In the small mining town of Crudup, Alabama, on the morning of February 14, 1911, Special Deputy Sheriff Ernest Birt, a 34-year-old White male, was making his rounds. As he walked past the hotel and commissary, a figure stepped out from a barber shop, raised a pistol, and fired a single shot. The bullet struck Birt in the back of the head, and he fell to the ground. The assailant fled the scene.
Deputy Birt was quickly taken to the office of a local physician, Dr.
Camp, who determined the wound was fatal. Sheriff Lister and Deputy Farrar were notified and began an investigation. Despite the doctor's efforts, Deputy Birt was pronounced dead at 1:10 p.m. The shooting sent a wave of shock and excitement through the normally quiet mining community.
Shortly after the shooting, another deputy stationed in Crudup, Deputy Painter, encountered a 23-year-old miner who confessed to the crime and surrendered. The suspect was a resident of a boardinghouse owned by Deputy Birt's mother. It was revealed that the two men had a long-standing and bitter dispute concerning Birt's younger half-sister, with whom the suspect had become involved. The conflict had escalated to the point where Birt had ordered the young man to leave Crudup on the very morning of the shooting. The suspect refused and instead lay in wait for the deputy.
Following his arrest, the suspect stood trial for the murder in the Etowah County Circuit Court. He was convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to 15 years in prison. However, in June of 1912, the Alabama Supreme Court granted him a new trial. Deputy Birt, survived by his wife and several children, was buried at Bethany Cemetery near Reese Station on the day after his death.
