(This story was written on the shore of beautiful Lake
Chapala, (Mexico's largest lake), Jalisco, Mexico, in
January, 1989)
I have always heard of the tragic deaths of Uncle B.
Harrison Henson and Hermon Wallace O'Donald. There were
never but sketchy details at best, so I decided to see
what additional information was still lurking in the
minds of some of those living in the area at the time the
murders occured. These killings happened in 1934 in
Whitfield County, Georgia. Hermon O'Donald was a youth of
18 years. It was rumored in the community that he would
drink alcoholic beverages upon occasion (a). It was also
stated that he would drive his car from church to church
on Sunday selling whiskey. He was never arrested for
bootlegging (b).
Hermon's mother, Irene Nance O'Donald, (December 6, 1898
to June 15, 1919), died when he was three years old and
he went to live with his maternal grandmother, Virginia
E. Scott Nance, (September 7, 1858 to April 27, 1938),
wife of W.O. Nance.
The details that I have gathered are often contradictory
so I have keyed them to their source with a lower case
letter in parenthesis. Hermon's tombstone indicates that
he was killed on Wednesday, November 7, 1934. Early in
the afternoon of that day (b) G.M. Miles [F.M. Miles
(f)], Sammy Armstrong and Hermon O'Donald came to the
Henson home and asked Harrison to go duck hunting with
them at the Huckleberry Pond. [Aunt Rowena says that they
were going Fox Squirrel hunting (f)]. They found Harrison
at the barn starting to hitch up his team to plow up his
sweet potatoes (f). Harrison got his shotgun and handed
his wallet to Rowena in the house as he went out the door
(b)(f). G.M. Miles was a resident of the community and
was well known to both Harrison and Hermon.(Aunt Rowena
thinks he was visiting from Murray County, Georgia) Sammy
Armstrong was a relative, visiting the Miles, from
Chattanooga. Armstrong was said to have been hired to cut
wood for Hermon O'Donald. All three of the men were much
younger than Harrison. As Harrison left the house, Aunt
Rowena asked him not to go, because she had a bad feeling
that something would happen (f).
The four men walked west from the Henson home along the
road, toward the pond. Huckleberry Pond was from 1/2 to
one acre in size (b). It was a wet weather pond fed only
by the rains and would dry up in some summers. There were
no fish in the pond, but the boys would go frog gigging
and hunting on it. Today it is mostly overgrown by
vegetation.
Just across the road from the pond, in a curve of the
road, a woods lane ran off to the north. The men took
this lane and walked about 100 yards along it into the
woods. There they sat down upon the trunk of a fallen
tree to talk (f). The lane makes a curve and a moderate
grade upward from the road to the point where they
stopped. From there the path begins a gentle slope
downwards. The forest on either side of the lane has a
gradual rise upward. One sunny day Mr. J. Glaspie
Longwith and I walked to this spot and stood discussing
the tragedy that had happened there almost 55 years
before.
If the men went to hunt ducks, why did they take the
woods lane? Some say they had gone into the forest to cut
wood (a). Some say that all four of the men had been
drinking (d), but preacher W."Will" H. Stewart, in sworn
testamony before a court of law, said that Harrison and
Hermon had NOT been drinking, (more on this later).
At this point Sammy Armstrong grabbed Harrison's shotgun
and hit Hermon on the head. Hermon started to run and
Armstrong shot him through the lungs, from the back.
Harrison started to run and one of them said, "Don't let
the old man get away." Harrison said that he was running,
and Armstrong was following trying to get a bead on him.
He then shot Harrison with the last shell (b), the force
of the shot striking him in the upper back, neck, and
head. Some stories say that Miles shot Uncle Harrison.
Armstrong took the 'windbreaker' off Hermon, and put it
on. He was seen in the community wearing the jacket with
the hole in the back, and the bloodstains around the hole
(a) (f).
Harrison regained consciousness, and fearing that they
might come back to finish the job, crawled into the brush
of a fallen tree top.
Miles told that Hermon was in the woods shot. Preacher
Will Stewart went up and found Hermon. He carried him in
his car to Dr. Stephenson in Ringgold. Dr. Stephenson
called a Kennemer's ambulance from Dalton, Georgia, and
had him taken to the Physicans and Surgeons Hospital,
operated by Dr. Banks (a), on McCallie Avenue in
Chattanooga, Tennessee. Hermon died that afternoon about
6:15.
On the way out of the woods Hermon told Will Stewart that
Harrison was in the woods shot too (b)! It is said that
Miles pointed in the opposite direction when asked where
Harrison had actually run and was shot (b). Miles tried
to put all the blame onto Armstrong. When they were put
in prison they fought so much with each other that they
had to be separated (f). J.D. and Bill Stewart told me
that they went searching for Harrison, along with Bill
Ward and others. Harrison's dog was still with him and
showed them where he was (b).
Gus Ward drove Harrison to Ringgold in a little one
seated car with a rumble seat. Mrs. Ida Carpenter
remembers seeing them pass with Harrison sitting up in
the car (a). Dr. Stephenson examined him and called a
Bryon's ambulance from Chattanooga, and transported him
to Erlanger Hospital. The Stewarts were in close contact
with the victims and would have discovered it if they had
been drinking. Uncle Hix Henson came to the Henson home
and spent several days (weeks) helping the family through
the crisis (f).
Harrison kept having infections after being released from
the hospital. They had not removed all the shot from
around the base of his skull. He continued to be seen by
Dr. Stephenson, and on one trip J.G. Longwith brought him
home from a visit to the doctor's. He says that Harrison
was a fine person (b). One day Harrison laid down for a
nap (c) and could not be awakened. He was rushed back to
Erlanger Hospital where he died on December 16, 1934.
I have often thought that had these shootings occured in
the latter half of the twentieth century with the
antibiotics and medical skills, that Harrison could have
been saved ... prehaps even Hermon.
What was the motive for such wanton waste of life? No one
is certain. Aunt Rowena said it was robbery, pure and
simple. It could have been an argument arising from talk
with two repulsive drunks, or it could have been a feud
with Hermon. It was known that Harrison had sold a bale
of cotton (500 lbs.) the day before. It is also said that
Hermon had sold a bale of cotton the day before, too
(a)(f). Others say that Hermon was not making a crop that
year (b). Some say that Armstrong demanded that Harrison
give him his money, which he didn't have, and that he got
$11 and change from Hermon (f).
The trial was held in Dalton, Georgia in January of 1935
(f). Uncle Harrison was already dead by that time. It is
said that Miles made threats on the lives of other Henson
family members(f). Miles and Armstrong spent many years
in prison. I have heard that Miles died in prison. A
weepy eyed group of ladies worked for the release of
Miles and Georgia Governor Talmadge commuted both
sentences from the electric chair to life in prison. J.D.
Stewart, long time sheriff of Catoosa County, told me in
the 1970's that Armstrong was to be released and that he
better never be caught in Catoosa County. Mr. Kendall
O'Donald of Three Notch Road, near Ringgold, says that
he has the old shotgun that killed Hermon (e). I went to the
O'Donald home and photographed the old single barreled
Stevens shotgun. Mrs. O'Donald has several photographs of
Hermon. One was made when he was about two years old, and
another at about fourteen. He was a handsome young man,
in the later photo.
The memory of the crime is fading fast as the oldtimers
die off. I hope this report will give some information to
those who are unfamilar with the account.
Paul Hughes (Frances Beasley's husband) said he was
picking cotton when he heard the shots fired. Soon
somone came and told of the shooting. He was 17 years of
age at the time. Aunt Rowena said that she also heard the
shots. JWH III