Phenix City story: Author reopens old wounds in Patterson case
Reviewed by Glen Browder
11-09-2003
WHEN GOOD MEN DO NOTHING: The Assassination of Albert Patterson
By Alan Grady: The University of Alabama Press, 2003, 312 pp., $29.95
A controversial new book has summoned the troubled ghosts of Alabama’s most notorious murder case, a half century later, to explore anew some painful, time-twisted questions about the assassination of attorney general nominee Albert Patterson in 1954.
All known, principal characters involved in that killing are dead and gone; and the case was officially settled long, long ago. But, according to author Alan Grady, there’s still no rest-in-peace for Patterson or his accused killers.
In fact, author Grady asserts, “the Albert Patterson murder investigation remains incomplete in that, one way or another, justice was denied. The Russell County Grand Jury indicted three men for Patterson’s murder, and depending on one’s point of view, either two of them escaped punishment or one was punished unjustly.”
Nonsense, retorts John Patterson (son of Albert) who, after the assassination, went on to become Alabama’s attorney general, then governor, then state criminal court judge, and is now retired to his farm in Tallapoosa County. “We got the right people!”
For the record, I must acknowledge personal friendships with John Patterson (a fellow ex-politician) and Alan Grady (my former student at Jacksonville State University), whom I consider gentlemen of integrity. But it is my duty as reviewer to report that my two friends diverge significantly in their perspectives on this case; in fact, the ensuing controversy is as interesting as the book itself.
Grady, a government contractor and local historian, has written a provocative but documented book with typical journalistic irreverence for legendary history — disturbing long-departed souls and digging up old bones among previously available sources, new interviews with survivors, and investigative records secured for decades in state archives.
Grady’s tale begins like a Dragnetepisode of that era, with dead-pan observation that “Shortly before 9:00 on the night of June 18, 1954, Albert Patterson left his law office in Phenix City’s Coulter Building and headed home.” But it quickly turns into a dramatized mystery akin to A&E’s Cold Case Files, City Confidential,and American Justice.He closes with cryptic comment that “Albert Patterson’s murder changed Phenix City forever … But underneath, largely unnoticed from above, the Chattahoochee River — deep, dark, and murky, like Albert Patterson’s murder — flows as it always has.”
As is the custom with writers reopening long-ago cases, Grady tries to address “who” killed Albert Patterson and “why” as if there’s something that the public record hasn’t revealed — yet. In detailed fashion, he presents a far-ranging statement of possible culprits, motives, and what-ifs that figured into Deputy Sheriff Albert Fuller’s murder conviction, Circuit Solicitor Arch Farrell’s acquittal, and State Attorney General Silas Garrett’s avoidance of prosecution through sanity shenanigans.
The book thus suggests less “whodunit” and “whydunit” certainty than is reflected in conventional accounts. Grady dutifully writes that Fuller was convicted, but he cites subsequent speculation regarding trial evidence; he even remarked to me recently that if he had been on the jury, he probably would have voted to acquit Fuller (ditto Farrell and Garrett).
Patterson, conversely declares without doubt that Fuller killed his father that Friday night in a panicked plan to prevent the elder Patterson’s planned grand jury testimony, the following Monday in Birmingham, about voter fraud involving Fuller and his pals. As he vehemently told me a few days ago, “Fuller was guilty, was convicted, and went to jail; unfortunately, we couldn’t nail Ferrell; and Garrett got out of the state.”
While agreeing that there is “yet an untold story” about his father’s murder and Phenix City of that time, Patterson challenged the original manuscript and secured substantive changes; and University of Alabama Press now refers to the book as a “controversial” rather than “historical” account.
So, at this point, author Grady adamantly pursues a case of perhaps uncertain justice; and John Patterson dismisses both the premise and tenor as reflective of mob gossip, spread both before and since, to discredit the murder investigation.
This book is not going to alter the official version of that chapter of Alabama history. But I imagine it has caused quite a stir among the summoned spirits of Albert Patterson, Albert Fuller, Arch Ferrell, and Silas Garrett; and its provocative assertions, while discomforting for survivors of that drama, inevitably will trigger further debate among inquisitive types who like to revisit political assassinations. If only I can get my friends John and Alan to share dinner with me some evening, maybe we can resolve the untold story or at least mitigate a few lingering points of mortal dispute (and help those troubled ghosts rest in peace).
Former Congressman Glen Browder is Eminent Scholar in American Democracy at Jacksonville State University.