A bungled attempt to break a drunk friend out of the Swayzee town jail in September 1900 spiraled into a fatal shooting, a manhunt that stretched across Grant County, and a murder trial the following year that collapsed under accusations of jury bribery. Saloonkeeper Frank Stillwell was shot through the neck and arm during the chaos, and he died six days later after his wound turned to blood poisoning.
According to the Grant County Sheriff's Office - Marion, IN, which recounted the episode in a Facebook post marking its 126th anniversary, the trouble began on September 6, 1900, when brothers Mart and William Nesbitt rode into Swayzee with their companion Everett Leer. As reported by the Cincinnati Commercial Tribune, Leer was arrested for public intoxication and locked in the Swayzee jail, which set the brothers off on a hunt to get him out.
Unable to spring their friend, Mart and William Nesbitt seized two revolvers and an axe from Stillwell's saloon, according to the same Cincinnati Commercial Tribune account. When Stillwell demanded his property back, the brothers shot him through the neck and arm, leaving him in what the sheriff's office post described as a precarious condition.
A Town Marshal Overwhelmed
With Stillwell down, the Nesbitt brothers paraded through Swayzee's main street firing pistols, according to the sheriff's office account. The Cincinnati Commercial Tribune reported that the town marshal was powerless to stop the disturbance, forcing local residents to arm themselves for protection while the brothers threatened anyone whose head they saw outside, per the sheriff's office post. No one else was hurt in the shooting.
Mart and William Nesbitt fled Swayzee that Thursday night. Sheriff Bradford, assisted by Deputy Sheriff Mort Gaines, Patrolman Bond, and Constable Watson, pursued the brothers through the night and into Friday afternoon, per the sheriff's office recounting. Officers searched both Mart's and William's houses along the way, and at one point Mrs. Nesbitt reportedly threatened to shoot any officer who tried to enter her home.
Caught Waiting for a Blacksmith
The brothers were finally arrested near Alexandria, at a blacksmith shop close to the home of their cousin, John Fuller, roughly five miles southeast of the town, according to the sheriff's office post. They had arrived at Fuller's early Friday morning and were waiting for their horses to be shod when officers caught up with them. Sheriff Bradford and Gaines were joined by the Alexandria chief of police and a patrolman for the final approach, and officers found two revolvers on each brother along with a Colt revolver in their buggy.
Mart Nesbitt, 30, refused to discuss the case with a reporter, and William Nesbitt, 22, likewise declined to speak, per the sheriff's office account. Both men returned to Marion without argument and were brought in without handcuffs, riding the Union Traction Company of Indiana's interurban electric line from Alexandria back to Marion. The Union Traction line, part of a regional network established between 1898 and 1899, gave rural law enforcement a fast way to move suspects across county lines before automobiles were common, according to the Indiana Historical Society. The brothers were jailed in Marion on September 7, 1900.
Both Nesbitts were sons of Cyrus Nesbitt, who lived in Herbst, and both were married men described, when sober, as quiet, peaceful, and well-liked. Mart had three children, and William had married a daughter of farmer Bert Smith. According to the sheriff's office post, William had served in the regular Army during the Spanish-American War, and the brothers reportedly told a reporter they became violent when they drank bad whiskey and had sought revenge against Swayzee residents over some earlier mistreatment. The brothers said they hoped Stillwell would recover.
A Fatal Turn and a Murder Indictment
For a few days, that recovery seemed possible. Dr. Duncan reported that Stillwell rested well on Friday before a fever set in and his condition worsened, and physicians feared blood poisoning given the nature of the wound, Stillwell's age, and the extreme heat, per the sheriff's office account. Dr. Duncan had said Stillwell had few chances to live but might survive without complications.
Those complications arrived. According to The Indianapolis News, Stillwell died on September 12, 1900, six days after the shooting, from blood poisoning stemming from his neck wound. The Grant County Grand Jury convened in Marion almost immediately and indicted Marcus Mart Nesbitt on murder charges, escalating the case from assault to homicide.
Trial, Deadlock, and Bribery Rumors
Mart Nesbitt's murder trial opened in Grant Circuit Court in Marion on January 2, 1901, according to the Indianapolis Press, which noted that both Mart and his brother William faced court proceedings in Grant County stemming from the shooting. The trial dragged on for more than a week before ending in a deadlocked jury on January 11, 1901, amid local reports of alleged jury bribery, according to an Indiana Historical Print Collection chronicle of Grant and Howard county records. It remains unresolved in the historical record exactly what became of the bribery allegations or whether Mart Nesbitt ever faced a second trial.
The violence in Swayzee unfolded against the backdrop of a boomtown moment for Grant County. The county's population had swelled by 73.7 percent during the 1890s, growing from 31,493 residents in 1890 to 54,693 by 1900, driven largely by the east-central Indiana natural gas boom, according to FamilySearch. Swayzee itself, in Sims Township, had a recorded population of just 1,162 in the 1900 census, a small town that had grown after rail line construction two decades earlier before its growth leveled off, per STATS Indiana. That kind of rapid growth in outlying towns, paired with thin local policing, left small-town marshals like Swayzee's largely dependent on county sheriffs and armed posses whenever serious trouble broke out, as the Cincinnati Commercial Tribune's coverage of the episode illustrated.
