Federal Prohibition Agent Atha "Nick" Carter

Atha "Nick" Carter

Federal Prohibition Agent Carter died from a gunshot received while trying to apprehend two still operators in Palisade, Nevada.

Agent Carter and another officer had been driven to Palisade to take into custody two still operators on a ranch shortly before midnight on Tuesday, December 19th, 1922. The officers ordered the moonshiners to put up their hands and one of the criminals fired in their direction, felling Agent Carter. The man who drove the officers to the scene saw Agent Carter fall and thinking both officers would be killed, fled. The officers returned fire and the criminals escaped, though one of their horses was killed.

Agent Carter was without medical aid for over eight hours as the officer walked four miles to the cabin of the driver, which was empty and then ten miles into Palisade. Agent Carter's face and hands were frostbitten from the long wait in the snow. He succumbed to his injuries shortly after 2:00 a.m. on December 24th, 1922.

The two suspects were apprehended near the scene, but not until they destroyed the still, throwing pieces in the river. Pigs had been driven over the spot where the shooting occurred in order to obliterate the tracks; all shells had been picked up; and the carcass of the dead horse cut upon so that pigs might devour it.

Agent Carter had served as a deputy sheriff in Washoe County in Reno, Nevada from 1918-1921 and served 11 months as a prohibition agent.