Re: William Melton Booker (Smith) - What is the story?
-
In reply to:
William Melton Booker (Smith) - What is the story?
Stacy Shingler 6/07/10
This story is as told to me on June 9, 2010 by my great uncle Melton Smith, son of William Melton Booker.Uncle 'Bookin', as we call him, told the story as best he can remember it.I've made a few adjustments but this is his story.
Conecuh County, Alabama about 1917
"My daddy was going to the store in town one day in his buggy drawn by his mule.Some people in town had cars but some people still had buggies.He was on a country road and there was this little shack on the side of the road and when daddy got close to that shack a dog ran off the porch and started barking at his mule.Well this man came out and daddy told that man that if that dogbarked at his dog on the way back from town then he was going to shoot it.On the way back from town that dog ran down off that porch and started barking at the mule so daddy shot it.Well that man came out with his gun drawn on daddy so daddy just shot and killed him. I think his name was Raines."
William Melton Booker was married to Catherine Snowden and had two children at the time but he had to leave so he wouldn't be caught.According to Uncle Bookin, William went to Bogaloosa, Mississippi because a great uncle 'had' a lumber company there, the Great Southwest Lumber Company (note, after looking into the Great Southwest Lumber Company I wonder if this great uncle just worked there).This great uncle had recently taken in Annie Laurie Richardson (?) because her dad Johnny 'Jack' Richardson (?) had died and the kids had been 'farmed out'. Apparently Annie's sister, Lenna (?), had shot and killed her dad because he had been sexually abusing her.William worked out an arrangement with his great uncle to take Annie with him if he married her in a couple of years as she was 14 at the time.It was believed that since the law was looking for a single man then traveling as a couple would throw them off.William and Annie traveled to Texas, changed their names to Tom and Annie Smith, and started a family there.Over the years William would leave for months at a time to go back to Alabama and see his family.According to Uncle Bookin there was even another child born between William and Catherine Booker.