Do not go gentle into that good night, Part 2 - Stories from the Family Tree

In Part 1 of this series, I touched on a number of ancestors who died in some military conflict. Sometimes, the victims were non-combatants. Take, for example, the fate of Gerard Munson, Barb's great-great grandfather.

Late in the evening of March 22, 1864, Gerard was riding on his horse in the woodland pasture of the family plantation, when he was shot in the head and killed. His body was not found until the next morning, and his horse was found tied to a tree about one-half mile from his body, which had been very carefully arranged. Camp Wharton, [Texas] a Confederate Army camp, was located about four miles from Oakland Plantation and soldiers from that camp regularly shot and stole hogs from the plantation. Apparently, Gerard came upon just such activity.

Colonel J. Bates, commander of  the Confederate forces in that area, immediately began an investigation of the murder, and affidavits taken accused a soldier named Joseph Pankey (who had suspiciously deserted camp) of being the man who fired the fatal shot.

Colonel Bates sent Gerard's brother George, a Private in the Confederate army (home on leave at the time), and an unnamed Lieutenant in pursuit of Mr Pankey. Evidently they were successful. Sarah Munson, wife of Mordello, brother to George and Gerard, wrote in her diary on 18 October 1864, "George is here. He came over yesterday with those men who killed Pankey."

Sometimes the perpetrator is not found however, and the death remains a mystery:

Thomas Starnes, grandfather of my grandmother Anderson, went to the barn to see about the livestock one night. The next morning, he was found hanging from a tree limb. Grandmother said, "He was to testify in court the next day against a man. Others have different opinions, but I never heard them."

Or there is the family story about John Abraham Wade - a very distant relative. He was murdered in 1925 and his killer never apprehended. Many years later, his son-in-law, Wayne Cartwright, received an anonymous phone call from the killer, expressing regret. Cartwright never told his wife, Wade's daughter, about the phone call, revealing that information to the family only after her death.

There are no Hatfields and no McCoys in either of our families, but I do have the Smiths and the Durdens. In 1870, Scion Smith married into the Boyd family, most likely in South Carolina. After some time, Nancy and Scion moved a few miles east into Georgia, where Scion became involved in a feud with some members of the Durden family. A Durden was killed and that family placed the blame squarely on Mr. Smith. Threatened by the Durdins, Smith kept at least one of his children with him all of the time. However, one day when the child had gone to the house, a shot was heard and Smith was found dead in his field. A breastwork of brush had been built in a fence corner, and the murderer hid there.

It wasn't too long after that before another of the Durden's met an untimely death. Wylie, the oldest son of Scion and Nancy, was accused and the threats were so severe that the Smith family moved back to Laurens County in South Carolina until things quietened down. Wylie married there and settled down, but it wasn't too long before a detective came to Laurens County.

The family narrative is that the officer concealed his identity by pretending to be deaf and dumb, and wandered around over the community working up the case. Just how he did that and maintain this cover is up for conjecture, but he left and in about two weeks officers came to Wylie's house and arrested him. He was carried back to Georgia to stand trial, a lengthy process, but was finally exonerated and lost no time leaving Georgia - and the Durdens - behind..

And then of course, there was the relative who died in a shoot-out with the police - Charles Arthur "Pretty Boy" Floyd. I told his story in "Skeleton in the closet."

In the next and final part of this series, I want to share an inquest held in June of 1838 by the Justice of the Quorum of Laurens District South Carolina - Mr. Thomas Wright - regarding the body of Larkin Bramblett,  "late of the said District, then and there lying dead."