This Month's
Newsletter Article
SOURCE:
Carrollton Patriot: Aug 1, 1907
RUSSELL'S EARLY RECOLLECTIONS
COMPILED FROM THE MANUSCRIPT OF THE LATE
S. G. RUSSELL,
BY HIS DAUGHTER, MRS.
LAIR.
Thursday, Nov. 29,
1855, was Thanksgiving Day. I went hunting with Jim
Pursley. At night I
went to the
house of Rev. Rankin to a social party, thence I went to
several other places of
amusement until
it was very late at night, or rather, very late in the
morning. Then I came to
my private room
over my law office, which was the ante-room of the
Masonic lodge where I
had a bed and my
private books; my office was immediately below.
J. M. Pursley,
whose wife had gone on a visit to Tennessee, had moved a
bed into my office,
& together with
his boy, about 6, slept there.
It was so late when
I came back that I did not think it worth while to
undress and go to
bed, but threw
myself on the outside of the bed and was soon asleep.
It was a very
bright moonlight night, as light as day almost. I
suppose it must have been
about 5 o'clock
when I was awakened by a shrill scream as of a woman,
and thought, it's
Lark Massey and
his wife in a general melee, as usual", for Lark had
been on a protracted
spree, and the
evening before had terrorized the whole town.
I soon heard
someone running rapidly along the pavement; and soon
someone smashed in
the door of my
office below, and a general skirmish immediately took
place between Jim
Pursley and
Massey. Jim was very much excited and tried to drive
Massey out of the room.
Then I heard Jim
run out at the back door into a little enclosure fenced
with a plank,
about 8 feet high.
As Jim went out, he
held the door fast behind him, and Lark, after striking
the door several
times with his
knife, ran to the window and went through it, bursting
out a sash, glass and
all. By this
time, Jim in his nightdress, had climbed up on the board
fence, and as I looked
out, Lark was
cutting at him with his big, ugly knife, but could not
quite reach him.
Jim hallooed to
me-"Spence, hand me down your gun quick!" I then opened
the window
and told him,”
My gun is not loaded!" "Load it quick Then!" he said,
"and hand it down
to me, for Lark
Massey has gone as crazy as a mad man, and I'm afraid
he'll kill me or my
boy."
I then ran down to
the foot of the stairs for my gun, when Lark dashed back
into the office
and Jim after
him. In the rush they knocked down the stove, making a
terrible racket.
I thought that it
would not do to wait to load my gun, that probably Jim
was killed. So I ran
out the back way
and around to the front door, and as I came up, Lark was
just in the act of
going in the
front door, having been shoved out, I suppose, by Jim. I
caught hold of Lark, but
as he was a
powerful man, I could do nothing with him. As he entered
the door I still had
hold of him,
when Jim shot him! Lark and I both fell together on the
floor, the flash of the
gun burning by
face, and I felt the hot blood on my hands. I heard Jim
cock the other barrel
of his gun, when
I cried out to him, "Don't shoot any more for God's
sake, for I believe you
have hit both of
us!"
As Massey fell he
exclaimed, " Jim, I'm killed! You've gone and killed me,
Jim!"
I then called 2
men, who had been attracted to us by the report of the
gun, to come and help
me. One was
Henry Day, watchman at the mill, and the other was J. H.
Davis, an apprentice
to Virginius
Williams. These boys carried Massey home, bleeding all
the way terribly, the
blood pattering
like rain on the sidewalk, and leaving a trail that
lasted for months.
I sent one of the
boys for a doctor, but no doctor would come; ""It's old
Lark Massey and I
hope he'll die",
was the only answer. Lark was shot in the knee cap at a
range of only a few
feet, cutting a
hole in his leg as large as the palm of my hand. I saw
that he would bleed to
death in a few
minutes if something was not soon done for him. So I
took a big silk handker-
chief that I had
and tied it around his leg above the wound and then put
a stick through and
twisted it with
all my might till the blood stopped, and then fastened
it in its place.
I then began to
examine him and soon found a fearful gash cut over his
right eye. Jim Davis,
the town bully,
was holding a candle while I was making the examination.
When he saw
Lark's eye
looking out of the frightful gash, he dropped the candle
and fainted outright. He
soon came to
himself and again took the candle, but as soon as he saw
Larkin's eye he
fainted again. I
laughed at him for he was a regular bully, and I had
fined him several times
for raising
disturbances in town. He said to me, "Now don't; you
ever tell that I fainted over
anything. If you
do, I’ll make it hot for you!"
It seemed that
Massey had come home in a drunken frenzy and tried to
shoot his wife. She
had taken the
precaution of taking the lock off his gun and hiding it.
When he found it out,
he grabbed a
butcher knife and made at her; she ran screaming to
"Ginny" Williams' shop
where Ed
Furgeson, her son by a former husband, slept. He,
hearing the scream, came
meeting her and
Lark with a piece of wagon spoke timber, and struck Lark
over the eye,
cutting the
horrid gash above described.
This blow aided in
some degree to set Lark crazy to kill someone, and as he
disliked Jim
Pursley very
much, he had selected him to commence on. On going back
to the office, I
found several
holes cut through the quilts where Massey had cut at him
and I also picked
up a big ugly
knife out of the pool of blood on the floor.
Dr’s. Davis,
Armstrong, and Hardtner came when appealed to again, and
took up the
arteries as well
as they could. Hardtner sewed up the ghastly wound over
his eye. They
all said his leg
would have to be amputated, and that owing to his long
debauch, he would
not live over
the operation.
They then held a
consultation and decided to let the case rest for a
time. I then old Lark
that the doctors
had said that his leg would have to be cut off or he
would die in a short
time. "Oh, God!
I’d be no-account in the world with only one leg. I'd
rather die and be
done with it."
I told him it that
was determination, if he had anything to say about the
safe blowing he'd
better say it
now. He repeated several times " 'Put' Vedder shall
have his money back again
for he has
helped me when no one else would. I know who blew the
safe open and who
got most all of
he money, and if you will go and get Davy Pierson to
help me get religion,
I'll tell you
and 'Put' all about it"
Vedder went after
Pierson who came, and between the Lark got religion.
During all this time
Turner had been
very anxious about the state of Massey's health and made
many and
frequent
inquiries, but Vedder and I were very careful that he
should not see Lark alone for
a moment; yet he
watched the house day and night for an opportunity. We,
as carefully
watched on our
side that he should not see him alone.
We took turns in
holding guard over him, but finally, I being tired out
with almost constant
watching, went
to my room and went to sleep, leaving Vedder strictly on
guard, for it had
become rumored
around that Lark had promised to make a clean breast of
it before he died.
Now, while I was
away, Vedder, who was county clerk, ran over to the
courthouse for some-
thing, which was
only about 200 yards away. But alas! While he was gone,
Turner, ever on
the watch,
popped in at the back door, and in spite of all that
Massey's wife could do, made
his way to
Massey's bedside and told him that Vedder and Russell
were trying to make him
believe that he
was going to die in order to get him to tell something
about the safe blowing.
He told him not
to believe a word that they said; that he would be all
right in time; that
there was no
danger of his dying.
Before Vedder got
back, only 10 minutes gone, Turner was off and away.
Vedder then sent
for me, and when
I came back, Massey was as silent as the sphinx; not a
word would he say.
I examined his
pulse which was becoming very weak, and saw that a great
change had taken
place in him in
the last 2 hours. In fact, I saw that he was dying and
said to him, "Larkin, if
you have
anything to say about the safe, say it quick for you are
dying!" "I believe it myself",
said Massey.
"Turner just told me."
Transcribed by
Leigh Gallimore
Thanks
Eileen 
