Written in Blood: The History of Fort Worth's Fallen Lawmen, Volume 2, 1910-1928

Chapter 5: Constable Robert Emmett Morison (November 8, 1916)

148 ROBERT EMMETT MORISON was the first Tarrant County constable to die in the line of duty, a victim of old-fashioned “lead poisoning,” as they used to call it. But demon rum was just as much to blame. The Constable’s death was an example of what happens when strong personalities mix with strong drink and guns. Morison, who went by his middle name, was a career lawman who wore several badges during a long career but never strayed far from home. He was first elected town marshal of Mansfield in 1881, nine years before the town was incorporated. Under state law, unincorporated towns could not have a marshal, so his title was unofficial; he really functioned more as a “regulator” than a regular marshal.2 On November 5, 1912, he was elected constable of Tarrant County Precinct No. 8 (Mansfield) and was re-elected in 1914.3 This rough sketch, handed down through the family, is the only known representation of Emmett Morison. Date and artist unknown. (Courtesy ofTerry Baker) 5 Constable Robert Emmett Morison1 (NOVEMBER 8, 1916) “Died a martyr to his duty” Constable Robert Emmett Morison (November 8, 1916) 149 Mansfield in the early twentieth century was still a small, rural community, located twenty miles from Fort Worth in the southeast part of the county. The business district stretched along a single main street, much as Fort Worth had some forty years earlier. Law enforcement duties were shared by the town marshal (no police force), a constable, and the county sheriff, whose authority was seldom felt. By 1916, the town had outgrown that awkward arrangement , and semi-organized crime was threatening to overwhelm the local representatives of law and order. Robert Emmett Morison was born in Virginia on June 15, 1855. When he was five years old, his father, J. W. S. Morison, pulled up stakes and moved the family to Texas. Emmett was far too young to fight in the Civil War, but growing up in the South he suffered from the effects of Reconstruction. After the Civil War, his father resettled the family in the southern part of Tarrant County, near the hamlet of Mansfield. Emmett’s parents provided a strong moral upbringing for their son, and he remained a temperate, honorable man all his life. He was not lacking in grit either. Emmett was respected enough in the community that at the age of twenty -six and with no law enforcement experience, the community elected him town marshal. At the time, he was about five feet ten inches tall, slightly built, with sandy-colored hair. Though not an imposing physical specimen, he seems to have been a model lawman . Many years later, family history would describe him proudly as having “an even temperament,” being “firm, fair and impartial in his conduct and treatment of others.” The number of times his constituents re-elected him over the next thirty-plus years seems to confirm this view. Family history also records that he was quite fond of children, his own and others.4 He grew up on a farm, typical of that time and place, and as soon as he was old enough bought his own homestead. Despite his agrarian roots, he was not content to be merely a lawman-farmer; he had an entrepreneurial streak. At the age of thirty-one, he went into the merchandising business and made a go of that, too, 150 Written in Blood although he wisely hung onto the farm since a man would never be entirely destitute so long as he had a piece of land to call his own. In 1888, he married a Mansfield girl, Florence Moody, who was ten years his junior. Her father, R. E. Moody, was a prominent local preacher who gave his blessing to the union. Emmett and Florence had two children, John, born in 1889, and Thomas, born four years later, and the future looked bright for the young man.5 Mansfield may have been small and insular, but there was plenty of work to keep a lawman busy, and Emmett Morison never walked away from trouble. As town marshal, he was relentless in bringing in criminals even when he had to do it all alone. In 1899, he singlehandedly chased down J. D. “Duke” Murphree after Murphree shot both the town postmaster and the postmaster’s son in cold blood. Morison was not content just to lock his...