Was Assassinated - Oscar Crosby

Typed as spelled and written

by Lena Stone Criswell

THE MARLIN DEMOCRAT

Eighteenth Year - Number 59

Marlin, Texas, Saturday, December 14, 1907

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WAS ASSASSINATED.

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Oscar Crosby Shot in Back

of Head in Dark.

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Dave Anderson and Wife of

Crosby are Held for

the Crime.

The killing of Oscar Crosby Tuesday night, five miles east of Reagan, appears to have been a cold-blooded assassination.

Physical evidence discovered at the scene of the killing on the E. G. Lloyd farm by Sheriff Poole, seem to leave no doubt that the negro was crept uoon from the rear and the fatal charge fired from a shot gun into the back of his head without warning of his impending fate.

Brief mention was made of the killing in Wednesday's paper, but at that time details could not be had. Sheriff Poole returned Wednesday afternoon at 6 o'clock from the scene of the killing, where he investigated it.

The sheriff brought with him Dave Anderson and Lula Crosby, who are now in jail, charged with the crime.

Crosby was on his gallery at about nine o'clock Tuesday night when he was shot from the rear, the load of shot tearing a hole in his head. The empty shell was found to fit the gun of Crosby, one barrel of which showed that it had been freshly discharged. The investigation conducted by Judge J. E. Davis, Sheriff Poole and Constable Moore developed the fact that the gun belonged to Crosby and was borrowed or taken from his house by Anderson on the day before.

Anderson lived at the of Crosby and it is said he and the woman were very good friends. When questioned, the woman denied everything and told Sheriff Poole that she fired the gun herself the day before at some blackbirds. However, disclosures made by a 14-year-old girl living on the place pointed to Anderson and the Crosby woman as the guilty parties and they were arrested by the sheriff.

Inquest proceedings were held before Judge Davis of the Reagan precinct.

The dead negro was thirty-five years old, his wife is twenty-eight, and Anderson about the same age.

Crosby was on the Lloyd farm seven years and Mr. Lloyd gives him a good name, saying that he was one of the most reliable negroes he ever had had around him. Anderson has put up time on the county road under Sheriff Poole, when he was road superintendent and the officer knows him well.

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by The Democrat, Marlin, Falls Co., Texas.