A white man was arrested.

by Lisa Y. Henderson

MURDER. – A free colored man named Jordan Petteford, residing in the suburbs of this town, was shot on Wednesday last, in the public street of that part of the town, and in broad day. He died on the following Friday.

A white man named Powell was arrested on suspicion.

A Coroner’s Jury has been in session since the death of Petteford, earnestly engaged in the praiseworthy effort to elicit some testimony to identify the murdered. So far, we learn, they have not been successful.

Fayetteville Weekly Observer, 4 August 1856.

In the 1850 census of Fayetteville, Cumberland County, Jordan Pettiford, 43, laborer; wife Ailey, 36; and children Wm. H., 16, Jas. W., 13, Amos, 8, Cordelia, 7, Charles, 4, Mary J., 1, and Sarah Daniels, 1.