Murder And A 25 Cent Piece Of Scrip(1)

I have been doing some work related to a cemetery in Wayland, Kentucky, where several of my relatives are buried including one of my great-grandmothers, a great uncle, an uncle, and an aunt.  During the course of this effort, I have added obituaries for several of the people buried there to their memorials on Find A Grave.  During that effort, I found not an obituary for one man but rather two sizeable news stories in the archives of the Floyd County Times which are located on the website of the Floyd County Library which maintains a fairly large and very useful local history collection containing newspaper files, historic photographs, a few sound recordings, and assorted other items of interest to both amateur and semi-professional genealogists and researchers.   

The man whose obituary I found contained in those two news stories was named John Franklin "Frank" Collins who died on May 27, 1934, at the age of 40.  Frank, as he was known, died at the hands of a local store owner in Estill, Kentucky, just a few miles from where Frank worked, lived, and has been buried for nearly ninety years. Frank was shot on a Saturday which would have been his day off from his job at the Elkhorn Coal Company mine in Wayland. He died the next day on a Sunday and a warrant was issued for the charge of murder against his assailant on Tuesday due to the fact that it was also Memorial Day on Monday.  Below is the full text of the article from the front page of the Floyd County Times edition of June 1, 1934.  It is interesting that the story about Frank's death is one of three stories about murders in the area that week.  Another story details the news of a shooting in which the victim survived. Admittedly, Frank Collins died almost twenty years before I was born in the area at Lackey in Knott County about a mile from Estill where Frank died.  I spent the first six years of my life on Steele's Creek. About a mile from the store in which I spent those first six years is the mouth of Steele's Creek, the site of the town of Wayland and the Elkhorn Coal Company mine where Frank worked.  I spent the next 14 or so years living in a second store my father had built at Dema, Kentucky, in Knott County about three miles from Wayland.  I have extensive knowledge of the area and its history. 

 Under the headline "Murder Warrant Issued For Craft" with the subhead "Estill Merchant Charged With Fatal Shooting Of Frank Collins Saturday", the news story/obituary about the murder of Frank Collins appeared in the June 1, 1934 edition of The Floyd County Times.  

"A warrant charging John Craft, Estill merchant, with murder was issued here Tuesday, following the death of Frank Collins, 40 years old, from the effects of a revolver bullet fired into his neck Saturday afternoon by Craft.  Craft had already been arrested and brought here Sunday morning when he was booked on a charge of shooting and wounding.  He executed $5,000 bond.  Collins died in the Beaver Valley Hospital, Martin, later Sunday.  Craft's bullet struck him low in the neck, ranged downward, and emerged from his back.  The shooting took place in Craft's store.  According to the merchant, Collins came into the store where he engaged in an altercation with Sol Bradley, who knocked him down.  Craft ordered the men outside, he said.  In the meantime, he stated Collins' small daughter had made a 15 cent purchase at the store offering 25 cents in scrip(1) as payment.  The merchant said he  had no scrip(1) change and soon after Collins and the child returned to the store, the father starting an argument over the change.  When Collins advanced on him with a knife, the merchant said he fired.  The other version of the affair, as told to Tbe Times, says that Craft was drunk and Collins was being taken from the store by his wife and a man when Craft leaped across a counter and fired.  This statement claims that Collins was unarmed.  The victim was a son of Mart Collins.  He is survived by his widow and five children.  Funeral rites were conducted Tuesday under the direction of G. D. Ryan, in the Collins Cemetery, three miles above Wayland.  Ministers officiating at the funeral were M. C. Wright and Earl Howard of the Regular Baptist Church. 

 

The photo above is of the Beaver Valley Hospital in Martin, Kentucky, where Frank Collins was treated before his death. The building no longer exists. It was typical of many small, privately owned, small town hospitals in the coal fields in the first half of the twentieth century.  It had only minimal surgical and little or no intensive care capacities and would not have been capable of providing appropriate care, by today's standards, for a victim of a serious gunshot wound. It was also not common for anyone to be transported to other larger, better equipped hospitals in the 1930's.  The hospital sat at the upper end of the town of Martin at what is now the location of the Nelson-Frazier Funeral Home.  I have actually received minimal outpatient care there as a teenager.  

When we read the newspaper story of the shooting and death of Frank Collins, we are struck by several aspects of the story.  First, Frank Collins was murdered in the sight of his small daughter.  I have little doubt that the child, who is unnamed in the newspaper stories, was traumatized by that event for the rest of her life.  Second, there are clearly two very conflicting stories about the shooting.  The shooter, John Craft, claimed he shot Frank Collins in self defense when he was threatened with a knife.  Mrs. Collins and one other person, the man who was helping her take Frank out of the store, both apparently claimed that Frank was unarmed and suffered the  gunshot as they were taking him out of the store.  Third, Craft claimed that Frank had been knocked down by a man named Sol Bradley during some sort of altercation.  Yet, the news story contains no statement from Sol Bradley.  I cannot say that I ever really knew Sol Bradley but I knew in my childhood who he was and never heard a negative word about him regarding brawling or any other sort of violent behavior.  But it would be interesting to know if there was some sort of family, business, or friendship connection between Sol Bradley and John Craft.  Fourth, and this is the most striking aspect of the entire story, the 25 cent piece of scrip(1) and the 10 cents of change owed seems to have been a key element of whatever happened.  It would be shocking to think that John Craft was willing to kill a man over 10 cents in change owed on a 25 cent piece of scrip(1).  It would be just as shocking to know that he was willing to kill a man over the entire 25 cent piece of scrip(1).  And, of course, there is also the accusation by Frank's widow and the unknown man who was helping her take Frank out of the store that John Craft was drunk.  There is a great deal left unsaid in that news story which we do not know and which would have given us a far better understanding of why John Craft was willing to shoot and kill Frank Collins.

 

In the September 21, 1934, edition of the Floyd County Times, a single sentence is tacked onto the end of a story about another man from the area who had been convicted of an unconnected murder.  That sentence reads: John Craft was on trial Thursday, as The Times went to press, charged with the murder of Frank Collins at Estill.  

There is another news story in the Floyd County Times the following week on September 28, 1934, under the headline "Craft Draws 21 Years In Prison".  The subhead to that story refers to a different murder case and the two stories are discussed in alternating sections of the single story covering both.  The opening paragraph of the story discusses Craft's conviction for the Frank Collins murder.  

"For the second time within a week, a jury in the Floyd Circuit Court gave a 21 year penitentiary sentence to a man accused of murder.  John Craft, accused of the murder of Frank Collins at Estill a few months ago, received the last sentence. 

The next two paragraphs in the story discuss two completely unrelated murder cases before resuming the discussion of the sentence given to John Craft.  

"In the trial of Craft, the Commonwealth gave evidence showing that he had shot Collins after the latter had been knocked down in an altercation with a man named Bradley and after Craft, a merchant, had ordered Collins to leave his store.  This testimony claimed that Collins was offering no resistance and had turned to leave when shot.  The defense sought to show that the merchant fired, thinking that Collins was armed and fearing that he would kill Craft."  

And that is the entirety of the newspaper coverage of the murder of Frank Collins and the trial and sentencing of John Craft for that murder.  Just as the first newspaper story left unaddressed several issues the disclosure and discussion of which would have made the coverage far more enlightening, this story also leaves several unanswered questions about the case.  First, who testified in the trial?  Were the only witnesses John Craft and the Widow Collins, who is not named by first name in either story?  Did Sol Bradley or the man who was helping Mrs. Collins take her husband out of the store testify?  Did the prosecutor and judge force Frank's small daughter to testify?  Did the police officer(s) who arrested John Craft and interrogated him testify?  Second, was medical evidence presented to the court by the doctor in charge at Beaver Valley Hospital which could have proven where Frank Collins was standing in relation to John Craft when he was shot?  Third, who was John Craft's attorney?  Fourth, was the issue of a 25 cent piece of scrip(1) and 10 cents in change owed ever raised in court?  Could that issue, if it was raised, have increased the jury's willingness to set a lengthy sentence in the case?  

Since I first became aware of the murder of Frank Collins and began writing this blog post, I have not had time to drive to Prestonsburg, Kentucky, the county seat of Floyd County and search for the Circuit Court records at the Circuit Court Clerk's office.  I will do that in the near future and, if those records exist, I will obtain copies of them and add the information they contain to this blog post.  I also have easy access to whatever employment records are still extant for the Elkhorn Coal Company which are now in the possession of the Wayland Historical Society and I will also search those records to see what pertinent information they might contain about Frank Collins. It is also possible that John Craft might have worked for that company for some time before owning his store just as my own father did before owning his.  I will also search for John Craft's employment records.  This is a very interesting small town Eastern Kentucky murder case from the heart of the Great Depression and the involvement of a 25 cent piece of scrip(1) in the events makes it even more intriguing.  Did John Craft murder Frank Collins just because of a 25 cent piece of scrip(1) or the 10 cents in change which he did not have in scrip(1)?  Was either amount of coinage worth the price of a poor coal miner's life? 

 

 

(1) I just cannot pass up one very necessary opportunity to act as a member of the Grammar Police.  The word "scrip" does not have a "t" at the end.  It is spelled "SCRIP" not "SCRIPT".  Scrip is a form of corporate currency which is rarely used in the world today but was common in the early 20th century in America especially with large coal mining and timber companies.  A "Script" is a written communication such as a "Script" for a play, movie, speech, or oral presentation.  "Script" can also be used to describe a general form of type face either on a computer, typewriter, or printing press.  

Buying (and sometimes reading) The Books No One Should Ever Read!

Coal Mine Fatalities In Elkhorn Coal Company Letcher County Mines

 

Elkhorn Coal Company Accident Report Book 1942-1955

While working on a large, somewhat related research project in the Elkhorn Coal Company records at the Wayland Historical Society, Wayland, Kentucky, I located and became tangentially interested in the “Elkhorn Coal Company Accident Report Book 1942-1955.  The book is a handwritten, folio sized, expandable record book with removable stiff paper pages some of which are written on both sides and some on the front only.  For my research purposes, I was primarily interested in the fatalities only.  The book contains thirteen fatal accidents which occurred between January 7, 1943, and January 20, 1956.  These fatalities are recorded in red ink as compared to the other non-fatal accidents which are all in black ink.  The names of the victims of these accidents are Frank Adams; Bill Tilley; Charlie Russell; Stacy White; Amos G. Bryant; Charlie Johnson; Lafayette Johnson; C. D. Hampton; William Breeding, Jr.; Arvil Breeding; Riley Little; Print Bullion; and George Washington.  All were single fatality accidents. 

When I attempted to cross reference these fatalities with the list of thirty-five names of miners on the “Dedication” page of the “Twentieth Anniversary…of Local Union 5895 United Mine Workers Of America 1933-1953”, none of the names in the “…Accident Report Book...” matched any of the names in the “…Anniversary…” book.  I considered the possibility that these miners could have not been members of the UMWA at the time of their deaths and it seemed highly unlikely that all of them could have been killed before being initiated as union members.  My second attempt to locate the correct answer to the discrepancy involved searching in the individual employee records in the files of the Historical Society.  None of these victims matched any of the names of the printed list of Elk Horn employees in the historical society records for the Wayland operation. 

My next attempt to reconcile the discrepancy involved checking the online issues of the Floyd County Times in the “History” collection of the Floyd County Public Library which are available at: http://history.fclib.org/floyd-county-times   After having searched for each of the thirteen fatalities in at least two weeks’ editions of the newspaper, I still found none of the thirteen men listed in news stories relative to their accidental deaths.  Throughout its long history under the ownership/editorship of Norman Allen, the Floyd County Times was always highly diligent about covering all deaths in the county.  At this point, I knew that it was definitely unlikely that the men listed as victims of fatalities in the “…Accident Report Book…” had actually been working at Wayland at the time of their deaths. 

My next attempt to locate these men involved searching each name in the memorials section of the incredibly useful and accurate Find A Grave website which I often use and contribute to on a regular basis.  That feature of their website can be found at: https://www.findagrave.com/memorial  and is highly useful to veteran genealogists and the person who is simply searching for an occasional lost friend or relative.  When I searched for the victims using the filters of full name as recorded in the “…Accident Report Book…”, correct year of death, and Kentucky as the location, I immediately found Frank Adams buried in the Holbrook Cemetery at Mayking in Letcher County. His obituary is located on page 2 of the Mountain Eagle newspaper of January 14, 1943. 

The following information is taken verbatim from the obituary of Frank Adams in the Mountain Eagle Newspaper of January 14, 1943, found online at the Kentucky Digital Library.

“Frank Adams was born October 10, 1883, in Owsley County Kentucky, and departed this life January 7, 1943, at the age of 59 years, 2 months, and 28 days.  On January 1, 1905, he was married to Nannie Burton, to them were born 10 children, 2 of them having passed away in leaving 8 today, who along with his wife and 12 grandchildren still survive him.  The children are Mrs. E. R. Holbrook, James Adams, Charley Adams, Mrs. Enoch A. Holbrook, Mrs. Elmer Amburgey, Mrs. Clarence King, Opal Adams, and Stella Adams.  Frank Adams came to this section in 1919 and has lived all that time at Sergent.  He was faithful employee of the coal company here while it was operating, and since that time has worked elsewhere.  He was a trusted and tried worker and was dependable in every respect.  He made friends with all whom he met; he was a kind hearted and friendly like fellow never saying anything of anyone else and always taking care of his own business.    He had many friends and was highly respected.  He was a devoted husband and father and always ready to help anyone in need and to go to the relief of his neighbors and friends.  As spoken of one of old, it was said of him, "He was a good man", and that speaks of his life.  In his untimely passing, Sergent has lost one of his good citizens, his wife a devoted and true husband, and his children and grandchildren a respected and loving father, and the Company for which he worked a faithful and trusted employee, and the Miners Union one among their best men.  He will be missed much but let us hope in all our loss that it has been his eternal gain.  Funeral services were held at the late home Sunday with Elders J. C. Prince, Dewey Sexton, and G. Bennett Adams and burial in the Holbrook Cemetery.  Burial in charge of Craft Funeral Home.” 

 

 When I searched for Bill Tilley and Stacy White using those same filters, I immediately found them buried in the Thornton Cemetery at Thornton in Letcher County. Amos G. Bryant is buried in the Englewood Cemetery at Christopher in Perry County.  Charlie Johnson is buried in the Halo Cemetery at Halo in Floyd County. Lafayette Johnson is buried in the Hemphill Cemetery at Hemphill in Letcher County.  William Breeding is buried in the Wright-Collier Cemetery in Letcher County which does not have a listed post office location on Find A Grave.  Arvil Breeding is buried at the Henry Meade Cemetery which also does not have a listed post office location in Letcher County.  Print Bullion is buried at the Whitaker Cemetery at Whitaker in Letcher County. I was able to locate all the listed fatalities except for Charlie Russell, George Washington, Riley Little, and C. D. Hampton in cemeteries in Letcher County, Floyd County, or Perry County.  After about the third correctly located victim, I realized that the “…Accident Report Book…” does not list employees of and accidents at Elkhorn Coal Company in Wayland.  Elkhorn Coal Company operated mines at several locations in Letcher County including Blackey, Cromona, Fleming, Jackhorn, Jenkins, Kona, Mater, Seco, Sergent, Thornton, and Whitesburg.  Basic information about all those companies can be located at:  

http://www.coaleducation.org/coalhistory/coaltowns/coalcamps/letcher_county.htm

Since I have no idea how many friends, relatives, former co-workers, or researchers might be seeking information about these men, I spent the time to send suggested edits to the person who maintains each of their memorials on Find A Grave and hopefully they will add that information to the memorials.  None of these memorials had a written obituary and none contained more than basic information.  I sent those messages in the hope this additional information would assist some unknown persons in the future to complete their personal searches of one or more of these memorials. Within twelve hours, I received a grateful and informative e-mail from a woman named Ellen Beam who is not just the manager and creator of the memorial for Charlie Johnson but also his great-niece.  Her message told me that her grandfather …”William Johnson had a picture of his brother's accident, hanging on the front room wall. It was a drawing showing how Charlie got caught by the machine and drug…my grandpa said he was there when it happened.” I know absolutely that all of these men were employees of some Elkhorn owned entity in Letcher County.  It also seems logical that all of them were probably working for a single Elkhorn entity in Letcher County.  I had thought at first that it could be likely that the full newspaper stories of their deaths can be located in the online archives of  “The Mountain Eagle” which are available at this link:  http://kdl.kyvl.org/?f%5Bformat%5D%5B%5D=newspapers&f%5Bsource_s%5D%5B%5D=Mountain+eagle+%28Whitesburg%2C+Ky.%29

But due to the fact that those archives for the Mountain Eagle are not entered in chronological order and it can take considerable time to locate a particular week’s paper.  Since I began this research, I came into contact with a resident of Letcher County, Richard M. Smith, who owns and actively uses the eight volume record of Letcher County cemeteries.  He assisted me both to verify some information I already had and was able to find some I did not have.   I hope that what I have done so far will benefit others.  Good Luck in that effort!

Roger D. Hicks, M. Ed.

The Big Sandy River Influence On American Culture

 

The Big Sandy River Influence on American Culture

The Big Sandy River has had an amazing amount of influence on American Culture over the last 100 years with a number of musicians, educators, writers, folklorists, and politicians coming out of the region which is in great contrast with the total population of the area drained by the river.  Formed by the Tug River and the Levisa Fork along the Kentucky, West Virginia border it drains Boyd, Lawrence, Johnson, Floyd, Pike, and part of Knott counties in Kentucky and Wayne, Mingo, and McDowell counties in West Virginia.  The region in both states contains only about 300,000 people and the population has been in flux at various times as outmigration has often taken place in conjunction with ebbs in the coal business which has been the primary economic driver in the region.

Yet, this region has produced an astounding number of important figures in American history including many of the country’s most popular musicians, a significant number of educators with national reputations, and several significant politicians.  The list from Boyd County includes The Judds including the actress and social activist Ashley Judd, Billy Ray Cyrus, and the Goins Brothers who were not natives but spent most of their lives in the region.

 Lawrence County has produced Ricky Skaggs and the multi-media artist Nyoka Baker Chapman who is also an official of the Huntington League of Women Voters.  The great Appalachian educator and writer Cratis Williams for whom the graduate school at Appalachian State University is named was also from Lawrence County. The former Chief Justice of the United States Fred Vinson was born in the Lawrence County Jail while his father was jailer there.  He also was a major economic officer in the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt during the recovery from the Great Depression prior to his appointment to the court.  Former Kentucky Governor Paul Patton was also born in Lawrence County and was county judge executive in Pike County. He also served a term as lieutenant governor and was a major driver of the expansion of the University of Pikeville as both president and board member.

Johnson County has produced, and continues to produce an astounding number of important musicians including the Webb sisters, Loretta Lynn, Peggy Sue, and Crystal Gayle; Hylo Brown; Chris Stapleton;  and the minor Bluegrass band Five Miles From Nowhere.  Few Americans realize that the actor Richard Thomas of The Waltons is the son of a New York ballet dancer who grew up in Johnson County and Thomas often spent his summers with his grandparents in Paintsville.  The country singer Tyler Childers was born in Lawrence County and grew up in Johnson County.  Brett Ratliff, an old time musician and singer, also grew up in Johnson County. John Pelphrey who is a well known basketball coach and a member of the University of Kentucky team referred to as The Unforgetables also grew up in Paintsville, Kentucky, and has since been a head coach at the University of Arkansas, South Alabama University, and Tennessee Tech University where he still coaches today.  

Floyd County produced one of the greatest collectors and publishers of folk songs and folk tales, Leonard Roberts, who produced a half dozen books of his collected songs and stories from Appalachia and was a professor at Pikeville College until his death before it achieved university status.  Dwight Yoakam was born near his grandparents’ home in Betsy Layne in Floyd County and often refers to his Eastern Kentucky history despite having spent most of his childhood in Ohio.  Floyd County also produced the founder of the band Goose Creek Symphony, Charlie Gearheart.  The famous Bluegrass singer Tommy Webb is also a native and resident of Floyd County. McDowell in Floyd County produced the significant Appalachian painter and art professor Tim Sizemore who taught for many years at Prestonsburg Community College. The well known artist Russell May lived his entire life Floyd County.  In Wheelwright, Kentucky, Carol Stumbo and her English students produced the significant literary journal “Mantrip” for ten years along with the assistance of Albert Stewart, a highly admired poet and editor from Knott County. Floyd County also produced the man who is generally conceded to have been the best high school basketball player of all time, Kelly Coleman.   

Pike County is famous for having produced Patty Loveless but lesser known for having been the home of the early country singer Molly O’Day. The former Kentucky Poet Laureate Lillie D. Chaffin was also born in Pike County, spent most of her life there, and was a professor at Pikeville College.  The country musician, song writer, and night club owner Marlo Tackett grew up in Floyd County and ran a well known night club in Pike County for many years.

Although Knott County is not fully drained by the Big Sandy River, a significant portion of it is and the Floyd County Times in Prestonsburg was, for many years, the primary newspaper serving Knott County.  Due to the small size of Hindman, the county seat of Knott County, most people on the northern side of the county did their business for many years in Floyd County and students from that area were also bussed to Floyd County schools for many years due to the lack of paved roads in the county.  Knott County has produced Albert Stewart, the poet who founded “Appalachian Heritage” magazine and taught for many years at Alice Lloyd College.  Knott County also produced Verna Mae Slone who became a best selling author in her late 60’s. The most important writer of Wiccan books, Jessie Wicker Bell, was raised at Mousie in Knott County and produced her literature under the Wiccan name Lady Sheba.  Her ashes were scattered in the Wicker Family Cemetery at Mousie.  The county was also home for many years to James Still and Mae Stone, both connected to the Hindman Settlement School, both widely read authors, neither of whom grew up in the area.  Similarly, William Howard Cohen, a poet and professor at Alice Lloyd College came to the area and produced significant works while there. Cohen was also chosen as a Cultural Delegate to the 1968 Mexico City Olympics where he read his poetry and later produced a book of poems about the experience. 

I have not studied the important cultural figures from the West Virginia side of the Big Sandy River drainage as extensively as I have the Kentucky side but the Appalachian author Lee Maynard grew up in Crum, West Virginia in Wayne County and wrote extensively about the region.  In fact, his “Crum Trilogy” refers several times to the border conflicts which sometimes occurred between adolescent natives of the two states across the watery boundary.  Fannie Belle Fleming, known more widely as the burlesque star Blaze Star, was born in Wayne County. 

McDowell County West Virginia produced two very important Appalachian authors, Denise Giardina and Homer Hickam. Giardina is a liberal political activist in her spare time and made an unsuccessful run for governor. Hickam spent his career at NASA as a scientist after he and a group of other high school students won a national science competition.   

It is truly exceptional that such a small geographic area in what is sometimes disparaged as a struggling region could have produced so many influential and successful individuals.  There are also a large number of these people who grew up just outside the environs of the Big Sandy but were significantly influenced by the culture of the area.  Those include Keith Whitley, Don Rigsby, and his brother John Rigsby all of whom have been important musicians who grew up in Elliott County.  Don Rigsby also was Director of the Center for Traditional Music at Morehead State University for a time.  Tom T. Hall, one of the greatest song writers in the country as well as an important novelist and short story author, grew up in Carter County and worked for a time as disc jockey in Prestonsburg, Kentucky, on the Big Sandy.  Magoffin County also produced the Bluegrass singer and attorney Charlie Sizemore who played with Ralph Stanley for several years before quitting to go to college at Prestonsburg Community College and on to law school.  Magoffin County also produced Tom Whitaker who was a significant Appalachian artist and art professor at Prestonsburg Community College.  Magoffin County also produced the minor country singer Rebecca Lynn Howard and two Lexington, Kentucky, television weather forecasters, Chris Bailey and Jim Caldwell. The country singer Gary Stewart grew up in Letcher County and often played in Pike County in his early career.  All of these people, while not directly growing up in the Big Sandy River area, grew up within a few miles of the river and were influenced by the culture of the river basin.