In 1834 Virgil Stewart rode from western Tennessee to a territory known as the ``Arkansas morass`` in pursuit of John Murrell, a thief accused of stealing two slaves.
Stewart\'s adventure led to a sensational trial and a wildly popular published account that would ultimately help trigger widespread violence during the summer of 1835, when five men accused of being professional gamblers were hanged in Vicksburg, nearly a score of others implicated with a gang of supposed slave thieves were exec.
In 1834 Virgil Stewart rode from western Tennessee to a territory known as the ``Arkansas morass`` in pursuit of John Murrell, a thief accused of stealing two slaves