Administrative Information

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Preferred Citation

S. Floyd Landreth Papers, 1904, 1911-1965. Accession 50463. Personal papers collection, The Library of Virginia, Richmond, Virginia.

Acquisition Information

Gift of Bernice Franke, Salem, Virginia, 19 June 2012.

Biographical Information

S. Floyd (Sidney Floyd) Landreth was born on 27 March 1885, the son of Reverend James J. Landreth and Missouri Phillippi Landreth of Carroll County, Virginia. On 14 March 1912, serving as deputy to Carroll County Circuit Court Clerk Dexter Goad, Landreth was present in the Hillside courtroom for an infamous shootout that left five people dead and several others injured. He was appointed a special prosecutor for the murder trials that followed. Landreth was elected to the Virginia State Senate in 1944, serving a number of terms. His long career also included a stint as chairman of the Republican State Central Committee and over 40 years as president of the First National Bank of Galax. With wife Lola Lintecum Landreth, he had one daughter, Kathryn Landreth Franke. S. Floyd Landreth died on 2 October 1977 in Galax.

Scope and Content

Papers, 1904, 1911-1965, of S. Floyd Landreth (1885-1977) of Carroll County and Galax, Virginia, focus chiefly on his involvement in the aftermath of the 14 March 1912 shootout at the Carroll County courthouse in Hillsville, Virginia. Included are a handful of copies of court documents pertaining to the events that led to Floyd Allen 's March 1912 appearance before the court; Circuit Court Clerk Dexter Goad 's telegram to Governor William Hodges Mann alerting him to the tragedy, along with Mann's response; Landreth's appointment as Commonwealth's Attorney in place of the murdered William M. Foster; the indictments for each of the five murder counts; an undated note from E. D. Wornell alerting Landreth to another man's statement indicating premeditation by the Allens; Landreth's 27 November 1912 letter to Governor Mann advising him not to commute the death sentence of Claude Allen, his 14 January 1913 response to Mann's questions about specifics of the case, and his 1 March 1913 letter urging Mann to go forward with the executions of Floyd and Claude Allen; Mann's 20 October 1913 letter to Landreth asking if there were any truth to reports that a monument had been erected to Claude Allen declaring him "judiciously murdered by the order of the Governor of Virginia"; various accounts showing expenses incurred in the prosecution of the Allen and Edwards men and correspondence regarding the passage of an Act of Assembly to pay Landreth and others working on the cases; extensive correspondence and accounts, 1914-1922, regarding a chancery suit filed to subject land belonging to Sidna Allen to the payment of judgments against him; Governor E. Lee Trinkle 's 6 October 1922 letter to Landreth and others notifying them of conditional pardons granted to Friel Allen and Sidna Edwards ; and letters, 1965, regarding plans of WDBJ Television (Roanoke) to produce a program on the tragedy. Also included are photographs showing the Allen and Edwards men and sites associated with them, a re-enactment of the shooting, and group portraits of surviving witnesses, as well as a collage of portraits of the three representatives of the court killed in the shootout.