On the night o
f September 4, 1913, Rafe Piper Sr., a respected citizen of Gainesville, Texas, was brutally murdered at the Sacra Ferry on the Red River. Piper, who had served Cooke County as Public Weigher for ten years, was accompanying Joe Taylor and Edgar Beasley back to Thackerville when their wagon broke down in the river and their team got away from them. While Taylor left to secure another team and wagon, a violent fight erupted between Dick Thompson, two Pittman brothers, and Edgar Beasley during which Piper was fatally shot and Beasley beaten into unconsciousness.
The murder occurred on a sandbar on the Texas side of Red River, though Piper was found dead in a wagon at Beasley’s farm in Oklahoma the following morning. The victim had been shot with a.44 caliber pistol, with the bullet entering through his left ear and exiting through his right temple, which was torn away. Dick Thompson, George Pittman and John Pittman, were initially arrested in connection with the crime, with the suspects claiming that several shots were fired during the altercation but that none of them knew Piper was dead until he was discovered the next morning. Edgar Beasley was himself arrested a week later.
The case took several turns as it moved through the legal system. Edgar Beasley was ultimately found guilty of negligent homicide by a jury in the district court at Gainesville and fined $750. However, at their preliminary hearing on September 9, 1913, George and John Pittman along with Dick Thompson were released from custody, and nobody was ultimately charged with murder after the case went before the grand jury. The tragic death of Rafe Piper, described as one of the oldest and most highly respected citizens of Cook County, shocked the community and completed a family tragedy as Rafe Parker’s wife had committed suicide in 1906 at the age of 40, by throwing herself into Elm Creek and drowning.
#TexasHistory #RedRiver #1913Murder #CokeCounty #Family Tragedy
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