The Killing of Bennett Musick 

Harlan County Murder and Mutilation

May 2, 1937

New and sensational stories of terrorism, murder and violence in Harlan County, Ky., were told by witnesses before the Senate Civil Liberties Committee last week.

The killing of their 19 year-old son was described by Marshal A. Musick, a Baptist preacher and union organizer, and his wife. After the father had received repeated warning that his life was in danger, a broadside of bullets was fired into the living room of the Musick home on February 9, killing 19-year-old Bennett Musick and wounding the mother and two other children.

Holding up his crippled bullet-mutilated hands for all to see, Hugh Taylor, a former Harlan Deputy, testified that Sheriff Theodore R. Middleton had offered him “2,000 and a new automobile”, if he would forget about the bullets fired at him by other deputies when he protested the Musick killing, and hide out until the Senate investigation was over.

A Harlan deputy, “Bill” Johnson, described himself as a “gun thug” and told how he was always “goin” out and catchin’ union organizers, taken’ them for a ride and bumpin’ ‘em off.” “But” he hastened to add, “I never killed anybody-not in Harlan County anyway.”

Sheriff Middleton, who admitted, that he and his wife had acquired property valued at $102,728 in the last three years, blandly informed  the committee Friday that “quite a lot of violence has been committed by my deputies.” Admitting that he knew two deputies had shot a fellow officer and left him for dead on a mountain roadside, he said:

“As a rule we don’t dismiss them until they are convicted.”