The Ballad of Tom Dooley: A Ballad Novel

by Sharyn McCrumb

  “Did they find it?”

  “A piece of window glass. He had concealed it in his bed. The jailer told me that he scowled fiercely at them when they found it, but by the time they started to remedy the damage to the chain, his mood had turned sardonic again. He told them the chain had been severed so for some weeks. But he must have realized that their finding the break had ended his last chance to escape before the execution the next day, and at last he accepted the fact that he was going to die. When at last the jailer turned to leave, Dula asked that I be summoned to meet with him as soon as possible.”

  I considered that, momentarily stung that he had not asked for me instead. Pride is the besetting sin of the public man. “I suppose that was because he knew that you lived in Statesville? No doubt I would have been hard to locate, being down here in Charlotte, and time was short.”

  “I expect that was the way of it, Governor,” said Captain Allison. “They sent a man to fetch me, and he found me at dinner, but I came away as soon as I could, and made my way to the jail. They led me to his cell—and they made sure to tell me about that filed chain, so that I’d be on my guard against any move he might make against me—but I think by then he had given up hope. He sat there on his cot, shoulders slumped, staring at the floor. He did not even look up when I came in. I hoped that he was praying.”

  “I doubt it.”

  “No. Perhaps not. I said, ‘Well, Tom. I have come. If there’s anything I can do to ease your mind, you can depend upon me to do it.’ He looked up at me then, and there was nothing of the joker about him anymore. His face was ashen and haggard with worry. I only hoped that he would recover his bravado before the execution. As a soldier, he would not wish to be dragged to the gallows begging for his life.”

  I shuddered. “There are some things that put dying in the shade.”

  “Yes. To die like a slaughtered hog would be no end for a brave soldier, no matter what his crimes were. But I was no minister, so I knew he had not called for me to hear tales about repentance and salvation. I warned him, ‘There is nothing more that I can do for you under the law. You would be better off making your peace with God, than by trying to struggle any more against the decree of the state.’

  “He nodded. Then he picked up a length of the chain that shackled him to the wall, and let it fall again. ‘They told you about this, then? Well, I had to try. I reckon I am bound to die, Captain Allison. So there is something I need to leave with you. But first I must have your word—on your sacred honor—that you will keep secret what I am about to give you while there is still breath in my body.’

  “I put my hand on his shoulder, to reassure him, I suppose, and I told him upon my obligation as his attorney that it was my duty to do his bidding, within the limits of the law. ‘And if it is your dying wish, then I am honor bound as a gentleman to do as you ask, so long as no other person is harmed by your request.’ He smiled then, and for an instant there, he seemed to get back a bit of his boldness. ‘It won’t harm nobody, Captain. Just the other way around. I aim to save a life.’

  “He asked me if I had a bit of paper on me. I fished about in my jacket pockets and finally found a rumpled scrap of notepaper, and a stub of pencil, which I handed over to him. He slipped down off the cot and smoothed out the bit of paper on the floor. While I stood there watching, he grasped the pencil, curling all his fingers around the haft. He set his face in a frown of concentration, with the tip of his tongue tucked in to the corner of his mouth—for all the world, the way a child does when it is just learning penmanship. I felt a stab of pity for him then, for he wasn’t much more than a boy himself—or he might have been, if the War had not come.”

  I had lost as much as anybody in that war—a seat in the United States Senate, and the chance to someday be President—but every time I passed a cemetery, or spied a woman in widow’s weeds, or met a one-legged man hobbling along on a crutch, I was humbled by the thought that my sacrifice was mere vanity compared to theirs. We lost so much in that infernal war. So much. “Do you think that the War made Tom Dula into a killer, Captain?”

  Allison shook his head. “The man was a drummer in the 42nd North Carolina—just a music maker, nothing more. And the records say that he spent half the War on sick call. Indeed, I am still not convinced—well, you must let me finish my tale, Governor. Dula passed a few minutes laboriously carving words on to that scrap of paper, and when he had completed it to his satisfaction, he handed it up to me. ‘Not until I am dead, mind,’ he warned me as he gave it to me, and I had to promise once again to honor his wish. Only then would he allow me to read what he had written.

  “It was the simplest of documents. Only a few short words, but it said everything. He had written: ‘Statement of Thomas C. Dula—I declare that I am the only person that had any hand in the murder of Laura Foster. April 30, 1868.’ I read it through twice. My first feeling upon seeing those words was one of relief that we were not sending an innocent man to the gallows through any lack of skill as attorneys. But a moment later I found to my dismay that I did not believe him. I thought that statement was designed to set people’s minds at rest—but also to effect the release of the other defendant. He could not save his own life, but it was within his power to save hers.

  “He had clambered back up on the cot now, straightening out the heavy chain that bound him fast. He was watching me closely as I read his confession. I slipped the document into my pocket, and fixed him with a stern gaze. ‘Is this the truth, Tom Dula? Do you swear to it?’

  “He smiled up at me then, and I could see some of the old charm in his countenance. ‘The truth is that Laura Foster wasn’t worth the forfeit of two lives, and there seems to be no hope of saving mine.’

  “‘But if you did not kill her, man…’

  “He smiled up at me then, as if he were speaking to a child. ‘I did not care enough about her to kill her. But there is someone that I love enough to save. Let me do this. This confession will break my mother’s heart, but at least she will have a measure of peace, believing her questions answered. And I will go to my grave knowing that I did one last thing for the one person I would willingly die for.’

  “It was in my mind to tell him that Ann Melton was not worth such a noble gesture, but the words stuck in my throat. I could see that the poor wretch wanted his death to count for something, and this was the only deed that lay within his power. ‘I will do as you ask,’ I told him.

  “He nodded and said, ‘Thankee, Cap’n. And if it sets your mind at rest any, I’ll have you to know that I am not entirely blameless in this. I dug that grave, and I carried the corpse up the ridge to it. I reckon they’d hang me for that, same as if I’d killed her.’ I could not dispute the point, and when I told him so, he seemed more pleased than anything. ‘Well, then, let them take my life, and welcome to it. But mind—I told you—one life and no more for that of Laura Foster. That’s a fair enough trade. I’ll hold you to that, sir.’

  “As I turned to go, he asked if he could have more paper to write down his thoughts, and from that I surmised that he intended upon making a last speech from the gallows. ‘Keep the pencil,’ I told him, ‘and I will instruct the jailer to bring you paper.’ He thanked me again, and then, in a soft voice, muffled, I thought, with unshed tears, he said, ‘I don’t suppose they would let me see Ann again—one last time?’

  “I hesitated—not because there was any chance of it, but only because I was trying to decide how best to soften the blow of refusal. ‘She is another man’s wife, Tom,’ I reminded him, as gently as I could.

  “He smiled at that, and then he said, ‘We have belonged to one another all our lives, and nothing either one of us ever did with anybody else amounted to a hill of beans.’

  “I looked away. ‘Shall I tell her that, then?’

  “He shook his head. ‘She knows.’”

  * * *

  I told Captain Allison that I had read an account of the hanging in the Salisbury Watchman. “May the first. May Day.
There’s a sad irony in that. A day when maypoles should be garlanded with flowers, but instead in Iredell County they erected a pole and suspended a man from it until he died. Strictly speaking, both customs are barbaric, but I prefer the former.”

  “Well, we both saw worse in the War, Governor.”

  “That’s so. I fought up in Virginia at Malvern Hill—that was like a thousand hangings all at once. But at least there is some dignity to a battlefield death. People don’t crowd around to watch a man die, and cheer for his passing.”

  “Not everyone cheered, Governor, but there were too many that did. I only went because I thought it was my duty to attend. I found it difficult to sleep that night after my interview with Dula in his cell, and after a restless night, I went along to the jail again about seven to see the prisoner one last time, in case he had changed his mind about that confession.

  “The jailer took me along to his cell. ‘He paced near the whole night, Captain,’ he told me. ‘He was like a caged bear, lumbering to the length of that chain on his leg, back and forth, back and forth across the floor. I looked in on him towards daybreak, and he had stretched out on his cot with his eyes closed, but I don’t think he was sleeping. I took him in his breakfast, and told him there were preachers a-waiting to see him, and he allowed as how I could send them in.’”

  “He found the Lord at the end? That eases my mind, Captain Allison—though I never thought to see it happen.”

  “I had the honor of seeing him baptized by the Methodist minister. Once the prayers were concluded, I was able to speak to him privately. ‘This is a fine thing you have done, Tom,’ I told him. ‘It will be of great consolation to your mother and sister to know that you sought salvation at the last.’ He gave me a grim smile. ‘I don’t reckon my mother sets much store by the promises of preachers, Captain. But the baptism was free, and it seemed like a chance worth taking. I would like to believe there is a heaven. It’s the only hope I have of ever seeing Ann again.’

  “I thought of his confession, resting still in my pocket. ‘But if she has done the murder, and if she dies unrepentant and unconfessed of the crime, then she will not go to heaven.’

  “He smiled again. ‘Why, she’ll have to, Captain. It won’t be heaven without her.’”

  * * *

  Richard Allison and I passed the next few moments in silence, while I lit a cigar, and thought about what he had said. I was trying to pity the prisoner, but that sentiment kept getting mixed up with something very like envy. I revered my Harriette, and stood in awe of her piety and her devotion to our boys, but all the same … I wished I loved anything or anybody as much as that raw mountain boy loved Ann Melton.

  Finally I said, “I suppose there was a carnival atmosphere in Statesville on gallows day?”

  Captain Allison nodded. “Well before noon the crowds began to gather. The sheriff had called out guards to keep order, and the saloons were closed so that drunkenness should not make matters worse. People must have traveled forty miles to come—rustic-looking hill folk, sun-bronzed and chewing cuds of tobacco.”

  “Yes, I came from those hills, Captain. Those are my people, and you should not be deceived by their outward appearance. They are the salt of the earth.”

  “Begging your pardon, Governor. I spoke as I found. Some of the ruffians I encountered were soldiers who had served with Dula in the 42nd. They seemed to think that he was a desperate character, and they meant to see with what bravado he would meet his death. And I was dismayed to see how many women had come to see the execution.”

  I smiled. “Dula was—what? Twenty-three? Tall and wiry, with a head of thick dark curls. I reckon if we had female juries he might have gone free on the strength of that.”

  “That’s true enough.” Captain Allison sighed. “Unjust, but true. Beauty absolves a great many sins. Since juries are comprised of men, I think Ann Melton might well have prevailed even without her lover’s confession.”

  “We shall not risk it, though. When Mrs. Melton comes to trial in the fall term of Superior Court, we must offer Dula’s confession in to evidence, and request a dismissal of the charges. He wanted to save her, and I think we must allow him to do it.”

  “She isn’t worth it, Governor, though I shouldn’t say such a thing of a client. Still, it’s the truth. She is a vain and proud woman, who thinks she is worth any sacrifice a man may make on the altar of her beauty. And I firmly believe that she killed that girl, even if we never find out the reason why. She ought not to be saved.”

  “No. But neither should poor Tom have died in vain. Try to look at it that way. You were with him to the end, Captain?”

  “Yes, and no one ever more heartily wished themselves elsewhere than I did that day. They took him out of his cell about half past twelve, and Sheriff Wasson and some deputies led him out to the town square. They had a cart waiting there to convey him to the place of execution. They meant to hang him from the back of it, too, of course.”

  “Yes, it is a distressing sight, watching a man ride off to his death in a cart, sitting upon the very coffin in which his body shall rest in an hour’s time. His coffin was with him, I suppose?”

  “Yes. He sat upon it. But at least his sister was permitted to ride in the cart with him, and, perhaps for her sake, he smiled and spoke calmly to her as the procession went along. His sister and her husband had brought the coffin with them from Wilkes County—a heartbreaking errand for the poor young woman, but at least he had someone to claim his body. I was seated next to the minister, keeping my balance in the cart as best I could, but we were engulfed by the multitude of spectators—black folk and white, men and women, even children, and I cannot imagine what their parents were thinking to allow them to attend such a spectacle. There were people in carriages, on horseback, or simply walking in the throng alongside the cart—a sea of eager, cruel faces. I hope never to see the like again. Tom seemed oblivious to all these strangers, though. He kept talking about how he had been saved, and assuring his sister that he would see her in heaven. He seemed more concerned for her peace of mind than for his own fate.”

  “Did you have far to go?”

  “No. Only to that open field beside the train depot, but the accompanying crowds so impeded our progress that it took us nearly half an hour to get there. There were even more people waiting around the gallows—and some enterprising young boys had climbed in to the trees surrounding the field, in hopes of getting a better view of the proceedings. It was barbaric. I shouldn’t like to die in the midst of all that.”

  “Nor will you, Captain. Rest assured. You and I will die in our beds like gentlemen, and no one will be singing broadside ballads about us after we’re gone.”

  “Well, if they do write any songs about Tom Dula, I suppose he has earned them. He died game, as he would have phrased it. When they pulled the cart up underneath the gallows, we all got out, leaving him there alone with his coffin. This must have been Sheriff Wasson’s first hanging, for he had erected a shoddy excuse for a gallows that couldn’t have taken an hour to put together. Two upright posts of cheap pine, with a crosspiece set across the top. I was afraid the thing would not hold his weight, and that he would topple to the ground still alive. It sickened me to think of it.”

  “I daresay it might have broken under my weight,” I said, patting my substantial girth. There had been lean times during the War, but I had been making up for it since, and it showed. “But I take your point about Sheriff Wasson. There are problems with North Carolina’s one-term sheriff law, and you have hit upon a major one. It is the county sheriff who must hang the convicted prisoners, but in a four-year term, a sheriff is not likely to perform enough executions to become proficient at it. We ought to follow England’s example and have one well-trained hangman to service the whole state. It would be a kindness to all concerned not to have our executions turned into botched exercises in torture through the incompetence of the hangman.”

  “Well, Governor, if you ever get elected to office
again, perhaps you could suggest such a plan. And you might consider limiting the condemned man’s last words, while you’re about it.”

  “Oh, I don’t know. I’m famous for my speech making. If I had a rope around my neck, I believe I could talk for a week.”

  “Yes, perhaps it was the fear of death that made him talk at such length. Or perhaps he thought that if he could stall long enough, a rider would come tearing up the road, waving the Governor’s pardon—but of course, no such thing happened. He talked about his childhood in Happy Valley, and he talked about his experiences in the War. He even touched on politics in his harangue. Apparently, he is not fond of our new governor Holden. Called him a secessionist.”

  “Yes, they weren’t fond of the Confederacy in Wilkes County. That’s why I moved the trial to Statesville. As the former Confederate Governor, I thought I could win with a sympathetic jury in a county where I was personally popular—or at least not vilified as a secessionist.”

  “We agreed with you, though, Armfield and I. As we had no evidence to refute the charges, it did seem the best course.”

  “Did Dula get around to talking of the murder in his oration?”

  “He did. He protested his innocence loud and long, but he also commented on the physical evidence presented in the trial. Something about the roads leading to the Bates’ place. Oh, and the map that the prosecution put in to evidence. He cursed Colonel Isbell, who drew it, and he insisted that there were errors in the map. And he accused some of the state’s witnesses of swearing falsely against him.”

  “Did he mention the servant girl, Pauline Foster? I’d agree with him there. What was it the newspaper called her? A monster of depravity?”

  “Well, a woman who has recently given birth to a black child, although her husband is as white as she is … one can hardly call her faithful.”