This picture of Earl and Marion Weatherly, with kids Hilda and Earl, Jr. was taken in front of the farm owned by "Grandpa Willie" Wood, Manassas, Ga., circa 1925.
THE STORY OF MY GRANDFATHER (left with family) and his untimely death had always been a family mystery. My own father, Earl, Jr., was only ten years old when it happened and apparently heard or made up some story about it being a hunting accident. Since I never questioned that version, it came as quite a shock to me at age 55 to learn from my Aunt Hilda that's not what happened! According to her, Granddaddy was shot taking a gun from a black man and later being killed by him. Her story had him as the hero . . . trying to stop a fight that had started between the black man and another relative.
But this was a puzzle. If Granddaddy Earl was a hero, why wasn't there more about him or his untimely death? What really happened? Nobody seemed to know or want to talk about it. This made me more determined than ever to uncover the real story, and I took it on as an ongoing project through Landmark Education in Atlanta.
But where to begin? The most logical place to start was close to where it happened - somewhere in or around Claxton. A three-day trip to Claxton, Mannassas, Bellville and Reidsville, Georgia in early December, 2007 turned up few facts on the shooting. No one, however, seemed to know what happened to Granddaddy Earl - or even remembered the Weatherlys at all. I found out there wasn't really much of a connection to the southeast Georgia Wood family except with my Grandfather's marriage to Marion Wood, my paternal Grandmother.
My cousin Mary Alice Walker and her husband Bill (left) were kind enough to meet me and give me a tour of the old Wood homestead in Manassas (above, currently owned by Nancy Wood Anderson of Claxton) and several local cemeteries. Mary Alice is daughter of Clara Wood Branch, sister of my Grandma Marion. I learned quite a bit more about the Wood clan and met lots of other cousins and distant relatives. Mary Alice also recalled - as did my Aunt Hilda - that there was some kind of fight or altercation with a black man and drinking was involved.
After my meeting with the Walkers, I researched newpapers, library microfiche and looked for other accounts of the shooting everywhere I could in Claxton and Evans County. My search, however, was in vain. All records between 1932 and 1938 were curiously missing - apparently stolen or destroyed. Even the surrounding counties of Tattnall and Bulloch had no record of a shooting, although there was mention of the Reidsville choral group meeting and other local items.
I did manage to find my Grandfather's death certificate at the Evans County Courthouse. According to the examining doctor, S.T. Ellis, Weatherly was shot around 6 pm on June 23rd, 1932 in Bellville, Georgia. The certificate stated, "Gun shot wound penetrated brain into center of skull... also shot in right side penetrating abdominal cavity."
Bingo. This was no accident.
My granddaddy was killed at point-blank range with two shots. Still . . . I was no further along in figuring out what actually happened. A call to Pharris Johnson, author of a history on Bellville, revealed nothing new. He likewise had never heard of the incident. Discouraged, I finally gave up and headed back to Atlanta on Wednesday, December 5th, hoping to at least get a family reunion together with the wonderful relatives I had already met. If the story was lost forever to history, at least I could feel good about my efforts to find it.
That evening, while I was getting in my car to continue my trek after grabbing a bite to eat in Dublin, Georgia, I received a phone call from a good friend in Savannah Beach. Chuck Powell (right) has many talents - among them loyalty, gentleness, and the ability to sing and play Neil Young's "Cowgirl in the Sand" on the gee-tar and still enjoy it at the same time. He is also an avid history buff. When I previously mentioned my search and gave him some names and dates, I didn't think more about it since I figured it was too big a request.
Anyway, he calls me out of the blue and says he found an article in the Georgia Archives - a June 25, 1932 account by the Savannah Morning News story about the shooting! Apparently the Savannah paper had news bureaus in every Georgia county during that time and kept up with everything that was happening.
I was ecstatic! Chuck warned me before reading it, however, that the story was neither pretty nor politically correct, and to take it in the context of the time it was written. I didn't care.
"Read it!" I pleaded. I knew it was bad news, but also knew my search was about to come full circle.
"O.K." said Chuck, "but you may not like what you hear..." He then read the story while I sat transfixed. I remember where I was when I first heard about the death of JFK and the first moon walk. This was one of those moments. December 6th, 2007, sitting in my Subaru in front of the Dublin Taco Bell. I nursed the last remaining sips out of my drink trying to make the moment last.
There were a few inacurracies in the story (e.g., ages of the children), and a few phrases that were not very clear, but the basic facts were revealing. Click below for a PDF copy of the Savannah News acount.
Please also volunteer your time or expertise!
AS A FOLLOW-UP to the story, I visited more members of the Weatherly family that same evening in
Macon, Georgia! Aunt Hilda's and my father's first cousin Amelia Weatherly Greene of St. Simons and
Macon was being taken to dinner by her son and daughter-in-law, Ernest and Patty Greene of Perry,
Georgia, and invited me to stop in. (L-R, Craig, Amelia, Patty, Ernest)
The next night, December 7, 2007, I was also invited to meet Amelia's other son Bill Greene
and his wife Kathy (below, left). We were to meet at the old Winecoff Hotel
(currently the Ellis) to take part in a memorial to Amelia's father Ernest Benedict ("E.B.") Weatherly and others
who perished on that fateful night in 1946 - described as the worst hotel fire in U.S. history. E.B. was the older brother of my grandfather William Earl, and owned the beef farm in Cochran GA that employed W.E. at the time of his shooting death. E.B.'s grandson Bill (below) is a commerical banker in Atlanta. I was told the other son, Warren, also lives in St. Simons near Amelia.
