Roscoe Flanary, a male police officer serving the town of Coeburn, Virginia, stepped into a tense autumn evening when politics had drawn a crowd and tempers were already running hot. A speaker identified in contemporary reporting as “Mr. Dobson” had stopped between trains to deliver an address ahead of an upcoming election, and townspeople packed in close to listen—some to cheer, others to heckle, and a few to settle old grievances under the cover of noise and excitement.
In the middle of the speech, C. A. Edwards—described as a lawyer and a well-known figure in Coeburn and Wise County—reportedly made remarks that disrupted the meeting. John Litz moved toward him and told him to hush. What might have ended as a brief scuffle instead snapped into violence: Edwards drew a pistol and, aiming for Litz, fired. The shot missed its intended target and struck Officer Flanary in the chest, turning a political gathering into a sudden emergency as the crowd realized the town’s policeman had been hit.
Flanary’s wound was serious. Accounts agree that he did not die immediately; he lingered as his condition worsened over the following days. Surviving summaries differ on the exact date he succumbed—one report placing his death on the Wednesday after the Saturday shooting, and another recording an end-of-watch date of November 1, 1906—but they align on the grim arc: a single bullet meant for someone else became fatal to the officer who was there to keep the peace.
Edwards was taken into custody at the scene, with later descriptions noting that the Wise County sheriff was nearby when the shot was fired and made the arrest. In the immediate aftermath, Edwards secured legal help from W. H. Werth, an attorney who happened to be present, and bail was obtained in the amount of $1,000. The available public summaries do not clearly document what followed in court—whether the case ended in a plea, dismissal, conviction, or some other resolution—leaving the historical record most vivid at the moment of the shot itself, when a personal grudge flared in a public place and Roscoe Flanary became the one who paid for it with his life.
