The Killing of Maggie McClellan: A Reconstruction Tragedy in Jackson County

Col. James F. McClellan

The years after the Civil War were the most turbulent in the history of Jackson County, Florida.

Local control had been stripped from the people in Florida's counties. All local officials of any consequence were appointed by the governor.

It was a challenging time, with whites and blacks alike trying to adjust to the new order of life after the end of slavery. Crop failures and a bleak economy caused hunger and suffering, while U.S. soldiers often marched the streets to enforce the will of local officials against whom citizens had no recourse.

The number of assassinations or politically-targeted killings in the county never approached the estimates given by some modern writers. The closest the area came to a real "Jackson County War," in fact, was in the days following the murder of young Maggie McClellan on October 1, 1869.

The tragedy electrified Jackson County residents and ignited a violent outbreak that has assumed legendary status in Florida history. Miss McClellan was sitting on a boarding house veranda facing today's Jackson Street in Marianna when shots suddenly rang out in the dark. Col. James F. McClellan, the young woman's father, was wounded in the attack but held her in his arms as she quickly bled to death from a bullet wound to the heart. 

Jackson County Courthouse, the late 1800s

The boarding house attack was long shrouded by mystery and speculation. The discovery of a trove of Reconstruction-era documents during the demolition of the old Jackson County Jail, however, shed new light on the incident.

The documents, still bound in ribbons and sealed in the wax, included the case file and testimony from the trial of Alex Dickens. A freedman or former slave, he was convicted of being an accessory to McClellan's murder.

It is crucial when considering such cases to remember that the court system was then controlled by former Union officers and officials and not local residents. Dickens was judged by a jury that included both white and back members, while the judge was a Nothern appointee.

Perhaps the most poignant testimony heard during the trial was that given by Maggie's father, Col. James F. McClellan:

Lafayette Street in Marianna, the late 1800s

  James F. McClellan being duly sworn says that on Friday evening, Oct. 1^st, 1869, between half past seven and eight o’clock (an hour in the night at least) at the Hotel (Mrs. Attaway’s) in town, my daughter Margaret Y. McClellan, James P. Coker, Miss Mary Ann Tillinghast, Miss Mollie Attaway and I were sitting in the front piazza, and were talking at the time. Am confident I was talking at the time. I was sitting near the right hand pillar as you pass in to the parlor. Col. Coker was at my left and the rest of the company also. I heard a slight noise near the fence which at the moment I supposed to be a calf or other animal. Immediately after I heard in a low but very distinct whisper the word “fire” which I recognized as the voice of Calvin Rogers. Instantaneously following the word fire was the report of two guns. They were just enough apart to distinguish that they were two guns fired very near to me. I felt the concussion. The charge of one of the guns hit me in the shoulder, passing out in the muscle of the arm. Either the same charge, or the other, hit my daughter immediately in the breast with four or five shot. I saw that she was hit from the fall of her head on her breast. The load that hit me produced some concussion to the nervous system but I soon recovered, and I said to the company to go into the house. I found my arm around my daughter and carried her into the passage where she slipped out of the chair and was carried into the room where she died a few moments after. She breathed I think but twice after being laid upon the bead. This occurred in Jackson County. The order to fire was in a suppressed tone but was very distinct. At first I thought I heard a hog or calf or something like a shuffle on the pavement. It was in a low tone, but very distinct. I know Calvin Rogers very well. I remember once to have heard him prompt a witness in a whisper before going before a Justice of the Peace. It was a distinct whisper. I have never had any doubt that it was the voice of Calvin Rogers. His enunciation was very distinct whether whispering or speaking. More so than other persons. I have never seen him since until the 27^th of January. He was then dead. His residence was at that time in this place, and he was in Marianna almost daily. From the time of the killing, although diligent search was made, I have never been able to found out his exact whereabouts, was alleged he was in the county. The next morning I sued out a warrant for him. I think not later than nine o’clock. He was not arrested on that warrant, but was taken. I sued on another warrant. On the morning after the killing I made affidavit before Justice Dickinson of the murder of my daughter, Margaret Y. McClellan, against Rovers, on which, I believe, a warrant was issued. On the Tuesday or Wednesday afterwards I made affidavit before Adam McNealy, Justice of the Peace, charging Rogers with the same murder, and had seven or eight warrants issued and placed in the hands of the parties deputized. When Mr. West was appointed Sheriff, I had a warrant placed in his hands. After an indictment was made against him I consulted with Mr. West and with Mr. Davis as to the best means of capturing him believing that he was still in the county.

John Q. Dickinson
Clerk of Court during Dickens Trial

  An indictment was found against him at the next term of the Court. A public meeting was held nine or ten days after the murder at which a thousand dollars was offered for his capture. I subsequently published in the “Courier” a statement guaranteeing this reward. A large reward was offered by the Executive for the apprehension & conviction of the murderer of my daughter. Am uncertain whether Rogers’ name is in proclamation or no.

--

Col. McClellan's testimony, which offers a heartbreaking description of his daughter's death, was taken on May 21, 1870.

Maggie McClellan's murder sparked a regional manhunt for the suspected assassin, a freedman named Calvin Rogers. He was the constable of Jackson County when the assassination took place but died of gunshot wounds in a confrontation with a Jackson County Sheriff's posse near present-day Graceville.

Modern writers claim that Rogers was lynched or murdered, but he died while attempting to escape from sheriff's deputy who was trying to arrest him on an indictment for murder. The records and testimony surrounding the incident were also found in the trove of Reconstruction documents.

A rash of murders following Maggie McClellan's death leading Federal authorities to order soldiers back to the streets of Marianna. 

To read another eyewitness account of Maggie's murder, please click here: http://twoegg.blogspot.com/2012/02/another-account-of-killing-of-maggie.html.

The Raid on the McKay Farm (January 1868)

Freedmen working a farm.

The Battle of the Flowers had ignited passions in Jackson County (see The Battle of the Flowers) and tensions between local white citizens and the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen & Abandoned Lands intensified through the summer and fall of 1867.

The growing resistance to the Federal government and particularly to its agents, Charles M. Hamilton and William J. Purman, reached the boiling point in January of 1868 when news spread through the county of the kidnapping and beating of two farmers, William McKay and John F.E. McKay. On January 3, 1868, the two filed suit against the Carpetbagger Hamilton, each alleging that the agent:

Col. James F. McClellan

…With force and arms then & there assaulted the said plaintiff then and there beat, bruised & ill treated him, and then and there kept and detained him in prison there, without any reasonable or probable cause whatsoever, for a long time, to wit, for a space of four days….

The lawsuits each sought a minimum of $10,000 in damages and were filed on behalf of both of the farmers by attorneys James F. McClellan, W.D. Barnes, A.H. Bush and Samuel Hawkins. McClellan, Barnes and Bush had all fought on the Confederate side during the recent war.

They alleged that both of the McKays had suffered injury to their persons and businesses as a result of their confinement by Hamilton.

Charles M. Hamilton

The situation developed, in fact, because of an edict handed down by Hamilton himself. Cotton prices had collapsed that year and money was in short supply. Many of the freedmen (former slaves) had purchased things on credit that year, in anticipation of being able to pay their debts when the cotton crop came in. When prices collapsed, they found themselves unable to pay their debts.

The creditors to whom they owed money began to seize their portions of the corn crop in order to settle the debts. Food began to run short and Hamilton decided to deal with the situation by all but completing his takeover of Jackson County's economic system. He ordered planters to cease dividing crops and paying out the debts of their laborers. He and Purman would decide how much the laborers were due and who should be paid.

Carpetbaggers as seen by Southerners

Many of the farmers objected to the agent's order as illegal. Hamilton ordered troops to the Campbellton area to enforce his edict, but the soldiers arrived to find themselves faced with the possibility of armed rebellion. Wisely they avoided a bloody confrontation and returned to Marianna. 

Learning of the outcry from the farmers of Jackson County, one of Hamilton's military superiors - Lt. Col. F.F. Flint - protested to Gen. John Sprague, the military commander of Florida, that the agent was pushing the citizens of the county to the brink and that a serious disturbance might be the result. Governor David Walker joined with Flint in blaming Hamilton for the growing tension in Jackson County.

Hamilton, meanwhile, moved on John and William McKay. The two farmers had dismissed one of their laborers during the year for balking at his orders and refusing to carry out work assignments. He and his family had been evicted from the farm, but after being contacted by the Bureau, the McKays had paid him for the work he actually performed.

Carpetbaggers as seen by Northerners

Hamilton and Purman now demanded, however, that the two farmers pay the worker his share of the crop even though he had not worked through the entire season. They refused. Both men were seized, according to the Marianna Courier, and "ruthlessly incarcerated in a filthy old smokehouse to be made to succumb to an unfair and unjust disposition of their property that amounted to absolute robbery."

In the process of this "arrest," the McKays reported that they had been badly beaten, dragged away from their homes by a band of armed freedmen and held in horrendous conditions.

 A court date was set for April 4, 1868, and Hamilton was issued a summons to appear. According to a notation on the summons, it was "executed by handing a copy of the within to C.M. Hamilton" on January 15, 1868, by Deputy Sheriff R.J. Pittman.

It would take Hamilton nearly six weeks to respond to the filing against him. I will detail his response in the next article.

Another Account of the Killing of Maggie McClellan

Jackson County Courthouse, late 19th Century.

A few days ago I posted a moving account of the 1869 murder of a young woman named Maggie McClellan in Jackson County. Please click here to read that post.

She was sitting on the porch of Mrs. Caroline Attaway's boarding house with her father, Col. James F. McClellan, two of her friends and a friend of her fathers, Col. James P. Coker. The men were smoking and the group was enjoying the cool of the evening and chatting after dinner.

Two shots rang out from the dark. One struck Col. McClellan in the shoulder. The other hit Maggie in the center of her chest. She slumped into her father's arms and died just a minute or two later.

Downtown Marianna Today

The incident was one of the most notorious of the Reconstruction War in Jackson County. It was a time of violence - how much violence is debatable - and the death of the young woman sent shockwaves through a county that was already tense and on the verge of all out war against the Carpetbaggers and Scalawags then in control of virtually all aspects of life there.

It was generally believed that the county constable, Calvin Rogers, was responsible for the shooting and, in fact, he was indicted on murder charges. Rogers disappeared at the time of Maggie's killing, however, and despite a widespread search could not be found. A second man, Alex Dickens, was arrested and charged with accessory to murder after the fact for helping Rogers to escape and hide. He was put on trial in 1870 and the newly discovered records of that trial reveal much about the shooting of the young woman and subsequent events.


John Q. Dickinson
Clerk of Court, 1871

One of the more interesting pieces of testimony found in the long lost case fill is that of Col. James P. Coker, who was a few feet from Maggie when she was shot:

...Was present at the time Miss McClellan was shot - was within two or three feet of her. I saw Calvin Rogers a few minutes before the shooting occurred. He was passing the house at the time.... Rogers soon returned by the house and turned his head toward the house passing up the street and very soon after the shooting occurred, not more than two or three minutes afterwards. I am positive it was Calvin Rogers. It was after dark. He was gone some thirty seconds. I heard a word but not distinctly. There were two reports - very nearly at the same time.... It is hard to deceive me with the gait or carriage of anybody in town. I can personally tell them. I recognized him  by his appearance - his carriage and gait - No one was with him. - Col. James F. McClellan, Testimony recorded on May 21, 1870.

I will post more about the Reconstruction War in my next post. It will include an overview of what the war was about, how long it lasted and how violent the situation became. Be sure to check back soon for a look inside the legend to learn about this horrible time in Jackson County history.