The Encyclopedia Americana (1920)/Garner Case

GARNER CASE, 1856, the most tragic of the fugitive-slave cases. Simon Garner, his wife, and his son Robert, slaves of John Marshall of Kentucky, and Robert's wife Margaret and their four children, slaves of A. R. Gaines, ran away, crossed the Ohio on the ice, and took refuge with a Cincinnati colored man. Gaines tracked them, secured a warrant, and with a deputy marshal and a band of assistants attacked the house. After a desperate fight the fugitives were overpowered, one of the posse being badly wounded; but Margaret, who had shared in the conflict, found time before her capture to murder one of the children, severely cut the throats of two others, and considerably bruised the baby, to keep them from returning to slavery. In sympathy with them, and to establish their freedom as denizens of Ohio, a Cincinnati judge issued a writ of habeas corpus, and the grand jury indicted Margaret for the murder of her child, and her husband and his father as accessories. The United States Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 prevailed, however; the slaves were given back to their owners and sent down the river. On the voyage Margaret jumped overboard with the baby; she was rescued, but the child was lost, at which she expressed satisfaction.