A Double Tragedy

A man shoots a black man, but later "looked into [his pistol] and accidentally discharged it," killing himself.

(James Ogletree Shot a Negro in the Back, and Later Killed Himself Accidently.)
[Daily World, Helens, Ark.]
This morning there lay in Loveland’s undertaking establishment, with a ghastly bullet wound in the forehead where blood and brains had oozed out and clotted, James Ogletree, who yesterday afternoon died by his own hand,- but accidentally. Death came to him in peculiar fashion and in a manner to suggest the grimness of retribution.
Ogletree was foreman of Dresbach Bros.’ levee camp. Down below the Williamson break, three or four miles south of the city. He was a man of ugly disposition and it was very difficult to keep enough labor where he was. Yesterday afternoon, as far as can be learned, he had words with one of the Negroes and in the course of the difficulty he Negro disputed Ogletree’s word. Will Brodie, the Negro, turned and walked off and as he was leaving. Ogletree picked up a Winchester rifle and shot him in the back, the ball taking effect about two inches to the right of the spinal column and below the shoulder blade. At this writing it cannot be learned how seriously Brodie is wounded, but it is thought his condition is dangerous.
About two hours after this shooting Ogletree was standing near the camp kitchen, handling his revolver, a 44 calibre Smith & Wesson. The cook and a flunky were busy within a few yards of him, but neither was looking at him when the fatal shot was fired. The cook’s back was turned, and when the shot rang out he reeled in time to see Ogletree sink to the ground. Death was apparently instantaneous. The big bullet had entered his brain a little to the right of and above his left eye, and he probably never knew what struck him.
The cook had heard the pistol snap a moment before the shot, but paid no attention to it The surmise is that when the weapon failed to fire. Ogletree looked into it and accidentally discharged it.
Mr. H. H. Dresbach who was attending to the disposition of the remains this morning, stated to a World reporter that he was in town with Ogletree yesterday, and that the latter bought two different makes of cartridges. During the afternoon he had been trying these, one make of which he found all right and the other not so good. He had been firing at tar ets and into the air. Mr. Dresbach had often seen him turn his pistol and look into it, when it missed fire, and the circumstances point to this habit of his as responsible for his death. In the pistol were found one cartridge snapped and one exploded.
Mr. Dresbach stated emphatically that Ogletree was not a man who would commit suicide, and he also told the coroner's’ jury that no one knew who the dead man would believe would believe that anyone else but the victim had ired into his face at such short range as the powder burns indicated. The jury found that the deceased came to his death accidentally from a pistol fired by himself.
The dead man has relatives somewhere in Arkansas, but had not written to them in about five years. About two months ago he got Mr. Dresbach to write to the postmaster at his old home, but nothing was heard from that source except that the family had moved. Mr. Dresbach does not remember the post-office but recalls that it was in Little River county.
The remains were interred in Maple Hill Cemetery this morning.

“A Double Tragedy,” Black Virginia: The Richmond Planet, 1894-1909, accessed December 7, 2025, https://blackvirginia.richmond.edu/items/show/1762.