Letter from H. C. Fairman and H. C. Conn to Mississippi Governor James L. Alcorn; April 2, 1871

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Letter from H. C. Fairman and H. C. Conn to Mississippi Governor James L. Alcorn; April 2, 1871

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Alcorn, J. L. (James Lusk), 1816-1894 Buckley, J. W.Clover, Unknown Conn, H. C.Eivers, C. C.Fairman, H. C.Hewson, H. F.Magee, James S.Vannerson, William Ware, James

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Brookhaven (Miss.)Copiah County (Miss.)Covington County (Miss.)Jackson (Miss.)Lawrence County (Miss.)Lincoln County (Miss.)Marion County (Miss.)Monticello (Miss.)Pike County (Miss.)

Page 1

OFFICE OF H. C. CONN,
Attorney and Counselor at Law.
WILL PRACTICE IN THE COUNTIES OF LAWRENCE, MARION, COVINGTON, LINCOLN, COPIAH AND PIKE. IN THE SUPREME AND FEDERAL COURTS AT JACKSON MISS.

MONTICELLO, MISS., April 2^nd 1871.

To his excellency Governor Jas. L. Alcorn—
Jackson Miss—

We respectfully enclose the within papers for your consideration—and especially call your attention to the affidavit of Mr Conn—We have not adopted this course hastily—and our action is not instigated by malice or prejudice—We call your attention to the matter with the full conviction that the public in-terest in this County requires it. In addition to his late gross violation of the law— ^Mr Eivers^he is entirely in-competent to discharge the duties of either of the offices he now holds here—viz—County Superintendent ^of Public education^ and Justice of the peace—We, in short, desire his removal, and the appointment of a more efficient Officer—

Respectfully—your ob't s'v'ts—

H. C. Fairman.
H. C. Conn

Page 2

The Citizen.

BROOKHAVEN.

THURSDAY, MARCH 30, 1871.

Jas. S. Magee
James Ware,

Editors.

The Eivers Challenge.

As the Last Resort, we are Invited into the Woods Alone.

We dislike to bore the public with our private affairs, but the Eivers' challenge has caused so much comment here we feel it our duty to give the correspon-dence. The italics are ours.

NO. 1.

MONTICELLO, MISS., Feb. 25, '71.

Mess. Magee & Ware, Brookhaven.

Gentlemen—In response to the ar-ticle in your little rag of the 23 inst. I will state that it would give great pleasure to give you full satisfaction on the very shortest notice from you. Please inform me with what, when, and where.

I have to day written to Capt. Clover in regard to this matter. Just let him know where you would like to have a settlement.

I have the honor to be, gentleman,
Your obedient servant,

C. C. EIVERS.

To this we replied, although we did not and do not yet consider C. C. Eivers a gentleman worthy of notice: but, as he had been [unclear] the columns of this paper, we replied as follows:

NO. 2.

BROOKHAVEN, MISS. [unclear]

C. C. EIVERS, Sir:—A commu-nication over your signature, dated 25th, to hand. In reply, beg leave to say that the party referred to by you was called upon and refused to act.

Very respectfully,

MAGEE & WARE.

It will be seen this letter was written on the 26th. No reply was made to it. On the 18th of March we received a let-ter from citizens of Monticello, asking for a copy of the challenge, to be for-warded to Governor Alcorn. We then wrote Eivers this letter to give him all chance to fight he desired, and forwarded the copy of No. 1 to the citizens as re-quested. Here is our letter.

NO. 3.

[page torn]

part to bring him to an honorable and manly settlement. Failing to do so, we brand him, as his own acts do, as a COWARD, and prom-ise not to disgrace ourselves further by noticing any communication eminating from so base a source.

[seal]

true and correct Copy[unclear] he is well acqua-inted with the[unclear]C. C. Eivers and that he very[unclear]tter in his possession to be written[unclear]rs, and further that Eiver[unclear]ed in his presen the sending t[unclear] named a letter of that nat[unclear]

Sworn & s[unclear] me this 1^st day [unclear]

H. C. Conn

[unclear] clrk

Page 3

NO. 3.

BROOKHAVEN, MISS., March 19' 71.

C. C. Eivers, Sir:—On the 25th of February you sent to the pro-prietors of this paper, per mail, a challenge. We immediately called on the party referred to by you to make arrangements to carry into execution our plans. The party positively refused to act. You were at once informed of this fact, supposing that you would procure the services of others; this you have failed to do. We therefore give you notice, as we have in a former issue of our paper, that unless you come forward and carry out the pro-gramme you have yourself inaugu-rated, or retract every word in yours of the 25th before the next issue of our paper, the entire correspond-ence will be published and your actions commented on as severely as they deserve, and the matter re-ferred to the proper ones for their action, as provided in sec. 27. arti-1, of the new constitution of the State. In shorter words you must fight or retract your challenge.

Respectfully,

J. S. MAGEE.

NO. 4.

On the 22d, the following cow-ardly document was received from C. C. Eivers:

MONTICELLO, MISS., March 22, '71.

J. S. Magee, Sir:—Yours of the 19th did not reach me until after the departure of to-day's mail. In reply will say that I do not intend to retract anything until after the two articles that appeared in the Brookhaven Citizen, one this year and one last, in reference to me are withdrawn. If these are apologiz-ed for, then I am willing to retract, not otherwise. If they are not withdrawn you can just name some place in this or Lincoln county away from the railroad, and this side, where you wish to have a settlement. It must be at least half way between Mon-ticello and Brookhaven, and you must come alone. No seconds needed, as Capt. Clover refused to have any-thing to do with the matter. I think a private affair would leave us less liable to a sham arrest. I seem to be an object of the greatest ha-tred with you, and now I am giving you an opportunity of satisfying yourself. As to "commenting se-[unclear] we have also a "paper" down [unclear] make use of its columns precisely as [unclear]

C. C. EIVERS.

NO. 5.

This we replied to as follows:

BROOKHAVEN, MISS., March 28, '71.

C. C. Eivers, Sir:—Yours of the 22d to hand. I deny your right to dictate terms to me. Your actions throughout this matter, and your letter before me of the 22d, smacks of too much low down cowardice to deserve further notice from me. I dismiss you from further notice as I would any other contemptable pup-py, as you have proved yourself to

Respectfully Yours,

J. S. MAGEE.

Now the public have the corres-pondence and we leave them to judge who has been whipped in this bloodless paper war. As this fight was proposed by Eivers and every exertion was made on our

Page 4

State of Mississippi
Lawrence County

This day came before me the undersigned Clerk of the Chancery Court of Lawrence County, H. C. Conn who states on oath that he has in his possession the original of which the anexed letter marked no 1 is a true and correct Copy, that he is well acqua-inted with the handwriting of C. C. Eivers and that he veryly believes the letter in his possession to be written by said C. C. Eivers, and further that Eivers has acknowledged in his presence the sending to the parties therein named a letter of that nature

Sworn & subscribed to before me this 1^st day of April 1871

H. C. Conn

W^m Vannerson clrk
By J W Buckley

Page 5

PRECIS.
[gap]

No'.

Executive Office,
State of Mississippi,
County of Lawrence

From H. C. Conn
Address Monticello
Dated April 2nd 1871
Received [gap]
Answered [gap]

Relating to the Eivers Challenge

JAMES L. ALCORN,
Governor.

H. F. HEWSON,
Private Secretary.