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James C. Breckinridge Smith, known to friends and family as 'Brack', was a deputy sheriff of Roane County, Tennessee in 1891. He had been raised in Knox County and was living at the time of his death in the Cave Creek community of Roane County. Widely known as a faithful and efficient officer of the law, the thirty-five year old Smith left a wife and six children in mourning. The obituary notice that appeared in the Knoxville Daily Journal on Sat., August 8, 1891, gave the following account of the murder:
An item in the Chattanooga Daily Times on Thursday, Jan. 7, 1892, had this:...In company with James F. Littleton, he had returned home from a trip to Kingston, and while they were in the stable yard unhitching a horse from a wagon some unknown party from ambush fired a charge of buckshot into his body from behind. The party was concealed in a cornfield near the barn. He fell forward and the only words he said were, "I'm killed.", and expired immediately. Some fourteen buckshot had entered his body under his left shoulder. At present it is not known who the fiend is, but the citizens of that locality were determined to find out, if possible. Another item from The Chattanooga Times of Monday, Apr. 18, 1892 had:...At the December term of court just passed Felix Brazeal was indicted for the killing, and on Monday last was arrested on the streets in this town and placed in jail. His attorneys have applied for bail, and the preliminary trial will be had here before Judge Rodgers next Monday. While the evidence may have been circumstantial, it turns out that the prosecution had plenty of reason to be suspicious of Felix Breazeale. There was something downright fishy going on in his arena. Details gleaned from official documents filed with the court are very revealing. First, he was at the home of a woman named Kate Allen five days before the murder and commented to her that Brack Smith would be dead before the monthly circuit court convened in Kingston, eight days hence. Second, another witness, a man named William Collins, claimed that Ephraim Miller told him that Brack Smith would be dead before court at Kingston, and intimated that someone else would do the act but offered to bet, with witness, that it would be done before court convened.Eph Miller was arrested on the streets Friday, charged with killing Brack Smith from ambush last August. Bush Brazeal has been in jail here for some time on the same charge. The evidence is circumstantial. A third witness, a man named John Hembree, claims to have loaded a double-barrelled shotgun with 'rifle balls' and loaned it to either Bush or Eph Miller, it is unclear which, on the day of the murder. The actual wording was, "...this gun was placed under a loan in the hands of the defendant, and by other witnesses it will be shown how this was, on the same day of the killing, in the possession of the defendant...". Later, it says, "...and that said gun had been loaned some days before by it's owner to other men, and through them had come to the hand of the defendant...". A fourth witness, a woman named Mollie Monger, claims she saw Eph Miller going toward the home of defendant Bush, on the evening of the killing, with a double-barrelled shotgun like the one Hembree described. Mollie was emphatic that she talked to Miller and got a real good look at the shotgun. A fifth witness, a man named Joe Harvey, claimed that on the evening of the killing and not long before the killing, he saw Eph Miller take a double-barrelled shotgun into Felix Breazeale's house and that Miller seemed excited and in a hurry. A sixth witness, a man named Sam Miles, claimed that he saw Eph Miller leaving Felix Breazeale's house on the same evening and that he did not have the shotgun with him. A seventh witness, a man named Hulet Blackburn, claimed that the gun was brought from Felix Breazeale's house after the killing. So, the true facts are that they were able to track the gun right to Bush's door and the turn of events that most likely compelled the prosecutor to indict Bush and Miller was that 'rifle balls' of the same size and kind Hembree loaded into that shotgun were removed from the body of Brack Smith. There were a number of other witnesses listed, but their testimony is not included in the documents so far examined. It would be interesting to know what they had to add to the picture. All-in-all, there was a string of some very suspicious events and questionable behaviors that would make anyone suspect that Bush Breazeale was involved. Yes, he was acquitted, but that does not mean that he was innocent of the crime. It simply means that, in the minds of the jury of his peers, there wasn't enough physical evidence to link him to the scene (the 'rifle balls' not withstanding) or an eye-witness that saw him do it. It appears that Uncle Bush may have dodged a 'rifle ball' when he was acquitted of the murder. The research into the true facts of this crime is not complete. There are some BIG questions that are begging to be answered: 1. An item published in the The Chattanooga Times, Saturday, Aug. 8, 1891, has a sentence in it that reads, "Smith had trouble some time ago with some of his neighbors and shot one of them, and it is supposed that his death is the outcome of that trouble". It would seem altogether material to a full understanding of the case to know who it was that he shot and the whole grievance that lead up to the shooting? 2. Both Felix Breazeale and Eph Miller made comments prior to the murder that implied that they both thought it was very important that Smith was to be dead before the monthly circuit court convened in Kingston? Why was that so important? Was something about to happen that they wanted to prevent by getting rid of Brack Smith? Was he a witness to something about which they wanted to insure that he would not give testimony? 3. It would also seem material to the full understanding of the case to know where Felix Breazeale's home was in relation to Brack Smith's and was there a footpath to get from one to the other? How long would it take? Could it be traversed in the dark, or was there enough moonlight on the night of the killing to make such a trip? The New Moon occurred on Aug. 4, 1891, two days before the murder, so it would have been virtually pitch dark. Of course, an experienced fox hunter, accustomed to "running the ridges at night", could probably have done it with ease. 4. Were bloodhounds used to attempt to track backward from the cornrow near the barn, where the shooter was lying in wait, to follow the getaway trail of the assailant? Done immediately with first light, the result of such an exercise might have been conclusive. Other questions of lesser importance to the substance of the case, but that give one cause to wonder, none-the-less, are: - Assuming they were guilty, if they knew they were going to commit such a dastardly deed, why would they be making emphatic predictive comments to other people who knew them? If they believed that someone else was going to commit the crime, wasn't remaining silent also a crime, making them accessories before the fact? - Assuming they were guilty, why would they let someone see them delivering the shotgun and picking it up? If they believed that someone else was going to commit the crime, would it not be prudent to avoid obvious public contact and involvement with any gun or other instrument of death, lest they be implicated? - Even more puzzling, assuming they were guilty, is the fact that they would use a borrowed gun in the first place? Page 1 of 1 |