Reddit reviews The Martial Ethic in Early Modern Germany: Civic Duty and the Right of Arms (Early Modern History: Society and Culture)
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The example you are thinking of might be from the records of the interrogation of Samuel Probst, who killed a journeyman printer in a fencing match in 1595 in Augsburg, Germany. After city officials establishing that he and the deceased had no ill will, and after the fencing school masters petitioned on his behalf, he was released with no punishment.
You can find the account in several places, but the best place is in Ann Tlusty's Augsburg During the Reformation Era. It is also mentioned and contextualized in Tlusty's more famous (and expensive) work, The Martial Ethic in Early Modern Germany.
https://www.amazon.com/Augsburg-During-Reformation-Era-Anthology/dp/160384841X
https://www.amazon.com/Martial-Ethic-Early-Modern-Germany/dp/1349366471
Farmers and tradesmen could, and did, afford swords and in fact formed actual fencing guilds where they practiced:
http://medieval.ucdavis.edu/120D/Money.html
https://www.amazon.com/Martial-Ethic-Early-Modern-Germany/dp/1349366471