The Murder of John Weathers

    On June 4, 1864, a young white man named Mason Brockman went fishing near Liberty Landing in Clay County with some acquaintances, and after a while, Brockman left the group and went to a nearby store to get some whiskey. While he was there, according to Brockman's later story, a slave named John Weathers passed by driving "a nifty ox team," and Brockman followed. Weathers stopped and offered Brockman a ride, which he accepted. After the two had gone a little ways further, two men jumped out from some brush and ordered Weathers to stop. When he didn't promptly obey, they started shooting. Brockman jumped out of the wagon and escaped to the brush, but Weathers was shot and killed.
    The next day a cousin of the black man's owner reported the murder to Union authorities at Liberty, and a detachment of soldiers went out and arrested several suspects in the case, including Brockman, Perry Mitchell, and Jack Pryor. Brockman gave a statement saying that Mitchell and Pryor, who were two of the men he'd gone fishing with, were the men who'd jumped out of the brush and ordered Weathers to stop. He saw Mitchell fire one shot at Weathers before he (Mitchell) jumped out of the wagon and escaped to the brush. He heard three or four more shots after that but wasn't sure whether Mitchell fired them all or Pryor also fired a weapon.
    A few days later, the case was turned over to civil authorities, but despite the eyewitness testimony, little, if anything else was apparently done to prosecute Mitchell and Pryor. The death of Weathers was apparently not deemed important enough to vigorously prosecute.