Fort Worth Gazette
Saturday, August 9, 1890
pg 4

Fatally Stabbed His Wife.
Special to the Gazette.
DENISON, TEX., Aug. 8. - Last night Tobe Garnett fatally stabbed his wife on Munson street. After the affray
Garnett made his escape. Officers are yet in pursuit. Tobe is a black negro, about thirty years old, and is near six feet tall. Family differences was the cause.



The Sunday Gazetteer
Denison, Texas
Sunday, August 10, 1890
pg 1

STABBED TO DEATH

Tobe Garnett (col.) Murders His Wife with a Dirk.

Thursday night about 11 o'clock, a fatal stabbing occurred on Hull street, in South Denison. Tobe Garnett
(colored), and his wife Adeline, have not been getting along well together lately, and have been living apart. Adeline residing with her mother and brother, Eli Webb, on Munson street, while Tobe has subsisted chiefly
around coon gambling houses and other like resorts. Thursday Tobe's niece came over from Sherman and Adeline was down seeing her off home on the Cannon ball train, when Tobe came around the depot and told her that he wanted to walk up the track with her to the street on which she lived, as he had somethings to say to her. Tobe had often threatened to kill his wife and his brother (nicknamed Col. Saddler), being present, advised her not to go with him. She replied that she wasn't afraid of the s--of--a--b--, and that she would accompany him to h--l if he said so. Saddler relates that they started off together and that fearing consequences he followed them at a distance. When near the viaduct they began to fight and he ran up on them and made them desist. They then moved on to near
Hull street when the began to fuss again, but after a minute quieted down and began talking low. He sat down
about a block away from them, to wait, as he said, till they got through talking, so he could see Adeline the rest of the way home. He must have fallen asleep, for his next sense of consciousness was hearing a loud scream, and seeing Mrs. Garnett running towards him, pursued by her husband. He sprang up and ran quickly toward the
fleeing woman, and passing her, seized and held his brother. It was then that Adeline wheeled with something in her hand and struck with it at her husband, and the latter, striking over his brother's shoulder with a knife, plunged the weapon to the hilt in the centre of her breast. With a cry of "Oh! Lord, I'm killed," the woman started to run but
fell on Hull street fifty yards away. Saddler's cries awoke parties in the neighborhood, and a messenger was sent for the police.
Officer Preston was on hand in a couple of minutes and dispatched a colored boy after Dr. Nagle, but before the doctor reached the scene the woman was dead. The body bore marks of several knife wounds in the back, which had no doubt been inflicted before Saddler's interference. After inflicting the fatal wound Garnett made off. He was heard of out on Iron Ore about 10 a.m., and Marshal James, Constable Mixson and a posse started in pursuit. They traced him across a couple of farms in the Iron Ore district but lost the trail in the dense woods of the Choctaw bottoms. They divided up and scoured the woods and country all day, enquiring at every house and of every person they met, without learning anything of the fugitive, and at 11 p.m. they returned to the city empty handed. The authorities at all points along the railroads have been notified and Garnett's arrest is looked for at any minute.



The Sunday Gazetteer
Sunday, August 24, 1890
pg 4

LOCAL CONDENSATIONS
TUESDAY
The police were notified this morning that Tobe Garrett, the negro wife murderer, had passed the night at the house of Henry Watson (colored) and that he was still there. A posse went over armed with Winchesters to get  him in, but when they reached the place the fugitive had flown. The Watson family denied Garrett's having been there but other parties living in the neighborhood said that he had.

THURSDAY
The city police were out in search of Tobe Garnett, the wife murderer last night, he having been seen by several responsible parties upon the back streets, during the afternoon. They didn't, however, find him.



The Fort Worth Gazette
Monday, August 25, 1890

TOBE GARNETT

The Murderer Surrounded - His Capture Dead or Alive Certain.

Special to the Gazette
SHERMAN, TEX., Aug. 23 - Telegraphic information reached this city last evening from Denison that Tobe
Garnett, the negro who cut his wife's throat there several weeks ago, had been seen near that place, and
asked the sheriff for assistance. The Bonham bloodhounds were telegraphed for and arrived on the Cannon
Ball. Immediately Deputy Sheriff Harvy May and the Fannin county officers left by private conveyance with
the dogs for the scene of Tobe's rendezvous. They were joined by the sheriff and Gene Andrews at Cook's
Springs and to-day's latest reports are in the effect that the murderer is surrounded and his capture dead
or alive is almost certain.



The Sunday Gazetteer
Sunday, August 31, 1890
pg 4
LOCAL CONDENSATIONS
THURSDAY

Tobe Garnett, the wife murderer, was reported as hiding in the woods out in the direction of Hudson's Quarters
and a large posse of citizens and officers went out to search for him. That $50 reward is likely to fetch him.



Austin American-Statesman
Friday, October 10, 1890
pg 4

STATE HOUSE NOTES
The governor has offered a reward of $200 for the arrest of Tobe Garnett, who murdered his wife in Denison.



The Sunday Gazetteer
Sunday, October 12, 1890
pg 4

Governor Ross has offered a reward of $200 for the arrest and conviction of Tobe Garnett, for the murder of his wife, in this city, on August 7th.



The Sunday Gazetteer
Sunday, June 12, 1892
pg 4
PERSONALS

Sheriff Mason, of Hunt county, arrived in Denison Wednesday having in charge a negro man whome he took to be Tobe Garnett, the wife murderer. It was not Tobe, however, and the fellow was discharged.



The Galveston Daily News
Saturday, March 4, 1893
pg 6

Police officer Henry Hackney has returned from a trip to south Texas, where he failed to locate his game, Tobe Garnett, who is needed here.



The Galveston Daily News
Friday, August 7, 1896
pg 3

Rewards Offered
Two hundred and fifty dollars reward for the arrest of Tobe Garnett, charged with the murder of his wife in Grayson county.



The Weekly Herald
Weatherford, Texas
Thursday, May 10, 1900
pg 3

Tobe Garnett Arrested.
Sherman, Tex., May 5 - Sheriff Shrewsbury brought in Tobe Garnett, a negro, and placed him in the county jail upon an indictment charging him with the murder of his wife, Adaline Garnett at Denison 10 years ago.



The Sunday Gazetteer
Sunday, June 10, 1900
pg 4
LOCAL CONDENSATIONS

Tobe Garnett (col.) who murdered his wife in this city a number of years ago, will go to trial this week in Sherman.



Evening Messenger
Marshall, Texas
Tuesday, July 31, 1900
pg 2

New Trial Denied
In the district court at Sherman the motions in arrest of judgment and for a new trial in the case of Tobe Garnett, colored, whose penalty for the alleged murder of his wife, Adaline Garnett, at Denison ten years ago, was fixed at death by a jury, were both overruled by Judge Bliss and the defendant gave notice of appeal to the higher court. In addition to the general interest felt in this case in the motions of question of mixed juries was involved. The motion in arrest was in substance that there were no negroes on the jury commission that selected the panel from which the grand jury that indicted Garnett was made, and that there were no negroes on the grand jury itself.  It was also set forth that there were no negroes on the commission that selected the panel from which the special venire in the Garnett case was taken and that there were no negroes in the venire and that this was all because of discrimination against the negro race.
When the defendant offered to produce proof of the above allegations the state claimed that the allegations were made too late and the proper time to have made these objections was on the trial of the case, and Judge Bliss sustained the grounds.


The Houston Daily Post
Saturday, November 3, 1900
pg 4

HIGHER COURTS
Court of Criminal Appeals
Submitted on motion for certiorari: Tobe Garnett, from Grayson.



The Bonham News
Friday, March 15, 1901
pg 1
Texas News Notes

Tobe Garnett, colored, was convicted of wife murder at Sherman, Monday, and was sentenced to hang on May 3.



The Houston Post
Saturday, April 27, 1901
pg 8

COMMUTATION OF DEATH
Sentence Granted Garnett Will Not Aid in Enforcement of Law.
Sherman, Texas, April 26 - Simultaneous with the commutation of Tobe Garnett's death sentence to life imprisonment, Sheriff Shrewsbury received a lengthy document from Governor Sayers, in which he set forth a list of reasons for commuting the sentence against the negro wife murderer. Sheriff Shrewsbury had a talk with Governor Sayers today, and was directed to take Garnett to the penitentiary instanter. He took occasion to express himself plainly to the governor, as follows: "We have in Grayson county the most law abiding, mob abhorring community on earth, but the commutation of this death sentence will, in my opinion, have a bad effect. The people have never quite forgotten the commutation of the sentence of Hunt, another wife murderer, and a continuation of the policy of not executing the murderers of defenseless women will work ill, and some day I am afraid that with their confidence in the legal infliction of the punishment that such crimes deserve being shaken, we will witness such scenes here as have occurred in other sections. The execution of Garnett would necessarily have been an unpleasant duty to me, but I would have performed it, feeling that it was a just punishment and fully satisfied that his defense did not have an lot of truth in it. For eight years I was familiar with the case and the facts surrounding it, and . . .  the trial not a voice was ever raised in extenuation of the crime."
Garnett was taken to Rusk this afternoon and he expressed himself as being well pleased with the governor's action.


The Sunday Gazetteer
Sunday, April 28, 1901
pg 1

Tobe Garnett, colored, who killed his wife in the city and was sentenced to be hung, has had his sentence commuted to life imprisonment by the governor.



The Bonham News
Friday, May 3, 1901
pg 1

Tobe Garnett, the negro wife murderer of Sherman, had his sentence commuted last week, by Gov. Sayers, from the death penalty to life imprisonment.



The Sunday Gazetteer
Sunday, May 5, 1901
pg 1

Tobe Garnett, (colored), who killed his wife in this city, has been conveyed to the penitentiary for life.