Rensselaer Republican, Volume 18, Number 10, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 November 1885 — An Arkansas Duel. [ARTICLE]

An Arkansas Duel.

About the year 1830, General Conway and Robert Crittenden, of Arkansas, were opposing candidates for the position of territorial deligate in the National Congress. Their speeches were bitterly personal; but for a time they abstained from coming into direct collision with each other, the one confining his canvass to the northern portion of the State, and the other confining his canvass to the southern. But this prudent course could not long be pursued in Arkansas at that day. The public became impatient with invective that did not reach its object except in faint reverberations. An irresistable demand was made for a joint discussion. Little Rock, and a day in midsummer, were the place and time fixed for it In the course of his second speech, Conway, faithfully complying like a good representative with the wishes of his constituents, used language which made a challenge upon the part of Crittenden amoral necessity in that portion of the United States. A meeting was arranged for the next morning. A “vast throng,” some of whom had come over a hundred miles to hear the discussion of the previous day, took their stand about the spot where the gladiatorial tourney was to come off. The seconds disagreed. Conway, whoj while a man of undoubted courage, was more nervously organized than his competitor, became restless and petulant; but Crittenden, who is said to have “inherited the noblest of human forms,” quietly extended his shapely limbs upon an outstretched blanket, and remained in that attitude with his eyes half closed, as if enjoying a peaceful slumber, until the seconds had settled their differences. This was finally done. The principals fired. Crittenden lost a button; and Conway lost what would in the case of some duelists be a thing of equivalent value —his life.— William Cabell Bruce, in the Current. '