ARTICLE :
JOHN CHURCHEY SHOT TO DEATH; NEGRO IS HELD - Linwood Johnson Arrested After Slaying at Flickersville

CORONER'S JURY TO INVESTIGATE - Shooting Grew Out of ALLEGED STONING of HOUSE

"LITTLE JOHN" CHURCHEY, 58, formerly of Hagerstown, was shot and killed at Flickersville, mountain settlement between Mt. Briar and Keedysville, about 5:30 o'clock yesterday evening. Linwood Johnson, 24, Flickersville negro, who is charged with the shooting, is being held in jail pending the outcome of an inquest to be held today.

Justice Richard Duffey and Deputies Gouff and Cushwa, who investigated the shooting, obtained most of the story of what happened from Johnson. They said the negro told them that yesterday afternoon he had trouble with Churchey and other members of the latter's family and that finally the Churchey crowd threated to stone him out of the home of Carrie Keets, where he was stopping.

The negro said that a band of some ten or twelve men surrounded the building. He said that he left the house and was standing in front of it when he was struck in the back by a stoned hurled by John Churchey, Jr., a son of the man who was later killed.

According to the investigators, Johnson told them that he then went to his home and obtained a cat rifle and fired the weapon at John Churchey, Jr. The elder Churchey stepped into the path of the shot and it struck him in the neck, piercing his jugular vein. Johnson said members of his family later gathered a bucket full of stones, which he had charged had been thrown at his house by Churchey and his companions. At one time, the stoning was so severe, Johnson said, that occupants of the house had to barricade themselves.

This was the only report of the shooting obtained by the investigators, but other witnesses may testify at an inquest which will likely be held at Keedysville today. In the meantime Harper Ballentine, states attorney, will begin an investigation of the entire affair. Liquor is said to have played a part in the shootin and the trouble which led to it and this end of the case will also be probed. The section around Flickersville is said to abound in stills and moonshine haunts.

The man who was killed was well known in Hagerstown. His wife, it is said, is living in Hagerstown.

The body of Churchey was taken to Keedysville. He is thought to have died almost instantly.

Source : The Morning Herald Newspaper - Hagerstown, Washington Co., Maryland - Monday, February 4, 1929