This Day in History

It is a woeful tale.....an event that occurred today in history.

This guy, who happened to be a Congressman from Maine.....Jon Cilley....got into an aggressive bit of behavior.....speaking out about a bribery accusation on the Congressional floor.  Guys could say just about anything they wanted in those days, and without TV or radio.....you usually got away with it unless some idiot was standing there....wrote the quote down, and then blabbed it to the insulted guy.

Well....in this case.....a southern Congressman....Bill Graves of Kentucky.....was the insulted party.  Bill wasn't exactly a guy to stand down.

In these days of 1838, things were a bit different.  Guys tended to drink excessively....all day long.  We don't know the drinking status of Bill or Jon that day....but I'd make an educated guess that both sipped some beverages and probably were a bit more reactive than you'd like.

There was no willingness on Jon's part to own up to the insult, so Bill decided a duel had to be necessary.  In this period of American history....duels were pretty accepted.  There various choices of weapon in a duel, with varying degrees of outcome.

Naturally, you were supposed to duel around the District area.  That was considered in bad taste.  So they crossed the river over into Maryland. The kindly folks over in Maryland....had created the Bladensburg Duelling Grounds....where you could professionally duel with other folks.  The history folks say over fifty duels occurred at Bladensburg during it's period of usage.

So Jon....who wasn't much of an expert with weapons anyway....shows up.  Bill shows up.  And there is this shooting match.  Bill basically shoots Jon in the leg pretty severely, and blood is pumping out rapidly....with Jon dead in 90 seconds flat.  Other than covering the guy with a horse-blanket in the moments after his death....there's not much you could offer to the guy.

Word gets out about this duel and upsets folks greatly.  So the kindly folks at Congress....Republican and Democrat....finally decide on a joint resolution.  No more duels.  You couldn't issue an invitation to a duel....nor could you accept an invitation.  Course, the wording was typical Washington....it only meant for threats given or received in the District.  If you got insulted in a regular state....then all bets were off.

The curious thing about this whole thing....a week later, the funeral occurs, with the President in attendance.  You can imagine this scene...a funeral with various party members....all in a state of shock of the duel and it's impact.

Dueling between political figures came to an end after that.  And if you were guessing....yeah....Bill was a Republican and a gun expert.  And yeah, Jon was a Democrat, and mostly known for no gun skills at all.