SECOND DEATH MAY END VETERANS' FIGHT
Confederate Soldier, Slayer of Comrade, May Die
Nashville, Tenn., Feb 17 - Death may write the closing chapter in the fight between two aged Confederate veterans at the state Old Soldiers' Home here Friday night when one of them, G. W. Hamby, aged 97, was fatally stabbed in a childish argument over whether a window should be raised or let down. Dr. T. G. Bracking, aged 91, the slayer, is in a serious condition, due to injuries received in the encounter, and attendants at the home believe that action by the state in prosecuting him will be forestalled by his early death. Meanwhile, it is momentarily expected here that a murder warrant will be issued against the former Confederate soldier by George Washington Hamby, Jr., 71 year-old son of the slain man, who arrived here this morning to make funeral arrangements. Comrades of Hamby will serve as pallbearers, and he will be buried with the Confederate service in the Old Soldiers' Home Cemetery. Dr. Bracking, confined to his quarters at home, is claiming that he killed Hamby in self-defense, when the latter attacked him because he would not raise the window in his room. The state has announced, following an investigation by the sheriff of Davidson county and Gov. Austin Peay, that no criminal action will be taken until Dr. Bracking is fully recovered. Gov. Peay has declared it to be the "most unique situation in the history of the veterans' institution."
(The Courier Chronicle, Friday, February 22, 1924)