Deviant Criminology
Dr. Richard Weaver Jr., Heather Kenney, and Rachel Czar take listeners on a journey through the world of true crime. With their unique careers in the criminal justice and academic world; they work to provide an entertaining and educational experience for listeners. This podcast examines many areas of true crime including; the formation of laws, cases that defined caselaw, and crimes that impacted the world. Please join us on this journey as we transition from professionals in criminal justice and academia to budding podcasters.
Deviant Criminology
The Lawson Family Christmas Massacre
The episode delves into the tragic events surrounding the Lawson family murders, which occurred on Christmas Day in 1929 amidst the Great Depression. It highlights the struggles of the family leading up to the horrific act, the psychological motivations behind it, and the community's response to this monumental tragedy, aiming to keep the victims' memories alive.
• Exploring the socio-economic backdrop of the Great Depression
• Uncovering the lives and struggles of the Lawson family
• Detailing the sequence of events on Christmas Day of 1929
• Discussing the psychological aspects of Charlie Lawson's actions
• Examining the aftermath and community response to the tragedy
• Reflecting on lessons regarding mental health and community support
Please keep the Lawson family's memory and names alive. Have a Merry Christmas.
www.deviantcriminology.com
So welcome to Deviant Criminology. I'm Richard, I'm Heather, over there is Nancy, who cannot be heard, and this is our Christmas episode. It is the holiday season, so we wanted to do a special episode that we'd release here, as is the basis of our entire podcast. We want to use this opportunity to remember victims of a horrific event that had happened and keep their memories alive. So this is an important part of doing the show, which was a foundation from the beginning, because, as people who we've worked in the criminal justice system different parts, but we all feel kind of a connection to trying to keep victims' memories alive. We wanted to make sure that we always present these cases in a way that can be learning experiences and not glorification of crime, and it's always about keeping the legacy of the victims going.
Speaker 2:And in honor of that, the concept this week was to do an episode that we would release at Christmas that had some link to the holidays. So our first kind of holiday episode. We decided to look at the loss and family murders that occurred on December 25th of 1929. And the sad reality of this tragedy was embedded in the events of the Great Depression that had started in August that same year, with several financial disasters. This is a very dark and deep topic to cover and I just want to make sure that we kind of do give a trigger warning that this does involve the death of some children. We won't get into graphic detail, like always, but we want to make sure that we do right by the victims of this horrible event and do justice to this story.
Speaker 3:Do we need to do a DV trigger warning on this one? You think too.
Speaker 2:I don't know if there's really domestic violence as much as it's just massacre, because I don't know if there's any history beforehand they bring up.
Speaker 3:Just because it's like dad versus you know what I mean. Or child abuse, I don't know.
Speaker 2:I mean we can just keep listening to it. I don't know if there's really a like the as much as just talking about like at this time period, I mean, and with a lot of family annihilations, usually it is the father that triggers that, but I don't know if it's domestic violence as much as patriarchal control, and when you lose that control, what can happen?
Speaker 2:I mean, moms do it too so yeah, there I mean we can go through all the cases, which is odd, because before 1980, I think, in the entire criminal justice system it was seen that women couldn't murder, or if they did, it was more like that demonic, like possession, not just that women had the same ability to kill. But yeah, in this case specifically, and we see in other family annihilations, we may not know the causes. We can always come up with ideas, but most of the time these are murder-suicides. There's very rare cases, john List, where the father doesn't kill himself, but I don't know. I think when you talk about a family annihilation you're already talking about domestic violence and interpersonal. I don't know, I think that's something we've never kind of linked to the two, because with this, this case specifically, the loss and family murders, there really is no history that we know of of domestic violence. But again, back in the 1920s, how was that seen, how was that reported? Women were not still seen as equals. So domestic violence may just I don't know. That's a great question.
Speaker 3:Which, like in Colorado at least, it's a sentence enhancer type idea where any crime that is committed with an intimate partner for the purposes of control or any of that like it, doesn't matter what it is, so like criminal mischief, if we've been in a personal relationship and I decide I'm going to key your car, that's considered domestic violence. So it doesn't necessarily have to be multiple separate events for it to be classified as that, if that makes sense.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, and I mean I definitely think if we're talking trigger warnings, yeah, I mean there as that, if that makes sense, yeah, no, I mean I definitely think. If we're talking trigger warnings, yeah, I mean there is warning that this is interpersonal violence, family annihilation, the death of adults and children. I think that's definitely something that needs to be thought of before you continue listening on to this. If there is anything that could possibly trigger any feelings and if so, I always say reach out for help and talk to somebody but most of all, like, don't listen to this episode if it could trigger you.
Speaker 3:So where were we at?
Speaker 2:So really kind of where this all starts is the onset of the Great Depression. So really kind of where this all starts is the onset of the Great Depression. So the Great Depression stands out as one of the most pivotal events in early 20th century history, profoundly reshaping the economic, social and cultural landscape of the United States. This period of severe economic downturn affected millions, leaving a legacy of hardship and resilience millions, leaving a legacy of hardship and resilience.
Speaker 3:Now the onset of the Great Depression. It's commonly associated and attributed with a singular day, october 29th 1929, known as Black Tuesday, and that specifically was the day that the stock market crashed dramatically, and you'll hear people relate to different stock days and trades and things like that in reference to Black Tuesday, like when we used to have all the news going on about the Great Recession as opposed to the Great Depression and comparisons there. But the amount that it crashed is unheard of and people literally in a day lost everything they had, and it was horrible for everybody, not just a certain subsection of people, but, like at least for my age group, my grandparents lived through it, so I heard a lot of their stories about it. I'm sure that for our younger people, they probably don't have personal accounts from family members as to what it was like then, but it basically impacted everybody across the entire country.
Speaker 2:In this day, like why Black Tuesday really stands out to people of the crash was there literally were suicides that were happening of bankers and stockbrokers and stuff that day and that's why it was so associated with that day. But the reality was that there were a lot of events that had happened in 1929, economic events and agricultural events and things that were happening that all led up to it. But it was that day that really, finally, was the tipping point of all these things that had been occurring.
Speaker 3:It was almost like the reflection of all of those things cumulative into the stock market Because, like you said, there was agricultural things and other issues behind it before we got to that stock market crash. So as you're looking through that, all those events come, you have the crash and then you are going into the Great Depression. So as you're looking at those, you have the factors that are contributing to the economic downturn. There's too much speculation in the stock market, which we've tried to stop, but obviously it still happens. You have the agricultural problems. Your banking systems are failing. There was also international economic imbalances because of World War I and the deaths that were associated with that.
Speaker 3:So things financially quickly became out of control and we entered into the Great Depression. And when we entered into the Great Depression it happened swiftly and it became a multifaceted crisis that affected every aspect of American life. Economically it led to a steep decline in industrial production and widespread bank failures. It resulted in peak unemployment rates of around 25 percent by 1933. Many families lost their savings, their homes, their livelihoods. There was a dramatic decrease in consumer spending and demand and basically everything fell apart.
Speaker 2:Well, and I think you know we talked about like there were stock market and bankers that were committing and completing suicide at the time and you did kind of see like two major reactions that came out of this. Major reactions that came out of this One was that sudden these high, rich people that had massive mansions and everything else, they suddenly had nothing. And then the people that already had nothing now had an enemy to focus their hatred of not having anything on. And we see at the same time kind of this rise of many figures that we've already talked about in this podcast John Dillinger, willie Sutton, van Meter and all these criminals that blamed this system for a lot of their family farms failing and other things. The flip side to that was farmers that had lost everything that saw. The only respite For their family, especially in communities with strong religious ties, was death, because if I can't take care of my family, god knows what's going to happen to them. And unfortunately that's kind of the story of what happens here.
Speaker 3:So, amongst the sweeping narratives of national despair, the smaller, more personal stories reflect the impact of individual communities and families. One such compelling narrative is the loss in family murders, and that happens in Stokes County, north Carolina. Stokes County during the late 1920s encapsulated the plight and struggles faced by rural America amidst the cascading failures of the national economy. Nestled in the heart of North Carolina, it was home to hardworking families grappling with the harsh realities of the Depression. Within this setting, the Lawsons family story unfolds, which is a tragic series of events that left an indelible mark on the local community and beyond.
Speaker 2:So Stokes County, like we said, is located in north central region of North Carolina. It's characterized by really like this picturesque it's North Carolina this really beautiful landscape, these rolling hills, is kind of you're getting into the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains. The county at that time was largely agrarian, with farming being primarily the occupation for residents of the county. The population was relatively small, with communities that were very close-knit and largely self-sufficient through agriculture and then small local businesses. The county was founded in 1789, but I tried to do some statistics through the Census Bureau and then local data and there's no population statistics for 1929, which is not uncommon when we look at communities, especially rural ones, really prior to like 1945, post-world War II, those stats just aren't there.
Speaker 2:But in 1929, the economic status of Stokes County mirrored that of many other rural areas across the United States. The county's economy again was heavily reliant on agriculture, but specifically tobacco being the principal cash crop, and that kind of was common across North Carolina, tennessee, into Kentucky. It was just very fertile land. Now it's other smokable plants that are primarily being grown there, but at this time tobacco was the cash crop for everybody and it provided the livelihood for many residents and played a central role in the county's financial infrastructure. In addition, tobacco farmers cultivated corn and staple crops, sustaining local food supplies and trade.
Speaker 3:However, like many other rural communities, during this time, Stokes County faced considerable challenges as the effects of the Great Depression took hold. Farmers experienced declining crop prices and the economic strain led to decreased agricultural income and growing financial instability. This economic pressure was compounded by the broader national economic downturn, which resulted in limited access to markets and credit.
Speaker 2:And we're already talking about you know, again, we go back to that specific October date in 1929, but rural areas were already feeling a pinch because there was over-farming across the US, but then tobacco prices were dropping already at this time. So as this event happens December of 1929, and people are like that's only a couple of months after that crash Well, you've got to take into account that this had been something that was building for a long time. So a lot of these rural communities were already being impacted by the starts of the Great Depression, well before the stock market crashed. And despite these hardships, the residents of Stokes County exhibited great resilience. There were a lot of strong community ties and neighbors often banded together to support one another through the economic difficulties. It's a very spiritual community that found solidarity in church. The backdrop against kind of comes this tragic event involving the Lawson family, and it further kind of showed the struggles but also the endurances of rural life during the Depression era.
Speaker 3:So the Lawson family and that's the family we're going to be talking about and is at the center of this tragic narrative comprised of Charlie Lawson, the patriarch, his wife Fanny and their seven children. Originating from a humble background, the Larsons were emblematic of many rural families struggling against the odds of economic adversity during the Great Depression. To understand the magnitude of the tragedy, it is essential to delve into the biographical details of the family members, and we want to make sure that we talk about their lives before the harrowing events that would thrust them into this horrible notoriety that they now have.
Speaker 2:So, and I think one of the first things to take into account is that Charlie Lawson himself came from a family of sharecroppers. So you already have an individual that saw his family kind of come from nothing earn their place. Then he gets his chance, he starts his own farm and then, as the Great Depression rolls in, suddenly you face the possibility of losing all this, so that patriarchal, the man's responsibility is to take care of his family. He saw his father rise from that, but now there's the possibility and we don't know for sure. He will talk about it later, but it's now. I'm looking at myself as an individual that can't do and I'm not a man like my father was. So there's obviously going to be some psychological stuff that comes up.
Speaker 2:But Charlie Lawson was born on May 10th 1886 at Lawsonville, north Carolina. He was the head of the family and the individual whose actions would leave a lasting impact on the community of Stoke County, on the community of Stoke County. Raised in a farming environment, charlie followed in the footstep of his father and those that came before him with a deeply rooted agrarian lifestyle that permeated much of the region. Despite growing up in modest circumstances, charlie was known as a hardworking individual dedicated to providing for his family and maintaining their farm, providing for his family and maintaining their farm.
Speaker 3:Oh, fanny Larson. She was the mother, fanny Manring Larson. She was born on December 25th funny enough, 1897, and she was Charlie's devoted wife. She dedicated herself to the household, her children. Fanny played a vital role in the family's daily life, managing the home, supporting the farm's operations alongside her husband and basically had that typical role that women had at that point in time in rural America. Knowing of her nurturing nature, fannie was a central, beloved figure within her family circle.
Speaker 2:And so again, charlie and Fannie Lawson had seven children, ranging from, at the time of this incident, infancy to young adulthood, and each kind of played their part in the family unit. Of course, at this time, like even the youngest at six and seven, would have had some chores on the family farm. That's kind of why you see these big families at that time Like seven kids wasn't unusual, because you needed that extra help. Unlike as we would start getting to more industrial cities and as we developed technologies, families started having a lot less. But you had Marie, who is the eldest, was born on June 27th of 1912.
Speaker 2:And she often took responsibilities that surpassed her years assisting with households and basically raising her siblings. Arthur, who was born December 31, 1913, was a pivotal figure in the family's story and would be destined to be the sole survivor of the Lawson Family Massacre. The remaining children were Carrie, who was born March 12, 1916, mabel, born January 10, 1920, james, who was born July 3, 1921, raymond, who was born September 15, 1923, and finally the infant child Mary Lou, who was born August 1927. Experiencing the joys and challenges typical of childhood in the 1920s. So they lived on the farm. They would have gone to church in the community. This was a tight-knit rural area.
Speaker 3:So, economically, the Lawsons were reflective of many families in the Stokes County area during that era. Their livelihood was intrinsically tied to the land that they cultivated and, like many families, they faced financial uncertainties which were exacerbated by the Depression. During these struggles, they were considered relatively prosperous compared to some of their neighbors, as indicated by their ability to afford new clothes and luxuries on occasion, a testament to Charlie's diligence and tireless work on their farm.
Speaker 2:Socially, though, the Lawsons were integrated into the fabric of their community and did participate in local church activities and maintain relationships with extended family members in the area. Their outward appearance of normalcy and contribution to the community life further amplified kind of the shock that was felt and despair after the tragic events that would occur shortly.
Speaker 3:So when we're talking about their farm, as we mentioned, they were farmers. Their property was located near a small community of Germantown, north Carolina, and that was a symbol of the family's hard work and a crucial source of their livelihood. The farm consisted of several acres dedicated primarily to the cultivation of tobacco, which, as in much of Stokes County, was the primary cash crop which we talked about briefly. Tobacco farming required intensive labor and you had to plant it, harvest it, cure it, and it was a crucial component of the local economy. The Lawsons' involvement in tobacco cultivation not only underlined their integration into the county's primary industry, but also underscored the economic pressures they faced due to fluctuating crop prices during the Great Depression.
Speaker 2:And like. If you look at pictures and they're available, we'll try and put links in on the website. But it was a modest farmhouse. This wasn't some fancy mansion or anything. It's a very simple building and then even the drying sheds like this wasn't like a state of the art type of facility. This is just a wood barn. That's got you know a very almost. In the pictures I've seen, which are right after the massacre, the roof's kind of coming down a little bit.
Speaker 2:So they were prosperous as far as the community would see, but when you look at the actual environment they lived in it was very modest.
Speaker 2:So in addition to tobacco, the Lawson farm supported the growth of other stable crops such as corn and various vegetables. This diversification was typical of rural farms of the area and would provide sustenance for the family and compensation for the volatile market prices of cash crops. So you know you would grow your big main crop, which is in this case tobacco, and then you would have kind of your side projects for your side like farm business or you sell at the market and stuff and then just sustain yourself through the winter months and everything else. So they were taking care of their family through farming and also having a slight diversity. But really at that time you would have most of your land would have been used for tobacco production, hoping that that was going to be what brought in the most money. But as the economy starts to downturn, tobacco is a luxury, it's not a staple food item. So there's already got to be some pressures coming from those economic changes.
Speaker 3:And I'm not a farming expert, but from what I understand, in those areas it's difficult to get very many crops to grow and tobacco is one of those rare things that you know. I don't want to say it's easy to grow, but it's easier to grow than some of the other crops that are grown in other regions of the country, from what I understand. Again, I'm not a farming expert, but that's my understanding of the area.
Speaker 2:And another problem that was happening.
Speaker 2:Like they said, tobacco was a normal crop in a lot of like you're talking a lot of North Carolina, kentucky, so there's almost a saturation of it to a point like there's a lot of like you're talking a lot of North Carolina, kentucky, so there's almost a saturation of it to a point like there's a lot of it.
Speaker 2:So if you're starting to see a slight downturn in purchasing, anyway, it's an oversaturated market for a luxury item and that becomes volatile. When you start seeing this downturn in the stock markets and banking finance, everything is people aren't going to buy your crop. This is what you have to live off of and it doesn't take long at this time period to go from surviving as a farmer to not being able to survive at all. And then I don't know about this area, so we can't speak that this impacted this community. But we also know out in the Dust Bowl and areas there's also a lot of over-farming land, so crops that were being grown were starting to come in less quality, lower quality or just not growing at all. So there's also those impacts. Again, I can't say that happened in North Carolina, I don't know that well, but that is something that had to be taken into account at that time as well.
Speaker 3:And the little bit again that I do know about farming is that a lot of it's very specific. So it's not like, if I know how to grow, let's just say, corn in Kentucky, I can't just take that knowledge to someplace in North Carolina and have the exact same success that I had in the other place. And I can't look at my farm and say, well, I've grown tobacco here for 10 years, I'm just going to plant corn and it's all going to be okay. So it's. There's a complication to it. It's not very simple.
Speaker 2:No, absolutely, and sometimes just the crop you grew before can take away so many nutrients that would not allow another crop to grow. I know a little bit from like little gardens my dad had growing up was nothing like what you're talking, a lot of acres here of land. But even then, like if you grew a certain like tomatoes in one area and try to grow something else the next year, the soil had been stripped of nutrients so you couldn't really grow and that's kind of that problem with over farming anyway. And we have suddenly become a gardening podcast. So let's get back to this. So the physical infrastructure of the farm was, as I said, kind of a modest farmhouse. There was a barn that would have been used for storing like farming equipment and then outbuildings, a lot of which would have been used for curing and processing tobacco, which reflected again the Lawson's economic status that they could not only afford just a farmhouse but these barns and the outbuildings that were needed for processing their tobacco. Despite the broader financial instability of the period, the family's ability to maintain and invest in farming resources suggested a relative degree again of prosperity compared to the less fortunate neighbors they would have had around them. So getting into the details of this homicide and this massacre.
Speaker 2:First I was brought to this again I've talked about in other episodes the more I've been embedding myself in Eastern Kentucky and culture. I've gotten kind of into bluegrass and older folk music and stuff and I had heard the loss and family murder song but not realizing that this was a true story. And it's something that I've learned being out there and making friends with the musicians and stuff, that a lot of these songs are very much embedded in the truth. So when I realized that this song that's very graphic song and very details a very short, brief overview of what happened here, just how tragic this was, and the more I researched it the more I was like I want to do justice to these individuals, especially coming up on 100 years since this horrible event happened To me. It's just interesting how music can impact you like that.
Speaker 3:But then that second wind when you realize that the song that's impacting you has got history behind it. So the Lawson family murders represent one of the most shocking and tragic events to emerge from the Great Depression era, and it captures the attention not just within Stokes County but nationwide, Because it really was just an unimaginable tragedy and the events unfolded on December 25th 1929, which forever marks Christmas Day in the heart of the Lawson family saga as just the tragic day that it ended up turning out to be. This chapter provides a chronological account of the heart-wrenching events that took place and the impact on each family member involved.
Speaker 2:So the Christmas morning Charlie Lawson gets his family up. They do their normal routine and then he makes the decision and tells them that he wants to take them into town to buy new clothes, which again they talk about how this is a sign of their economic prosperity. But it also may be a sign of exactly what he's got planned to come, because he also takes them to do something that is extremely rare and expensive at this time and that's take a family portrait. So he gets the family up, has them go buy new clothes, they get their new clothes on, they get a family portrait taken and then they return home Following this outing. After they return home, the first thing that Charlie does is he has Arthur go back into town to do some more errands for them, as the family's eldest daughter, marie, remained at the home to bake a cake in celebration of the festive day. Carrie and Maybel go to visit an uncle and aunt nearby an uncle and aunt nearby. As they're returning back to the property, charlie intercepts Carrie and Maybel and they are the first two victims of this massacre. He shoots them in the yard and then he shoots them in the back of the car.
Speaker 2:The methodic nature of this murder was kind of chilling. As Charlie proceeded to the house, his wife Fanny comes out to the front porch and he shoots her on the front porch. The terror continues as he goes inside where he kills Marie, followed by his youngest child, james, then Raymond and then unfortunately kills his infant child. Each of these innocent lives were exhausted in their most tender stages of life, leaving a scar on the entire community. But after these heinous acts, charlie disappears in the nearby woods where the anticipation of his next move gripped his neighbors and family friends. So the massacre's happening and it has happened. People hear it, people are coming to the farm, but Charlie's disappeared. They don't know where he's at. The last he was seen was going into the woods. So during this time, local community members, including relatives and friends, they're left in this stage of shock and apprehension and I can only imagine, like the family of him, the extended family, like he's massacred his family, is he going to come after us next? What's going on?
Speaker 3:And many feared what he might do next and the atmosphere around the area was one of tension and dread around the area was one of tension and dread, which, of course, makes sense, because these are the people that he's supposed to be taking care of and protecting above all else. And if he does that to them you know, as a neighbor or anybody else in the community why would he not do the same thing to me? If he's doing that to the people he's supposed to be protecting, what's going to stop him's doing that to the people he's supposed to?
Speaker 2:be protecting what's going to stop him from doing that to anybody else? And I think at this time period you know, sadly, today mass shootings and mass violence are not uncommon, but in this time period this is rare Like this, and especially in such a tight-knit community. What has happened, especially in a strongly religious community on Christmas? Like is the devil taking over Charlie? And especially when the first two children are killed coming back from an aunt and uncle like what are the fears of those aunt and uncle? Is he going to come after us? I couldn't really find anything that talked about the distances. We're talking here Like you can find the distance from, like the town to the house, but it doesn't really say in any of the stuff I found how far the aunt and uncle lived. Like did they live near the same property? If they walked there you would think it was somewhat close by. So people are hearing this, they're responding, but they're responding also with this apprehension of how close do we want to get? Because we don't know where he is.
Speaker 2:Law enforcement neighbors began a search, scouring the area for Charlie. The search culminates when gunshots were heard echoing from the wooded area. Upon advancing to the sources of the noise, searchers discovered Charlie Lawson's lifeless body alongside a pair of letters and notes. I was not able to find any like depth or detail, but everything I read said that the notes offered little in terms of definitive explanations or motives, instead contributing to the ongoing speculation about what drove Charlie to commit such horrendous acts.
Speaker 2:So he's killed all his immediate family, except Arthur, but doesn't really explain why, and there's a lot of speculation. Some of it is really grotesque and very it doesn't deserve any airtime from us because it can't be verified. But one of the things that can definitely be taken into account is that there was a lot of financial things that were going on. It was very common for men to see themselves as the breadwinners, and if he felt that he wasn't able to perform the duties of keeping his house together, keeping the farm, let me take my family into town, get them nice clothes, have a picture to remember us by, and then if I can't take care of my family, god knows what's going to happen to them. It's better to deliver them to heaven than for them to somehow end up destitute in God knows where and for me to be seen as a failure to my family.
Speaker 3:Which, of course, then there wasn't a lot known about mental illness either. So it's not like you're going to have any type of diagnosis or evaluation that we can, you know, use any of that as information to figure out what's going on with Charlie.
Speaker 2:Oh, absolutely. And even back then, like men were stoic, like men didn't talk about their emotions there was no, and women weren't really seen as talking about the home life outside of the house. So everything was always kept very inside and a guy's not going to say I'm not feeling right, I'm depressed. You see, and I mean we see it even now that they more lash out than they are willing to talk about their feelings and we don't know I didn't see records again of it but what the financial status of the farm and themselves was. We don't know if he was on the verge of destitution and this was a last grip effort and this was a last grip effort.
Speaker 2:I do think the timing's kind of weird that it's Christmas because there is, as we talked about in another episode, like this is a time that you do see an increase in domestic violence and issues like that, but especially because the pressures put on a family member, and especially the men, to like presents for your kids and things like that, because they don't really talk about that and any of this stuff is all like the kid's presents or anything. You just took them out to buy clothes, get this picture done, and that picture is available online. It is a 1929 picture. It is kind of, in a way, disturbing to look at.
Speaker 3:And as far as like the Christmas gifts and things like that, my grandparents would have been the ages of the children in this story and I know from their stories about what things were like then you might maybe at Christmas get an orange and that would be the extent of your Christmas gift. So if you're thinking about like Christmas gifts like in a modern sense it's not going to be like the trees overflowing or there's gifts laid out or presents wrapped it literally might just be an orange for each child and that might be Christmas. That might be it.
Speaker 2:A hoop and a stick pushing down a dirt road. Yes, one of the greatest old things that I used to hear old people say. When I was your age, I used to push a hoop with a stick down a dirt road and I always thought that wasn't real. And then I started seeing old time pictures where people were moving a hoop with a stick down a dirt road.
Speaker 3:And I was like, well, son of a bitch, that's a real thing.
Speaker 2:Absolutely so. In this story, though, remarkably, arthur was spared the fate that befell his family due to this errand that his father sent him on befell his family due to this errand that his father sent him on. On the morning of the murders, charlie Lawson sent Arthur into town on a task, a decision that inadvertently saved his life, but I don't know if it was like a lot of the things that you read like. Well, it inadvertently saved his life, but I very much think that Arthur was spared. He was 16 at the time, which would have been considered an adult. He was the adult heir to everything, so he would have been seen as being able to take care of himself. So I don't know if this Charlie doesn't seem like the type of guy that forgets he has a kid that he sent to town before he massacres the rest of his family. They'd already been to town, bought clothes, gotten this photo taken, so I don't think this was an act of God saved me. I think this was Charlie. Let his son live.
Speaker 3:Yeah, if he had a plan at the point when he went in and they bought the clothes and took the picture, if he already had that plan going, then I would think sending his son off to town would have been a decision, like you said, either to choose for him to live or possibly a strategic decision. Maybe he looked at his son and thought if anybody here can stop me, it's him, so I'm going to send him off to town. So then that way, nobody here can stop me.
Speaker 2:And I think if you can find the family photo again, I'll try to put a link on our webpage in the blog. But Charlie, everybody else, except one of the little kids and Charlie, everybody else is very stoic face, which is very common for that time. But Charlie has a smirk. So something in his body language shows that he's at peace and there's definitely something going on in his head. It's not that stoic 1929 photo, it's very much. I've made a plan, I'm at peace, everything's going the way I see it going.
Speaker 2:As the details of the family murders unfolded, arthur's survival kind of became a central point of interest in speculation. The community, as you would expect in rural North Carolina, really rallied around him as he grappled with the shock and sorrow of losing his entire immediate family. Local businesses and individuals provided financial support to assist Arthur during the immediate aftermath, in highlighting the community's empathy and solidarity in the face of unthinkable loss. And one of the pictures that we looked at which to me was kind of mind-boggling and you kind of had a different view on it, but to me it was mind-boggling that they buried them all together- and, when I look at it, that's what they did back then.
Speaker 3:They put everybody together. You were a family, and that was just the way it was, through and through.
Speaker 2:To me like and again, I guess this just goes off my, I'm a bitter, bitter man, but if you annihilated my family, I'm not burying you with the same people that you massacred. And you look at the headstone, it's got him as the patriarch at the top, and probably one of the most chilling photos that you can find is just all the caskets laid out and you can read about something like this. But it's not until you see something like that and this row of seven caskets laid out that it really hits close to home of just the extent and the victims that were taken in this one, I want to say selfish acts of male machismo.
Speaker 3:And the sizing of it too. It's not just that there's seven. Like you can see that there are distinctly some that are small, yeah, which is difficult.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it is very difficult, and when we talk about mental health and any family annihilation, I mean there's some of the worst cases to read when I look at mass murders.
Speaker 2:But just the ability to kill a child is, to me, harm yourself. You know an adult's, adult you have a fighting chance, but a two-year-old child, just that is who I really want us to remember more than anything. And why this story to me was so important was to remember those six, five children no, it was six children that were murdered at this man's hands because they didn't have an option, they didn't have a choice. So the tragic sequence of events, witnessed in part by Arthur, revealed a family dynamic overridden, with potentially hidden turmoil, overshadowed by the economic problems at the time and, emotionally, by the pressures of the time period on, specifically, men to be providers. While investigators and historians have tried to piece together the motivations behind Charlie's actions, the inexplicable nature of the murders challenges understanding and leaves many questions unanswered. This chapter in history kind of lays bare the progression of the crime and things that were happening at that time period, while also trying to memorialize the hands and hearts that were snatched away from us by such an evil act.
Speaker 3:Charlie's death by suicide also did not bring closure to the community. Rather, it intensified the misery and disbelief surrounding the tragedy. Theories emerged, ranging from financial stress to familial discord and mental health struggles, but no singular explanation could encapsulate the breadth of Charlie's actions, and I don't think that that's something that we can ever really figure out for this specific case or any of the cases that are like this. I don't think it's something that we can even wrap our minds around.
Speaker 2:No, and I mean part of it is it's very rare. These are usually murder suicides, so it's usually rare. You can't talk to the individuals. They're all gone.
Speaker 2:A lot of this stuff, especially this time period, was kept, like we said, in-house. Nobody talked about things, so you couldn't really go to neighbors. The shitty thing to me is that usually after crimes like this, you always have people that come out oh, I think, or I heard, or somebody said, and unfortunately you don't. That's not helping anything. It tarnishes the names of people. Or I heard, or somebody said, and unfortunately you don't. That's not helping anything. It tarnishes the names of people Because, charlie, being a murderer or not, you still don't want somebody to tarnish the reputation, because you can be two things at the same time.
Speaker 2:You can be a good person and a mass murderer it's possible. But also the victims shouldn't be dragged through the mud as examples of well, well, this bad thing was happening or this bad thing was happening. That led to why he did this, and I think that's probably the worst thing that you see, especially when you start looking at cases, usually within 10 minutes after them happening now because of social media and everything, but back then and kind of the tabloids and news, because whatever was well, whatever was most shocking is what got the front page and if I was the person that said it, my name got in the paper and that was a big deal. So unfortunately, I think sometimes horrific, very extreme, random rumors Thank you, exactly I was about to say, couldn't find the words though Became kind of folklore in this and I do respect that. A lot of the stuff I've looked at tried not to or did not delve into those rumors and speculations. It really, in my mind, tarnished the victims more than helped them.
Speaker 3:And I think part of that too is people again trying to make sense out of nonsense. Because you look at this and you can take it from one extreme to the other. Right, you could say, well, he realized that his family was going to have nothing, they were going to be impoverished if they had no food. There weren't the social safety nets that we have today. If they didn't have food, maybe his family would starve to death. You know who knows where they would end up if he couldn't take. You know he had an older daughter like. Who knows what would end up happening to her if he, you know, if he couldn't provide for her.
Speaker 3:So maybe if you're looking on like the I don't know if you want to call it like the positive spin of him, maybe you could try to say he was trying to protect them from those fates that were worse than death in his mind, and maybe he was trying to protect them from those things. It's hard to say because I can't make my mind to think that way, and maybe it's just. You know, I've seen so many bad things that I can't look at somebody like Charlie and try to see a good part of him. But you know, maybe it was something like that, some type of misguided protective instinct, but it's hard to say. I think more likely in my mind it'd be more like a mental illness control type thing. He's losing control. He's losing financially. The whole country's falling apart. The future is uncertain. I don't know what's going to happen. But if I do this, I know what's happening and I'm taking control of the situation.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think that that's a big thing is, when we say control, we're not just talking about like him controlling his family, it's him having control over life and taking a little bit back, not not again as bad terminology, not in the normal like murder or having control of life, but having control of destiny and fate. Like at this time you're watching everything around you collapse, your family's dependent on you, you have to try and feed an infant, small children, your wife, and I think, like you said, there's a big part of me that, being a former police officer and having dealt with and studied all these horrible crimes and seen horrible things, that again is like 700 episodes in themselves of just that type of trauma. But then also coming from the social work side and being able to say, like I said, that you can be two things at once, like you can be a good father and have the best intentions, but they are horribly misplaced and you massacre innocent people in your mind, which I think again goes back to mental health. You think is the only option you have and I think here later I kind of will mention how that can be addressed.
Speaker 2:But in the years following this tragedy, arthur himself, the sole survivor of this sad massacre. His life was significantly marked by the events of that Christmas day and he faced challenges, rebuilding his life amidst the lingering public attention and his own personal grievances. While Arthur rarely spoke publicly about the murders, he did continue to reside in the community, tackling the intricate process of coping with unforeseen circumstances tackling the intricate process of coping with unforeseen circumstances. But sadly, his life just ended up being marred by tragedy. In 1945, arthur Lawson was killed in a motor accident and he left behind a wife and four children. So 19 years after his family was, 16 years after his family was killed, he sadly lost his own life.
Speaker 3:The local reaction was characterized by a mix of shock and sorrow and confusion. Understandably, the sudden loss of the Lawson family, coupled with the brutal manner in which the events transpired, left neighbors and relatives devastated, which of course it would. Members were often seen gathering at local churches and homes, seeking solace and comfort in shared mornings, and vigils and memorials were held, attended by large crowds who came together in an effort to support each other and honor the memory of the victims.
Speaker 2:The emotional impact on local residents also was profound, as many struggle with feelings of fear and vulnerability heightened by this tragedy, which is understandable. That's a major shock. These were close-knit communities, not like now where I may see my neighbor but I don't know many things about him. A lot of these small-knit communities were related somehow, or related within three degrees of separation. So it's very understanding that they would have fear themselves, especially because the impacts in some of the things they thought may have influenced him were happening to other families in the community. So the understanding that such violence could erupt within a familiar and presumably safe environment was deeply unsettling and this led to heightened anxiety and protective instincts among families in the area. And the media coverage also at the time didn't help. But one thing that did come out of that is that the family was memorialized in different ways through culture and music.
Speaker 2:So one of the most poignant representations of loss and family tragedy has been found in music.
Speaker 2:There are over 10 songs alone that have been written about the horrific events and these songs kind of capture the sorrowful and haunting details of the murder and emerge as part of kind of Americans' full-score music tradition and especially kind of sadly titled like the murder ballads of American folk music, notably the song the murder of the Lawson family, was a ballad performed by the Carolina Buddies and it became emblematic reflective of the era's response to the sensational nature of this crime and then the plight of kind of rural Americans at the time.
Speaker 2:The song's lyrics recount the events with stark clarity, serving as both a memorial and a commentary on the societal tensions of the time. The musical rendition provided a platform for storytelling and embedded the loss and tragedy in the collective memories through oral tradition. Me personally, there's a version available on streaming services. I played it kind of for all of us before we started, called the Murder of the Lawson Family, and it's by Dave Alvin and I listen to it kind of often. It's kind of a reminder of why I do the research I do, because the biggest thing to me and why I got in this again is just victims. And how do we keep the memory of victims alive and also learn from these tragedies to try and decrease the ability and more victims coming in the future?
Speaker 3:And I think that's hopefully what we learned from all of these tragic events, and I think sometimes that's why people study these and we talk about media attention and how almost a fascination with these types of cases. I think part of it goes back to trying to figure out why did this happen and what can we do so that it doesn't happen again.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. And again, it's hard and in this case it's one of those like, he didn't leave a lot of information. It's almost now 100 years ago, so going back and trying to get the details that we would want now as researchers, it's really hard. We can't even find census data, we're not probably going to find the exact letters and we're not going to find actual witness accounts that really give us the information we want.
Speaker 3:Again, you got those rumors out there, but we can't get cold hard facts. And even if that stuff was available, as far as like if we could see everything that they had and in an evidentiary standpoint now that they had been, that still doesn't mean we'd know yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2:Again, you know this better than I do as a former prosecutor. There's their side, there's a offender side, the victim side and then the truth, and we would never be able to get that in between. But in the the Lawson family murders in the historical context underscore the complex intertwining of personal tragedy with broader societal forces which were characteristic of the Great Depression era and, I think, other eras that have happened in the United States, especially political and financial turmoil. The examination has provided insight into how devastating economic pressures and societal dynamics during one of America's most challenging times can manifest in profound personal loss and turmoil, era hardships and reflective both the universal struggles of rural communities and the individual human experience that history often overshadows Like.
Speaker 2:Again, this was something I've studied mass murder, family annihilation, serial crimes for a long time. I had to learn about this through a song, it's just not one that I'm sure more people know about it. But also I'm not from North Carolina, so. But the comprehensive look at Lawson's family, their farm and the ensuing tragedy highlights again these economic, social and cultural factors that contribute to and were affected by the events of December 25, 1929, from the implication of patriarch Charlie Lawson's actions to the community responses and the portrayal of the murders in popular culture. The analysis demonstrates the multi-faceted impacts of such tragedies and can be a reminder of why mental health, community support and adequate resources are needed. Do you have anything you would like to add to this?
Speaker 3:Nothing that I can think of that's particularly helpful. It's just one of those super sad, super tragic, horrible things that happened that you want to look for it and you want to try to say what can we learn from this or what's the silver lining. But I struggle to see anything from that. I really don't see one of those learning experiences because, like you said, from the outside none of the neighbors knew what was going on. None of the other family members knew what was going on and, like you said, that stuff was all contained in the home in that time period. But also, like you said, everybody knew everybody else. There were people who knew this family for their entire lives, people who had grown up with them and probably felt like they knew Charlie as well as they knew themselves or anybody else. And so it's kind of scary when you think about you know that he's just in their community and nobody knew that something was wrong.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that's the biggest part and kind of a wake up call to all of us. Maybe the more technology has gotten to us and the farther we spread out from our roots and everything else, the easier it is for these type of developing situations to go unnoticed and for us to kind of lose those connections. And when people lose human connections they lose access to support, to connectivity with their community, and it becomes easier to see yourself not only disconnected but that when a hard time does come, that you don't have any real options. So I think let this, if anything, a silver lining is take this as a warning of when times are getting tough and there are problems to look out for each other and look out for your neighbors. And you know, maybe this Christmas, you know, remember Marie Fanny, baby Mary Lou, carrie, raymond, mary Bell and James, and even Arthur though he survived, I'm sure he was never whole again. For sure.
Speaker 2:So thank you for listening to this episode. Please keep the Lawson family's memory and names alive and have a Merry. Christmas.
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