Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1882-10-20
TnE slim SL1YBACK
ApOStrOphized by His Friend
aud COmerade, Colonel
Pat DOnRn.
Fargo Argus.l7.

Fargo Argus, II.
In all the blood stained annals Of
Missouri no event has eyer created a
more universal and profound sensation
of horror than the murder of Colonel
Alonzo w. Slayback, who was assas-
sinated at half past five o'clock last
Friday evening by John A. Cockerell,
the editor of the st. Louis Post
Dispatch. Colonel Slaybaok was
born in Lexington, Missouri, and was
beyond all question the noblest son
that barbarian State ever produced.
He commanded a regiment Of cavalry
in the Confederate army during the
war, and no knightlier soldier drew a
sabre on either side in that great
struggle. When the cause which he
had espoused, and for which he had
fought with the heroic devotion of a
Paladin, went down in defeat, he
crossed over into Mexico and identi-
fed himself with the ill-starred Maxi
MILAN. He returned to the United
States in 1866, and at once entered
upon the practice of law in St.
Louis. His tremendous working
power, his t%ireless energy, his
zeal, his profound learning
in his profession, his mastery elo-
quence and fertility Of resources, and,
more than all, his grand and generous
manhood speedily placed him at the
head of the st. Louis bar. His ambi-
ton was t%ireless, be was a diligent and
constant student, and from the day he
won his first case and saved the life OF
Captain Donaldson after one of the
most memorable murder trials that
ever took place in st. Louis, he was
the rising mar of his profession in his
city and State. Every day added to
his power and his fame; he was cease.
lessly growing in the grand sweep Of
his intellect, until at the hour of his
assassination he ranked as the first
lawyer in the Mississippi valley. He
won more cases and lost fewer than
any nan who ever practiced in st.
Louis. His gigantic abilities and his
unlimited generosity we're drawn upon
at all times and under all eircumstan-
ces. His charity practice was i'm.
mense. No mans or woman's just
cause ever lacked a pleader for
want Of a fee, if it was laid before
HIM. No public occasion, reception
or celebration W. passed in st. Louis
without his eloquent tongue being
called upon to do it honor and grace.
In May, 1873, he delivered, at the
United States cemetery at Jefferson
barracks, the first memorial address
ever delivered by a Confederate soldier
on National Decoration Day, and the
grandeur of the effort, its eloquence,
its power and its tenderness, secured
it publication throughout the Union.
In every political campaign he
was in perpetual demand, and his
speeches 10 Indiana in 1880 we're
pronounced by far the ablest made on
this side that year. He went. as
State Commissioner Of Missouri, to
the recent Mining Exposition in Den
yer, and in ten days his name became
a household word in Colorado. He
was called on to deliver the address
on Childron's Day, the address
before the Colorado Bar Asso-
citation and one Of the closing ad-
dresses Of the great exhibition. The
world was non too wide for his genius
and his exhaustless sympathies.
Wherever he went he was put to
work for the public good. He never
shlrked or held back, and during his
brief life gave away, with his free
heart and hand and tongue more than
most men ever have. Great of brain.
heroic Of heart and eloquent OF tongue
and ready OF hand, he united the
courage Of a man with the tenderness
Of a woman. God never made a truer
friend or a nobler man. He lies dead
another victim of the bloody and
barbarous customs, which have made
Missouri and the South a missing
and a byword' throughout Ohristen.
dom. Dead. Fallen on the field of
his labors and his glory. Cut down
In mid career, as every day was
adding to his usefulness and his
fame. Slain, in all the grandeur
of mis- young manhood, by an assassin
ten thousand of whose bastard lives
would not be worth one drop of the
blood that trickled from his noble and
generous heart when the murderous
bullet pierced it. Dead-and Mis-.
souri, has not, and will not have in
this generation, one capable Of taking
his placel
Soldier Statesman Orator! Tru,
friend and comrade beloved! Farewell
a long FAREWELL Green be the tur
that rests upon thy pulseless heart
Sweet be the %violets that shall bloom
above thy breast, and sweet the song
of the birds that shall nestle in m,
cypress boughs above thy rave. Ma,
the God Of the widow and the ia
therless pity, protect and comfor
thine agonized dear ones, and gran
that, when the last great ~reyeiII
sounds, thou and they nav NEE
again, no wanderer lost, a family f
heavenl