Old South, Champagne for Jacob and Flaubert

Bp 7-8-09

Old South, Champagne for Jacob and Flaubert

Researching a legend Part 4

Griffin Slave Sale and Magnolias.

Griffin, Georgia Doc Holliday’s birthplace is right smack in the middle of the Old South. And while the city has grown and taken on a more modern look, some of the buildings from the 1800’s are still standing beside the modern, and from time to time you might get a touch of nostalgia when you smell the magnolias.
Among the buildings built in the 1800’s is the Byington Hotel, located at Broadway and Hill; another is a two-story brick building willed to Doc Holliday by his mother and located on the south side of Solomon Street.
When talking to Griffin residents I found that not everyone gave Doc Holliday favorite son status. One of my early encounters came at the Griffin Historical Society when I was asked, ‘Why write a book about a common gunslinger?’
I said, ‘I think there’s more to Doc than the cardboard cutouts most of us are familiar with.’ I didn’t change the local historian’s mind, but neither did his comment deter me from my fact-finding mission.
Of course there are many on the other side of the argument that believe Doc got a bad wrap by historians regarding his life in the east and in the west.
But I wasn’t there to argue the point one way or the other; I was simply there to look at life in Griffin during the 1800’s and the Holliday family heritage.
Doc Holliday’s father Henry B. Holliday was the first clerk of the court when Spalding County was formed so I figured that was a good place to start my research. Old court records are always a good source of information. But that idea was immediately shot down when I heard that the original courthouse had burned. Fortune was with me though as I later learned that not all the records had been lost. In fact quite a few had survived the blaze and were currently stored at the court annex.
I went to the annex and asked about the old courthouse records that were saved from the fire.
A middle aged gray-headed gentleman wearing spectacles gestured and said, “Down the hall, first door on the left.”
‘May I take a look at them?’
‘Sure, but they’re in a mess and piled up in the middle of the room.’
‘Have any other researchers gone through the stack?’
‘No, you’re the first.’
I walked to the door, looked inside and agreed that the place was a mess. There was a large stack of oversized, official looking, record books piled in the middle of the room. From the top of the stack I picked up a large book marked A, sat down on a chair and began to thumb through the pages. There was a bold notice at the top of page 3, announcing the Estate sale of William L. McKey and dated the 6th day of January 1857. I knew from earlier reading that was the father of Doc’s mother, Alice Holliday.
The fifth transaction down on page 3 was the purchase of a slave man named Leuis by Henry B. Holliday for the price of $110.00. And two lines farther down Henry B. Holliday bought another slave indicated as Susan and child for the price of $460.00
An isolated notice farther down the page states: Late on Tuesday January 6, 1857 one house and lot in Griffin sold to H.B. Holliday for $800.00.
In another book marked Voucher Book A on page 265 it stated that the William McKey Estate Executor was Aaron Woodward.
The voucher book contained many pages indicating payments made by the estate executor for a variety of items from a pair of shoes to school tuition along with a set of violin strings for daughter Margaret McKey.
(To be continued)

‘The Goring Collection’
Prologue Part 4

Jacob took the train down the day before the wedding and arrived in time to attend the rehearsal and have dinner with the Bromfield family. At the end of the evening he escorted his sister to her bedroom, kissed her goodnight and just before he turned to leave said, “Is the family aware of my political persuasion?”
“Only that you are a professor and speaker and that your politics tilt to the left.” Then Natalie laughed. “And I suppose they will stay that way until I can talk some sense into you.”
Jacob grinned. “You never give up, do you, Sis.” Then he walked outside and down the path toward the guesthouse. The smell of night blooming jasmine mixed with thoughts about the day’s activity and Natalie’s joyous laughter somehow gave him a sense of freedom and a feeling of exuberance that he had never experienced before.

The formal ceremony went off without a hitch and Natalie looked beautiful in her white silk and lace-wedding outfit. Jacob found time at the reception to congratulate the bride and groom. Then he meandered around and studied the guests that had gathered for the occasion. The diversity of the group was puzzling to him. A wide spectrum of politics was represented, extending from the radical left to the extreme right. He spotted one of the Hollywood ten, across the room, talking to a conservative congressman that had voted that group in contempt of congress and sent them off to jail. Jacob shook his head and mused, “Only in America.”
Someone gripped his arm and guided him toward the terrace. "Jacob, dear boy. I need a word with you."
"Tony Rockwell! What a pleasant surprise." Then Jacob stood back and said, "You're looking good."
"Looks can be deceiving, dear boy, but I had to get you alone and thank you --"
"Don't even say it. There's no need," Jacob said ruefully. "I know how you feel and extolling the subject won't change the matter one whit. It was all a bad scene. The Congressional Hearings, the Black List and all the rancor that went with it."
"I suppose you're right, Jacob. But please allow me at least one observation. Of the people I've associated with on the Hollywood left, you Jacob are the only one I know that has character and integrity. Which leads me to wonder if you are truly as far left politically as you profess to be."
"I suppose I should accept that as a compliment, although I'm not sure it's deserved," Jacob said as he put his hand on Tony's shoulder and smiled. "Now, we can continue this conversation some other time, my friend, but today is a celebration, so lets go inside and have some champagne."
(To be continued)

Writers Notebook:

Think the pace of your writing is going too slow?
Read a few lines from the letter Gustave Flaubert wrote to Louise Colet during the time he was working on Madame Bovary.
Saturday night, February 1, 1852.
‘Bad week. Work didn’t go; I had reached a point where I didn’t know what to say. It was all shadings and refinements; I was completely in the dark: It is very difficult to clarify by means of words what is still obscure in your thoughts. I made outlines, spoiled a lot of paper, floundered and fumbled. Now I shall perhaps find my way again. Oh what a rascally thing style is. … In my other books I was slovenly; in this one I am trying to be impeccable, and to follow a geometrically straight line. No lyricism, no comments, the authors personality absent. It will make sad reading; there will be atrociously wretched and sordid things. … I am doing no more than five or six pages a week.’
I suspect that as a group we turn out a lot more copy today than Flaubert did in 1852.
But is it better?

Tom Barnes -- Actor, Writer and Hurricane Hunter.
Check out my website for books, blogs, western legends, a literary icon, reviews and interviews. Also my novels The Goring Collection and Doc Holliday’s Road to Tombstone along with a non fiction remembrance of The Hurricane Hunters and Lost in the Bermuda Triangle.
www.tombarnes39.com
www.RocktheTower.com
www.TomsHurricanes.com