Re: Perry Green Magness-1829
-
In reply to:
Perry Green Magness-1829
James Pryor 11/03/02
James, I wanted to give you some back ground on the shooting that Perry Green was involved in.I had to locate my info.I have some copies of papers that Basil Marks wrote.Basil was the son of Bonnie Magness Marks.She was the daughter of Perry Green and Nancy Wilbourn.According to Basil, Nancy told him the stories.
"In the spring of 1880 while in church one Sunday morning, he (Perry Green) and his family was sitting on the front pew when from the back of the church shots were fired at him.His eldest son was wounded.In order to draw the fire from the rest of the family Grandpa (Perry Green) jumped up behind the pulpit where in exchange of bullets he was wounded in the leg.It bothered him the rest of his life. (1880 census of Marion Co. in May shows him and Wayne laid up with pistol shots)
Again reading from Basil's writings, Grandma told me later that year Grandpa and two older boys had gone to town and Uncle Morg (Perry's and Nancy's oldest son) went fishing and a neighbor boy told him he had heard the other family (the same family that shot at them in church) planning to waylay his dad and brothers when they came from town.Uncle Morg came in and asked her to hand him the shotgun above the mantle on the fireplace.She thought he was going to hunt squirrels.He was almost nine years old at the time.She said, the boys had been taught to use a gun as soon as they could lift one.Grandpa told her when the shooting started and he heard the blast of the shotgun on the other side of him, he turned, all he saw was a hat and a gun and just as he pulled the trigger he saw that it was Uncle Morg.He was able to move the gun enough to miss him.He was still shaking over the near tragedy when he got home.He decided then to move before one of the boys was killed.He sold out and moved south of Ft. Smith, Arkansas in Sebastian County.(The family that was trying to kill them,as I understand from my Dad was Nancy's brother Matt's wife's family.That family later killed themselves off in shootings.I guess they fought with everyone.