fair Ground Thursday, which terminated in the death of Samuel S. Rankin, who held the office of Supervisor at St. Joseph township. A difficulty grown out of some misunderstanding between Wm. White, of St. Joseph township, and John Murphy, a blacksmith who has been at work for Mr. Sullivant, near Homer. Mr. Rankin came up and proposed to settle the difficulty. Insulting words were followed by blows between Murphy and the deceased, when Murphy inflicted on the body of the deceased four wounds with a knife, one just above the hip on the left, one on the back, and two on the breast, one of the latter penetrating the heart causing instant death. Murphy has been arrested, and is now in jail.
The above, which we clip from the last week's Hickory Boy, contains, so far as we know, a correct account of this melancholy affray. Mr. Rankin, not by any fault of his own, we are informed, is added to the terribly long list of victims to the whisky fiend. If we continue, year after year, to exercise the vocation of a journalist in Champaign county, we shall inevitably, until the final suppression of the whisky traffic, be compelled from time to time to publish such records as this. Every one of them is an unanswerable argument in favor of Prohibition, every one should be an irresistible appeal to an intelligent and order loving community.
Since the above was in type we have been reliably informed that the quarrel which resulted thus fatally, was an old difficulty between John Murphy and Barney Rankin, a cousin of the murdered man, and that it was not connected in any way with the Fair or its surroundings. The murdered man, Mr. Samuel Rankin, was endeavoring to prevent an affray and to keep the peace, thereby drawing upon himself the anger of Murphy. After his brutal and cowardly act, Murphy attempted to escape, but was overhauled just west of Urbana by Mr. John P. White, assisted by W. P. Satterwhite. He is now in jail at Urbana.
Transcribed by the Homer Historical Society
Melancholy and Fatal Affray - Rankin Murder
John Murphy Murders Samuel S. Rankin
September 26, 1860 page 2 Central Illinois Gazette
An affray occurred at the Fair Ground Thursday, which terminated in the death of Samuel S. Rankin, who held the office of Supervisor at St. Joseph township. A difficulty grown out of some misunderstanding between Wm. White, of St. Joseph township, and John Murphy, a blacksmith who has been at work for Mr. Sullivant, near Homer. Mr. Rankin came up and proposed to settle the difficulty. Insulting words were followed by blows between Murphy and the deceased, when Murphy inflicted on the body of the deceased four wounds with a knife, one just above the hip on the left, one on the back, and two on the breast, one of the latter penetrating the heart causing instant death. Murphy has been arrested, and is now in jail.
The above, which we clip from the last week's Hickory Boy, contains, so far as we know, a correct account of this melancholy affray. Mr. Rankin, not by any fault of his own, we are informed, is added to the terribly long list of victims to the whisky fiend. If we continue, year after year, to exercise the vocation of a journalist in Champaign county, we shall inevitably, until the final suppression of the whisky traffic, be compelled from time to time to publish such records as this. Every one of them is an unanswerable argument in favor of Prohibition, every one should be an irresistible appeal to an intelligent and order loving community.
Since the above was in type we have been reliably informed that the quarrel which resulted thus fatally, was an old difficulty between John Murphy and Barney Rankin, a cousin of the murdered man, and that it was not connected in any way with the Fair or its surroundings. The murdered man, Mr. Samuel Rankin, was endeavoring to prevent an affray and to keep the peace, thereby drawing upon himself the anger of Murphy. After his brutal and cowardly act, Murphy attempted to escape, but was overhauled just west of Urbana by Mr. John P. White, assisted by W. P. Satterwhite. He is now in jail at Urbana.
Transcribed by the Homer Historical Society
John Murphy Murders Samuel S. Rankin
September 26, 1860 page 2 Central Illinois Gazette
An affray occurred at the Fair Ground Thursday, which terminated in the death of Samuel S. Rankin, who held the office of Supervisor at St. Joseph township. A difficulty grown out of some misunderstanding between Wm. White, of St. Joseph township, and John Murphy, a blacksmith who has been at work for Mr. Sullivant, near Homer. Mr. Rankin came up and proposed to settle the difficulty. Insulting words were followed by blows between Murphy and the deceased, when Murphy inflicted on the body of the deceased four wounds with a knife, one just above the hip on the left, one on the back, and two on the breast, one of the latter penetrating the heart causing instant death. Murphy has been arrested, and is now in jail.
The above, which we clip from the last week's Hickory Boy, contains, so far as we know, a correct account of this melancholy affray. Mr. Rankin, not by any fault of his own, we are informed, is added to the terribly long list of victims to the whisky fiend. If we continue, year after year, to exercise the vocation of a journalist in Champaign county, we shall inevitably, until the final suppression of the whisky traffic, be compelled from time to time to publish such records as this. Every one of them is an unanswerable argument in favor of Prohibition, every one should be an irresistible appeal to an intelligent and order loving community.
Since the above was in type we have been reliably informed that the quarrel which resulted thus fatally, was an old difficulty between John Murphy and Barney Rankin, a cousin of the murdered man, and that it was not connected in any way with the Fair or its surroundings. The murdered man, Mr. Samuel Rankin, was endeavoring to prevent an affray and to keep the peace, thereby drawing upon himself the anger of Murphy. After his brutal and cowardly act, Murphy attempted to escape, but was overhauled just west of Urbana by Mr. John P. White, assisted by W. P. Satterwhite. He is now in jail at Urbana.
Transcribed by the Homer Historical Society
Inscription
Murdered by a ruffin by name of John Murphy on the fairgrounds of Urbana
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