Special Deputy Sheriff Allen Dean

Allen Dean

Special Deputy Sheriff Allen Dean was shot and fatally wounded, and Special Deputy Charles Watson was shot and killed in a gun battle with two moonshiners at the Kesselburg Bridge on the Notla River.

A third deputy was seriously wounded. Deputy Dean succumbed to his wounds two days later at a hospital in Polk County, Tennessee.

The suspects, thought to have been shot and seriously wounded, escaped. The men were apprehended in Texas six months later. Both were convicted of second-degree murder. One suspect was sentenced to seven years and the other to six years.

He was survived by his wife, three daughters, and five sons.