Information Sheet

 

 

R         Orr, William J., 1856-1940.

857                  Papers, 1899-1940.

                                    One folder.

 

 

 

These papers deal mostly with the conviction, appeal, and later death of J. F. Kennedy, a train-robber.  William J. Orr was an attorney for the Kansas City, Fort Scott and Memphis and later the St. Louis-San Francisco railways, who prosecuted Kennedy in 1899.  Also included is an obituary for Orr from the Springfield (Mo.) News Leader.

 

William J. Orr was born in Pike County, Missouri, on 2 February 1856.  In 1890 he became an attorney for the Kansas City, Fort Scott and Memphis Railroad, and continued in that capacity when it became part of the St. Louis-San Francisco (“Frisco”) Railway system.  He retired in 1926 and died in Springfield, Missouri, on 21 December 1940.

 

The centerpiece of this collection is a scrapbook kept by Orr when he assisted the state in prosecuting J. F. “Jack” Kennedy, and others, for the robbery of a K.C., Ft. S. & M. train at Macomb in Wright County, Missouri, on 3 January 1899.  The robbers forced a safe belonging to the Southern Express Company, but were soon caught, tried, and convicted.  The scrapbook in­cludes candid snapshots of the defendants during their trial at the Wright County Courthouse in Hartville, as well as portraits of Orr and Wright County prosecutor Col. F. M. Mansfield.

 

Kennedy appealed his conviction in a case that was argued before the Supreme Court of Missouri.  Orr and Missouri Attorney-General Edward C. Crow and Assistant Attorney-General Sam B. Jeffries successfully represented the State in that case.  The arguments are presented in two duplicate 37-page booklets.  Included at the back of one of the booklets is the Court’s deci­sion, stating that “no error demanding reversal has occurred,” as printed in 55 Southwestern Re­porter 293.

 

After serving his term in prison, Kennedy was later shot and killed while attempting to rob a Frisco train near Wittenberg in Perry County, Missouri, on 3 November 1922.  On 7 December 1922 Special Agent Ed Monroe, knowing of Orr’s previous experience with Kennedy, sent him photographs of the fully-clothed corpses of Kennedy and his accomplice, Lawrence Russler Logs­den.  This letter and the photographs are included in the collection.

 

The final item in the collection is an obituary for Orr that was published in the Springfield (Mo.) News Leader on 22 December 1940, the day after his death at his home at 830 E. Walnut Street in Springfield.

 

 

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