A hero to remember
The Logan County law enforcement community has a new fallen hero to celebrate but, fortunately, the cause to remember this man does not come at the expense of opening a new wound.
George W. Rockwell was laid to rest in Jefferson Township’s Zanesfiield Cemetery.
Instead, the annals of Logan County history have revealed a 140-year-old story of a Civil War veteran and part-time sheriff ’s deputy whose service to his community and circumstances of his death may warrant inclusion on the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial in Washington, D.C.
On the morning of May 1, 1878, George Washington Rockwell made the ultimate sacrifice for his community and family after having been shot in the back by an individual described in the newspapers of the time as a “madman” and “menace” to eastern Logan County.
George Rockwell, a veteran of the Civil War and a former night policeman, had been deputized by Logan County Sheriff John McCracken and was working on a part-time basis to help serve process from local court cases, which comprised a significant portion of a sheriff ’s work in those days.
Although he was not full-time, Rockwell was considered a special deputy in the employ of the sheriff, according to various reports that include the Bellefontaine Republican newspaper and Robert Patterson Kennedy’s Historical Review of Logan County, 1903.
Read complete story in Saturday’s Examiner.
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