Hayes Bentley 1921 - 1944

Walker Hayes Bentley was born January 21, 1921. His parents were Morgan Bentley and Isabel Fleming. He has a double Bentley line. Morgan's parents were Solomon Bentley and Mary Jane Bentley. Solomon's line goes back to John Queller Bentley who was our Benjamin Bentley's brother. John Queller and Benjamin were sons of Daniel Bentley. Mary Jane's line goes back thru to the Benjamin Bentley who was a brother to Daniel.

Isabel Fleming was the grandchild of Frederick Fleming and Nancy Ann Wright. Hayes is related to me through mom and through Dad.

Hayes was not married according to his Army enlistment records. However he did say he was single with dependents. I believe his children were Eleanor and Kenneth R. Bentley and that their mother was Octavia Stewart. Hayes enlisted in the army on July 2, 1942. Eleanor was born December 26, 1942. Kenneth was born June 9, 1944. Hayes died on September 8, 1944.

Hayes is buried in the Houston Cemetery at Goose Creek behind where R. B. & Siller Houston Meade and Denton Houston's homes used to be.

The Colliers

The blog is acting up. It is doubling pictures and adding lots of spaces between paragraphs. I am going to once more remove them, but I cannot guarantee that they won't be there when I push the publish button.

This is a nutshell view of the Colliers as I have them.

The oldest Collier I have is Isaac who was born about 1718 and married Mary Gaines who was born in 1720. They had a son named Michael who was born about 1738 and married an Elizabeth. Michael and Elizabeth had a son on January 8, 1764 named Daniel.

Daniel married Elizabeth Prather born December 9, 1769. She was the daughter of James Prather. They had a son Richard on May 9, 1789. He married Matthew Caudill and Sarah Webb's daughter, Mary Caudill.

Richard and Mary married on August 30, 1832. They had a daughter, Elizabeth, in 1833.

In the 1850 census for Letcher county they are listed as:

Collier, Richard, 53

Mary 49

Stephen 16

William 15

Samuel 12

Sally 11.

Stephen married Elizabeth "Betsy Ann" Roark. They had these children: Richard (married Mary Bell Cook), James, Martha and Jamie.

William Dee "Willie" Collier married twice. First, he married Rebecca Meade, daughter of Thomas Kronis Meade and Mary "Polly" Hall. In the 1860 census he and Rebecca are living with his parents Richard and Mary:

Colier, Richard, 68, farm laborer

Mary 58

William 25, farm laborer

Rebecca 22 (William's wife Rebecca Meade)

Mary 5, grandchild

Robert 3, grandchild

Willis 1, grandchild

Meade, Catherine 24 (Rebecca Meade's sister)

Christener 4 (Catherine's child)

Martha 1 (Catherine's child)

Mary the 5 year old is Mary Matilda "Polly" Collier who was born April 30, 1855. She married Andrew "Little Andy" Wright who was killed in a shootout when he and other Wright relatives and William Pardue went to arrest Elijah Wright. After Little Andy's death she married Alexander Wright and then Wilburn Reedy.

The grandchild Robert who was 3 was born May 15,1858. He married Martha Yonts.

The grandchild Willis who was 1 was born April 22, 1859 as Willis Kirk Collier. He first married on September 18, 1885 to Mary Ellen Adams daughter of William Green Adams and Mary "Polly" Webb. She died in April of 1889. On May 5, 1890 Willis took Elizabeth "Lizzie" Vanover daughter of William and Elizabeth Vanover as his second wife.

Willis had three children with Mary: Wilburn "Wibby", Sadie and James Harrison. Sadie was Otho Bentley's first wife.

Willis had ten children with Elizabeth: Arnettie "Nettie", Mazie Frances, Milton M., Florence, Ireland Drew, Carrie, Ira F., Howard M., William and Delphia Jane.

I can't find Richard and Mary in the 1870 census yet. William Dee and Rebecca are there under a spelling of Colier.

Going on with Richard and Mary's children Samuel P. Collier married Martha Roark, probably a sister to Stephen's wife Elizabeth Roark. I haven't done any work on the Roarks to confirm this. Samuel and Martha had 8 children: William Wesley "Bill", Lizzie, Mary, Peter, Richard, James, Martha and Enoch Irvin.

Richard and Mary's youngest child, Sarah "Sally" married Robert C. Meade. They had 8 children: Mary "Polly", Nancy, Siletha, Riley, Rebecca, Samuel, Arminda and Martha.

The reason I wanted to try to sketch out the Colliers is because so many of them are in the Houston Cemetery at Goose Creek.

W. D. Collier

I don't know if this is William Dee Collier. It says W. D. Collier. It was clear at the graveyard. I can't make it out clearly on film. I should have chalked it so it would have read clearly.

Willis Kirk Collier 1859 - 1943

It says Rev. W. K. Collier July 23, 1859 May 8 1943. At the bottom that says "In Memory of Howard Collier." His son, Howard, did not die until 1971, so it is probable that this marker was not placed until after that time.

Florence Collier Hall 1898 - 1922

Florence was the daughter of Willis Kirk Collier and Elizabeth "Lizzie" Vanover, She was the half-sister of Sadie Collier Bentley. She was born on July 22, 1898 in Letcher County. She married John Henry Hall on February 21, 1916. They had two children: Rhoda and Ford. John Henry died on March 17, 1924. In the 1930 census the two children are living with their grandparents: Rhoda with Willis Kirk & Lizzie Vanover Collier and Ford with is widowed grandmother, Nancy Elizabeth Anderson Hall. Jim Hall had died in 1929.

Carrie Collier 1903 - 1920

Carrie was the daughter of Willis Kirk Collier and Elizabeth "Lizzie" Vanover. She was a half-sister to Sadie Collier Bentley. I could not find a death certificate for Carrie.

Sarah Collier Yonts 1886 - 1967

Robert Collier was Willis Kirk Collier's older brother. He married Martha Yonts, daughter of Solomon & Frances Whitaker Yonts. This is the grave of Robert and Martha's daughter, Sarah. Sarah was born August 6, 1886 at Neon. She married John Quiller Yonts, the son of Solomon "Sollie" Yonts and Virginia "Jennie" Quillen. They had five children: Luther, Quilva, Marcus, Martha and Gladys. John died in 1950 and was buried at Goose Creek. If Sarah lies beside him, he is in a grave marked only with a rock and the head and foot.

Arthur Denton Collier 1909-1909

I can't figure this one out. I have no birth or death record for him. I don't know who he belongs to.


Robert Collier 1899 - 1926

Again I can't figure this one out.

Rinda Mae Houston & Jonathan A. "Twig" Collier

Rinda Mae Houston was born on October 15, 1879. When she was 19 she married Jonathan A. "Twig" Collier who was 24. Twig was the son of Stephen Collier and Mary Meade. H was the grandson of Richard Collier and Mary Caudill. Richard was the son of Daniel Collier and Elizabeth Prather. Richard was also the brother of William Dee Collier who was the father of Willis Kirk Collier who was the father of Sadie Collier who married Otho Bentley.
.

Mary Caudill was the daughter of Matthew Caudill and Sarah Webb who are my fourth great grandparents. Mary's sister, Susannah Caudill married Joseph Hampton. Their daughter Nancy married Enoch Mahlon Hall. Their son Joe married Lettie Craft. Their daughtre Nancy married Otho Bentley.

Rinda was my great grand aunt through the Houstons and Twig was my 2nd cousin three times removed through Granny.

In the 1900 Letcher County Census Twig and Rindy had been married for two years and had one son, William H, who was 1 year old.

Ten years later the family had grown. Now married 12 years Rindy reported she had had six children and all six were living: William H. 11, Ballard 9, Delpha E. 7, Marcellus 5, Stepher E. 3 and Thomas Luther 1year and 2 months. Twig was farming out a living for his family.

Visiting the Houston Cemetery at Goose Creek I found the following

If you look at this picture closely it says she was born on October 15, 1879 and died on June 8, 1915.


I always try to look for official records. I found a death certificate for a Renda M. Collier who died in 1917. She was in Pike County. At first I only found it in the Kentucky Death Index. It only gives the certificate number, volume and year that it was filed. Then I went to looking for it so I could let it go out of my mind. It said in the index for the ancestry that this was for an "Unnamed Collier". Someone sent in a correction to ancestry so there is a second note that it is for an "Unnamed Huston". I had to look at this one. I thought maybe the name of the person who died had been left off. The cause of death was blank, but the name was Renda M. Collier as supplied by J. A. Collier and listed her parents as Nathanual Huston and a Fleming. It is not marked as delayed. It shows her home at that time was Myra, Pike County, Kentucky.

Cousin Alma said she had the dates of death written down for Nathaniel and Betsy. Now I hope that list includes Rinda Mae, too. I have it on my list of things to talk to her about when we talke again. I also am interested in what her cause of death was.

Next to Rindy in the cemetery is her husband, Twig.

Their son, Thomas Luther Collier, who was born February 23, 1908 died on March 18, 1941.

Betsy & Thaney's Children

Thaney and Betsy Houston had nine children that I know of: Mary, Preston, Joseph, Hannah, Annie, Lavina, Rinda Mae, Aulden "Olvin and James Denton. They married into many of my related families:

Mary , the oldest was born in 1867. She never married though she had several children with a Bentley and a Potter.

Preston was born in 1869 and died before 1880.

Joseph was born about 1870 and died on May 20, 1976 of dropsy.

Hannah was born on December 29, 1971. She died September 29, 1960. She married three times: Alexander Wright and William Milton "Milt" Meade. She had a child by Israel Jesse Adams.

Annie married only once to Joshua Mullins.

Lavina "Vina" married Rhodes Meade.

Rinda Mae married Jonathan A. "Twig" Collier.

Aulden G. "Olvin" married Susannah Wright. He also had a daughter with Mary Collier.

Oliver Denton married twice: Eliza Jane Wright and Mattie Wright.

I want to concentrate on the Colliers because of the graves I found at Goose Creek.

Piney Mae Venters 1899 1918

PINEY MAE VENTERS 1899 - 1918

Jesse Wright was married four time, 1st to Elizabeth Moore, 2nd to Mary Brummitt, 3rd to Maggie Perdue and last to Nickotie Vanover. After he and Mary divorced, she married at least two more times. Her second marriage was to John Venters, the son of James & Emeline Slone Venters. John had been married before, too. Mary raised and her step children stayed with her throughout her other marriages. John and Mary had one child of their own: Piney Mae Venters. She was born April 14, 1899. She had a child Gurna Charles Venters on February 26, 1918. She died on March 3, 1918. I found Gurna Charles in census records with a Potter family in West Virginia. He did end up living in Neon. He married a Hazel Hall. He died on June 23, 1946 of a heart blockage. His birth certificate listed his name as Gernia C. Wright parents Martin Wright and Piney Mae Venters. His death certificate lists Piney Mae as his mother and Martin Wright as his father. The informant was Roy Venters who was one of John Venter's children who stayed with Mary Brummit. Gurna Charles is buried in Neon.

Thaney, Betsy and Annie

Nathaniel "Thaney" and Elizabeth "Betsy" Fleming Houston

I got started in genealogy listening to my grandmother tell about her family history. I loved sitting at the fire listening to her talk to my mother about things that had happened in the past. When I started to actually write things down I wanted to do things right and I asked for help in organizing what I thought was going to be a lot of information just because my mother was one of 21 children. I was told that I should only do one line -- the Mullins or at best the Bentleys because that was my mother's line that genealogy was about the men. So that set me on a quest to find all the women in the family. It is the women who bring the other lines into play.

Some lines I thought were hopeless back those many years ago. Like knowing my great grandmother's name was Betsy, but having no clue as to her maiden name. The same went for Maggie Perdue -- another great grandmother. For 45 years I did not know who she was. I took trips, I interviewed people, bought books, joined historical societies, spent hundreds of hours in the library and tried every way that I knew to collect information on my family.

The internet could have saved me a lot of time. There is so much good information out there. And so much incorrect information there. My greatest tool has been access to the actual census records. Over the years I had spent hundreds of dollars on transcripts of various counties and areas -- many of which contained a lot of errors and omissions.

By accessing the Kentucky Birth index and the Kentucky Death records I have found many things. One, is that my mother was one of 22 children. I had queried all births in Letcher county where the mother was named Sadie Collier. I also queried by Sadie Bentley. I was comparing what those records said versus what I had from family Bibles, interviews and other research. Up popped little Mae Bentley. I went to others in the family and no one said they had heard of her. Later, I found her actual death certificate where the informant for the document was Otho Bentley, who was also listed as her father.

I grew up thinking that baby Mary died with Sadie in childbirth. I now know that Sadie's labor was started when she was kicked by a cow when she went out to milk one day. Mary was born. Sadie died several days later. Mary did not die until several months later. When I questioned that one Uncle Joe knew and tried to locate her grave at Chunk Craft's cemetery. She was buried near the gate. We walked it all over and with the gate gone he could pinpoint the spot for sure, but he, too, verified that Mary died after her mother.

I figure if we thought all those years that Mary died in childbirth with her mother and she was one of 21, that surely Mae who has a birth certificate and a death certificate should certainly be added in for a total of 22.

As I looked for more about grandmother Annie I saw that Grandpa Joshua married again after her death. He married a woman mostly known as Susan Venters. Venters was her married name. Working through the records she was actually Susan Wright, the sister of Jesse Wright and Bad John Wright. Joshua and Susan were listed in a household by themselves in 1910. Annie's children were listed with her parents Betsy and Thaney Houston.

I wondered if this meant that there was a rift between the Houstons and Joshua over Joshua's choice for a new wife. I wondered if Joshua liked being the merry widow and chose to go with a new wife and leave the children behind. I could only wonder because no one I knew had the answers.

No one until I met Annie's niece, Alma Meade. Annie had a sister, Lovina who is listed online as Melvina, Vina, Viney and others names. Her daughter says her name was Lovina and she was nicknamed Vina.

Lovina Houston was a younger sister to Annie Houston. She was born in 1875. On October 14, 1897 she married Rhodes Meade. Rhodes was the son of James Madison and Letitia Wright Meade. Rhodes was the grandson of Thomas Kronis and Mary "Polly" Hall. Letitia Wright was the daughter of Susannah Wright and Andrew Steel. Susannah was the daughter of Joel and Susannah Wright.

Rhodes and Vina had eleven children: Oscar, Olven, Matt, Forester, John Riley, Roy, Flossie, Orville, Lala, Charlie and Alma.

The afternoon after we went to the cemetery at Goose Creek, I met Alma.

Alma is wonderful. She is 90. Her sight is failing, but she can still see shapes. She is a little hard of hearing, but all you have to do is speak up. She has a wonderful clear voice. She looks like she might be 70. She is certainly not a shriveled up little old lady. You would never know that she was 90.

I asked Alma about Thaney and Betsy and Annie. What I found out changed my perceptions regarding those census records.

Joshua did marry Susan Wright Venters, and she was mean as a snake. She was not good to his children. She was not good to him. She would not feed the children. They were starving. Grandma Betsy came and took them to her home. Alma said that when she fixed them dinner she had to stop them from eating so much because they were so hungry and she did not want them to get ill. After the children were gone, Susan tried to poison Joshua. I had always heard it was poison in his soup. Rosie heard it was in the coffee. Alma said it was in the spring water.

But, someone tipped him off and she failed in her attempt. I asked her why Joshua would let Susan starve the children or be mean to them. She couldn't answer that. I asked her why Susan would want to poison Joshua. She said she didn't know, that Susan was just a very mean woman who did things for no reason.

She went on to tell me that Joshua was a very humble man. The Houstons loved him and when he married Rosie Adams after Susan died, the children went back to his household. Who knows what someone will turn into after you marry them.

I asked if she had known Thaney and Betsy herself. She said yes. I asked if she had ever talked to him or her mother about who his father was. She said yes. She said that his mother, Hannah, had a sister, Mary. Mary married a Potter. She had Hannah come to live with them. While she was there he got her pregnant. That is the potter who is the father of Nathaniel Houston. I don't have all the siblings of Hannah. The Potter that is always pointed out to me to be Nathaniel's father is Abraham who was born in 1837 and who was married to Sarah Wright. That would be a pretty neat trick to be a father at 9 since Nanthaniel was born in 1846. Alma said that the father's name was John and he was a brother to an Abraham. She didn't recall his parents name. That is what she told me in person. On another day I called her and we talked about this again. She mentioned the name Abraham as his father, but repeated that it was Hannah's sister, Mary's husband, who was the father.

Also, when I called I asked about Betsy and Thaney and their dates of death. She said she had the dates written down and I could see them when I came back to visit her. She said Betsy died first when she was a very little girl. She said she was 13 or 14 when Thaney died. Since the last census I could find them in was 1920 and Denton no longer had them in his household in 1930, that made sense. I would approximate Betsy died about 1922 and Thaney in 1929. I have not found a death certificate for either of them.

When we walked up that hill to the cemetery I could tell from Archie's description and from the place where the Meade and Houston houses has been that we were coming in from the back of the cemetery. Robert found Jennie McCray's grave and that of her husband. We found no markers for the babie's graves, but lying behind Jennie's grave were the remants of an old rusted fence. Rosie and I tried to lift it away and we poked in the soft ground there for a stone. Archie thought there were stones for both Betsy and Thaney. We could not find them.

We only found another piece of the fence at what must have been the back right hand corner of the cemetery. Where was all the rest of the fence? My thought is that when the convicts cleaned the graves, they threw that fence over the hill. They could have thrown two old stones that might have fallen down, too. There are many rocks serving as head and foot stones in that cemetery in obvious straight lines of graves.

Rosie incovered two stones from under the leaves and growth. One grave was sunken in and its stone was down and almost sunk and covered, too. There really weren't that many Houstons in the marked graves -- more Colliers, but who knows who were in all those graves marked only with stones.

This is Thaney and Besty Houston:

Murder or Self Defense?

If we go back to Masias Hall and Unisiah Branham Smith, they are my fourth great grandparents. Their son Richard married Sarah Tackett. Their son Enoch Mahlon married Nancy Hampton. Their son Joseph married Lettie Craft. Their daughter, Nancy, married Otho Bentley.

If we go back to Elder William "Preacher Billy" Tackett and Anna/Amy Johnson they are also my fourth great grandparents, too. Their daughter is the Sarah Tackett listed above.

Richard Hall's sister Pherina married Jesse Hamilton. They had a daughter named Elizabeth.

Sarah Tackett's brother, George Washington Tackett married Hannah Osborne. Hannah's Osborne line is also related to the Wheatley and Kilgores who are Poppy's family through his mother. George and Hannah had a son named Tapley.

Elizabeth Hamilton and Tapley Tackett married. They had eleven children that I know about.

1860 Pike Co Kentucky Census
Tackett, Tapley, 34, farmer
Elizabeth, 32
Ireeny 13
William S, 12
Greenville, 10
Freelan, 7
Jessy, 5
Permety, 4
George, 1
All born in Kentucky.

1870 Floyd Co KY census
Tacket, Tapley, 45, farmer
Elizabeth, 43, keeping house
Irena 23, at home
Green, 20, at home
Jessie, 14, at home
Perneta, 13, at home
Hannah, 8
Preston 6
Nelson, 4
All born in Kentucky.

1880 Floyd County KY census
Tackett, Tapley, 55, farmer, KY KY VA
Elizabeth, 58, keeping house
Hirena, 32, at home
Hannah, 18, at home
Preston, 15, farm hand
Nelson, 13, farm hand.
All KY KY KY except Tapley.

George Tackett born November 5, 1859 in Pike county married Martha Casebolt. She was born in 1860. They had 13 children.

1900 Pike County KY Census
Tackett, George W, 41, head, Feb 1859, married 22 years, farmer
Marthy, 40, wife, Apr 1860, had 12 children, 12 living
Harlin, 19, son
Spurlock, 18, son
Lee, 17, son
Charley 13, son
Nancy 12, daughter
Elizabeth, 11, daughter
Willie 6, son
Faney, 5, daughter
Stellie, 3 daughter
Anjeline 1, daughter

1910 Caney, Pike County KY Census
Tackitt, George, 52, head, 1st marriage, 30 years, farmer, general farm
Martha, 52, 1st marriage, had 13 children 12 living
Betty, 18, daughter, farm laborer, home farm
Willey, 16, son, farm laborer, home farm
Fanny, 14, daughter, farm laborer, home farm
Stelli, 12, daughter
Angeline, 10, daughter
Gracie, 8 daughter

Pretty ho-hum, hun? George and his wife by marriage (2nd cousins 3 times removed) and his children by blood are our cousins (3rd cousins twice removed) through Granny and Poppy. I wouldn't be suprised to find a connection through the Mullins because of the Hamilton family, but this is all I have so far. They appear to be simple mountain folks farming out an existence.

In the story below from the Washington Post on May 14, 1911 just after the Census was taken in 1910, George, his wife, and his children Charley, Fannie and Betty are the family listed in the census records above. Here is the story:

Mountain Girls Shot To Kill

Daughters of Kentucky Moonshiner Gave
Battle To and Defeated a Revenue Posse

Sergent, KY. Bor. New York World

When the Circuit Court convenes in June to hear the pleadings of such offenders against the law of the sovereign stat of Kentucky as Pike County has produced ‘tween sessions, two girls from the mountains will be put on trial for murder. They are Fannie Tackitt, aged 15, and Bettie Tackitt, aged 18 – sisters.

A new-made mound in the burying ground back of town marks the place
where lies he body of Charlie Smith, the Deputy Marshall – with a bullet still
embedded in the muscles of his heart. The sisters are charged with killing
him. One or both may admit it, which is different from confessing, and one
or both will tell the story of a tragedy such as even Pike county, schooled
alike to civic and official quick trigger, has not seen since the last feudist
slid from his horse in the shadows and died like a snake in the first warmth of
the dawn.

There’s no harm in being strictly fair to the Tackitts.

Revenue nostrils which catch the scent of stewing mash, even as a cow finds a
salt lick, discovered a still on the side hill in which corn was being converted
into whisky in violation of at least seven pages of Government statuettes, and
of course it had to be raided. The job was assigned to Deputy Marshall J.
Mart Potter, who picked Levi Smallwood and Charlie Smith for such moral support and physical participation as the occasion might require – a trio of men with nerve. They crept up the gulch while the scrub oak and walnuts were still
dripping with dew, and came to a mountainside (sic) clearing at midday.
“Uncle George” Tackitt, head of the family, was away from home –unimportant where. Charlie Tackitt, who learned how to coil a worm for a still and vaporize spirits before he could bound Kentucky, was carrying water from the spring, and in the direction of the mashtub. Mother Tackitt was in the kitchen. Fannie sat in a swing screeching a song about someone who loves me ever true, and Bettie was busy working a yellow cupid on a red tidy on the porch.

In an instant this domestic scene shifted. Charlie Tackitt, down in the gulch, cried, “They’re coming.” And the three revenue men emerged from the roadside brush. Two of them grappled with young Tackitt, who at 20 was as strong as a bull, and as unmoved by fear as the mountain pines. Three to one is losin odds, and the nippers were snapped on Tackitt's wrists. Smallwood and Smith ran around to the rear of the house, expecting to capture Uncle George. They came face to face with Mother Tackitt, who was carrying an armful of stove-size wood in from the shed. They laid hand on her and she defended herself well and ably with a bullet. Much occurs in an incredibly short time on occasions of this kind – action is swift.
Intermission brief, there was a pistol shot, and Mother Tackitt’s gray hair became crimson. A bullet had coursed along her temple, just breaking the skin. Then another bored its way into her shoulder and she sank on the threshold. Kentucky history wouldn’t be what it is if more than two shots were to be fired by one side in a controversy without a formal reply in kind. Pike County folk know the rules –men and women alike –and, all thing considered, it’s well that they do. The next puff of smoke came from a rifle, the muzzle of which showed under the kitchen window sash. Fannie Tucker finger pressed the trigger. The bullet opened an airhole in the crown, of Deputy Smallwood’s hat one inch under the kitchen window sash. Fannie Tackitt’s finger pressed the trigger. The bullet opened an airhole in the crown, of Deputy Smallwood’s hat one inch above his thinking machinery, which he ducked naturally, knowing the revenue method.
Charlie Tackitt had been thrown on the grass by the deputies after he had been handcuffed. They expected him to lie there, but he didn’t. As the conflict became warmer, the deputies, recognizing in him a noncombatant, massed for the larger
struggle. Then Charlie crawled to a protected place behind a rock where he
could make signs for his fighting party. Two shots cut finger-sized holes in the
window pane, and Smallwood, backing away toward a tree, was reloading when a bullet from another window entered his left arm, which supported his rifle. He knotted his handkerchief above the wound and returned the fire. Mother Tackitt was at this moment at the back door yelling for help. Charlie pointed with double fingers in the direction where a good aim would count. Deputy Smith was the target. Bettie Tackitt now took her place at the port-hole in the fortress, armed with a late model shotgun. She fired at Deputy Smith, but the window falling threw the gun out of line and the shot simply riddle his loose blouse. Mother Tackitt had by this time crawled into the house. Her hand was gashed in half a dozen places. Marshal (sic) Smith had beaten her with the butt of his revolver,
she moaned. There was no time to dress her wounds, no time to carry her to
bed. She lay upon the floor feebly trying to stop the flow of blood with the crumpled folds of her apron. Ant the fight went on.

All three of the deputies now had positions affording some protection. Marshal (sic) Potter was at the edge of the winter cut of cordwood. Smith with a tree between him and danger, and Smallwood, from a point to the left, blazed away over a stump.

There’s no earthly use of being a mountaineer if you haven’t guns aplenty and no use having guns without ammunition. Pike County knows his rule, too. The Tackitt home was an arsenal. Three shots to the minute were the average of fire from both sides. Smallwood was not in good shape, the deep wound in his arm trickling blood at his finger tips each time he raised his gun.

Growing bitter as the fight advanced, Bettie Tackitt threw open the door to the end that her aim might be direct. A bullet from without passed over her shoulder and plunked into the cupboard. Bettie’s gun was at her shoulder in an instant. Before Smallwood could lower his weapon she pressed the trigger. The show went true. It tore the finger from the hand that held the gun. A man twice shot has the status of a dead man, so far as warfare effectiveness is concerned. So Smallwood’s rifle became silent and the fight was now one wounded on each side, a man and a woman.

And so, for a full half hour, shots from the open were answered by shot from the house. Marshall Smith was inclined to belittle the bravery of the mountainside garrison. He wanted to take it by storm. Creeping out from his sheltered spot he advanced with gun muzzle moving like a side-playing pendulum to cover both windows. He saw a girl at one window and momentarily forgot the other. A spit of fire was the answer. Smith Dropped and never moved.

Marshal Mart Potter didn’t wait for that. He hurried down the gulch and the fight was over. Later in the day, when the shadows had settled on the mountain, he came back for Charlie Smith, who was lying open-eyed and unconscious where he had fallen. Potter dragged him on a pine bough along the bank of the laughing brook and into valley civilization. The county doctor did what he could for Smith, which was nothing at all. The rifle bullet had cut into the muscles of his heart and
there was no hope and no need of drugs or advice. The riddled heart pumped
on slower and slower for four days, and stopped happily on Sunday.

Mountain folk have an abiding hatred for “revenues” and strange to say, a sort of respect for peace officers of a county’s choosing. Deputy Sheriff Osborne and a
posse went later on to the Tackitt home. Charlie Tackitt was not there. A sharp tile had cut the steel bands that held his wrists together and he had become a fugitive. But the girls were there and ready to give themselves up. They were taken to Pikeville and arraigned before County Judge Fud. The town and country side turned out to see them; some to applaud, not to condemn; for Pike County admires bravery and has rude respect for women. The girls were found in bonds of $20 each for appearance at Court. Freeholders stood ready to become surety for them. The gals rode out of town through the line s of interested folk and back to their home hanging on the cliffside. There, in the very setting of the tragedy, your correspondent saw and talked with them.

Fannie, whose sixteenth birthday will come on June 12 while she is on trial for her life is a mere child buoyant and happy. She doesn’t understand how the law views what she is accused of doing. Possibly she doesn’t care.

“I don’t suppose any one could much blame us for what we did,” she said, sitting in the swing and with little toe kicks swaying back and forth. “We fought for our poor old mother who is lying in the house now, and fought bravely as girls or their mothers should under the circumstances. The revenues treated her brutally. They beat her. Think of it. Men beating a poor old woman. Why don’t the revenues deal with men? We want to live under the law like other people, but if the law puts us in prison, I don’t know what we might do next."

And these things said as a girl might say them – innocently and without boldness or bravado. "Because I could shoot and shoot to the spot,” she continued as she led the way to the house, “I lost no time. Some one had to come to mother’s rescue. I was nearest. We killed the officer; that we don’t deny. We will outlive and outgrow the charge that the Tackitt girls are murderers."

The elder girl was spreading the table for dinner, and your correspondent was asked to sit by. He did, with a girl at either elbow. The meal was plain, well cooked, well served. After dinner the girls went into the open and photographer posed them just as they were, in simple frocks.

Marshal Potter says he was lucky to escape with his life at the mountain fight.
“I escaped without a scratch, “ he said, “but shots flew thick and fast around my head, and more than once it seemed that I would have to retreat. However, after my best man, Charlie Smith, was shot down I thought it best to get out. I did so, and after everything calmed down I went back and carried the wounded man to the home of a physician and had his wounds dressed. Smallwood was hurt but little. Charlie Tackitt escaped, and I have not heard from him since. The Tackitt girls are certainly brave.”

J. Mart Potter is considered one of the bravest officers in the South. For seven years he has been in the service of Uncle Sam, and more than twice he has shot off moonshiners who fired upon him. Today he is baffled at the thought of Kentucky’s brave girlhood; of having to fight them in a battle as he did the Tackitt girls – and yet he says, like almost every one else he admires the bravery of the Tackit sisters.
“I will never stand and fight them again,” said Potter to your correspondent. He meant it, too. It is said that Uncle Sam will offer a liberal reward for the arrest
of Charlie Tackitt, brother of the Tackitt sister, who is yet at large.

Potter says he will not want the reward.

J. Mart Potter is one of our relatives, too. I will detail him in another story that involves moonshining in another article.

I went on to search out the girls and Charley. In the 1920 Census Charley had married and had children. He was still in Pike County but now in Marrowbone. In the 1930 census he was in Williamson, West Virginia where he died. Betty I havn't found yet. Fannie evades me in the 1920 Census, but she is living with her widowed sister, Angeline "Annie" in Pikeville helping to care for Annie's children in 1930. There are no children of her own listed and she is shown as single.

I have searched the Washington Post and other online newspaper archives trying to find the outcome of the trial of the girls. So far I have come up empty. I will keep searching and add an update if I find more details.

So was it murder or self defense?