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Buford Thaddeus Bagger
Buford T. Bagger (July 27, 1831-September 4, 1873) was a carpenter and inventor who also served as a Confederate medic during the American Civil War. A lifelong pacifist, Bagger dedicated the last years of his life to the creation of the Bagger Box - a device he believed would replace dueling among gentlemen as a means to settle their differences.

During the Civil War, Bagger's training as a carpenter was put to good use, as most of his work consisted of sawing the limbs off of young men. His aversion to violence was only reinforced once Buford returned home to Kentucky after the war.

The few surviving Southern Gentlemen with whom Bagger would often imbibe spirits seemed determined to duel themselves into extinction over increasingly trivial matters. Being a Southern Gentleman himself, Buford never questioned the code of honor that precipitated these duels, but deeply mourned the fact that regardless of outcome, he often stood to lose a drinking partner.

In 1872, after seeing yet another one of his contemporaries shot dead during a duel, Bagger locked himself in one of his brother’s warehouses, declaring that he would not emerge until he had devised, “a bloodless manner for the modern gentleman to suitably defend his honor.”

The Bagger Box
In 1873 Buford emerged from the warehouse, called his family together and unveiled to them the Bagger Box – a device he believed would mean the end of duels to the death among gentlemen and possibly even wars between nations.

While the details of what follows are hazy, all accounts agree that after a heated exchange, Everett Bagger declared that he would, “shoot the rascal dead,” if his brother attempted to patent his invention the next morning.

True to his word, Everett Percival Bagger murdered his own brother on the steps of the county patent office on the morning of September 4, 1873. Everett was hung six days later.

While both brothers left behind large families, no Bagger descendant has ever laid claim to the device that was designed to prevent the very type of violence that led to its inventor’s death. The invention itself and its plans have never been found.