The motive for the shooting was believed to have been a lingering grudge dating back to their partnership. Falkner had just been elected to serve in the Mississippi legislature. He died the next day. Literary works Falkner was also an author, writing novels, poems, a travelogue, and at least one play. His most famous work was a novel entitled The White Rose of Memphis (New York, G. W. Carleton & co.; 1881), a murder mystery set on board a steamboat of the same name. This work was popular enough to be reprinted several times through the early 20th century, selling over 160,000 copies. Partial source: Mississippi Writers and Musicians {{} The Life and Confession of A. J. MacCannon, Murderer of the Adcock Family (1845) The Lost Diamond (1867) Influence WC Falkner's oldest child John Wesley Thompson Falkner was the father of Murry Cuthbert Falkner. Murry's oldest child was Nobel laureate author William Faulkner. As a child, William (who later changed his surname to Faulkner) reportedly said, "I want to be a writer like my great-granddaddy." The elder Falkner served as the model for the character of Colonel John Sartoris, who appeared in the novels Sartoris (1929; reissued in an expanded edition as Flags in the Dust, 1973) and The Unvanquished (1938), as well as a number of short stories. Thus, Colonel Falkner is the inspiration for an integral part of the history of Faulkner's fictional Yoknapatawpha County. Faulkner's short story "Knight's Gambit" (in the 1949 collection Knight's Gambit) has been viewed as including a commentary on Falkner's The White Rose of Memphis (1881). Bibliography References External links 1820s births 1889 deaths People from Knox County, Tennessee 19th-century American railroad executives American military personnel of the Mexican–American War 19th-century American novelists American travel writers Assassinated American politicians Deaths by firearm in Mississippi Confederate States Army officers Businesspeople from Mississippi Members of the Mississippi Legislature People from Ste. Genevieve, Missouri People from Pontotoc, Mississippi People murdered in Mississippi Male murder victims People of Mississippi in the American Civil War William Faulkner 19th-century American poets American male novelists American male poets People from Ripley, Mississippi American male non-fiction writers Writers from Missouri Writers from Mississippi 19th-century American politicians