User:Kf5hfv/Rainwater Creek Massacre

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Background

The Rainwater Creek Massacre was a series of inter-related deaths that occurred on or near Rainwater Creek in western Wood County, Texas over a three-day period beginning December 6, 1859. It was not a massacre according to usual definition, but the event became known as such according to local tradition. Rainwater Creek, as it became known, is a tributary of Lake Fork Creek, bisecting a tract of land that was settled by the families of Miles, Joseph, and Benjamin Rainwater in 1857.^[1] Benjamin's portion of the land proved difficult for farming, owing to its rugged topography and poor soil. Accordingly, he began to augment his meager sustenance through the distillation of spirits, which were dispensed to eager customers traveling the road between the county seat of Quitman and Simpkin's Prairie (near present-day Alba). Benjamin's business venture placed him frequently at odds with his brother, Miles, who was an ordained minister and an avid proponent of temperance.

Events

On December 6, 1859, John Tooley was returning from a trip to nearby Quitman where he had sold several mules and appropriated additional provisions for the winter. He stopped at Benjamin Rainwater's residence where he purchased a significant amount of corn whiskey. By the time Tooley arrived at his cabin on Old Lake Fork,^[2] he was substantially inebriated. Enraged that his wife, Polly, had not prepared a supper, he swung a heavy iron pan, fatally fracturing her skull. Realizing that she was dead, he fled on horseback.

The next morning, Tooley's neighbor across the lake, William Wright, noticed the lack of smoke rising from Tooley's chimney and decided to check on Tooley's wife and baby. Upon entering Tooley's cabin, he found not only that Polly had been murdered, but that her uncovered infant had perished during the cold night in the unheated cabin. The presence of Tooley's wagon, still loaded with provisions and corn whiskey, combined with Tooley's reputation as a violent drunkard, immediately aroused Wright's suspicicions of the perpetrator. On the floor lay the shattered remains of a whiskey jug, which further supported his hypothesis.

Wright immediately rode for Miles Rainwater's house for assistance. Rainwater and Wright returned to Tooley's Cabin, where Rainwater surveyed the evidence and reached a like conclusion. The pair then rode back to Quitman to report the crime to sheriff John M. Boyde, who returned with them to Tooley's cabin. Late that evening, Rainwater left to return home, but not before agreeing to meet with Wright the next morning to bury the bodies.

On December 8, Rainwater left before dawn to join Wright in their grim mission, which was performed without incident. Rainwater performed a brief service and erected a stone to mark the common grave of mother and child, then left for home.

As he travelled home, Miles Rainwater was evidently troubled by the role that his brother Benjamin's enterprise had played in this tragedy, and resolved to destroy Benjamin's distillery. Upon arriving at Benjamin's homestead, he retrieved an axe and began to demolish the still.

Benjamin, upon hearing the noise, ran in from his fields and engaged in a violent argument with Miles. In his rage, Benjamin drew a large knife and slashed at Miles, wounding him in the throat. Benjamin's wife, a Choctaw squaw,^[3] saw them struggling with the knife and ran out of the cabin with a loaded rifle. As Miles collapsed from his fatal neck wound, Benjamin turned and grabbed the rifle from his wife. Her finger entangled in the trigger, which caused the rifle to fire, fatally wounding Benjamin in the chest. In her own shock and agony, Benjamin's squaw then took her husband's knife and slashed her own throat.

Miles and Benjamin's brother, Joseph, was so overcome with grief at the sudden and tragic loss of his brothers, that he was unable to attend to the burial of the bodies. This task fell to Joseph's young sons, William and Robert, who buried them on a nearby bluff overlooking Rainwater Creek.

John Tooley was apprehended at a saloon in Jordan's Saline (now Grand Saline^[4]) where several witnesses had heard him drunkenly confess to having hit his wife. Upon becoming sober and finding that his actions had also resulted in the death of their child, he hung himself in his own cell.

Historical Significance

The tragedy of the six alcohol-related deaths kindled strong and lasting pro-temperance sentiments in Wood County. Upon the repeal of Prohibition in 1933, Wood County retained the local option to restrict the sale of alcoholic beverages, and remains one of thirty dry counties in Texas to this day.^[5]

Alleged Paranormal Incidents

Local legends abound regarding alleged paranormal activity at the site on Rainwater Creek. Some witnesses claim to have heard the wail of a young woman, followed by the appearance of unusual lights. Other witnesses have reported seeing the apparition of a young Indian woman with a knife. No formal efforts have been made to investigate such activity.

Notes

^ Joseph purchased the original 1280-acre tract of land from John Sparks, who had purchased it from its original Republic of Texas grantee, Edward Goodsir. According to prior agreement, the three brothers subdivided the land amongst themselves, casting lots or drawing straws to determine who received each portion.
^ Located on Lake Fork Creek, Old Lake Fork was a natural lake inundated by the impoundment of Lake Fork Reservoir in 1980. Consequently, the location of Tooley's cabin and the grave of his wife and infant are submerged.
^ Although hostilities between the area anglo settlers and the indigneous Cherokees and Choctaws ended with the defeat of Chief Bowles at the Battle of the Neches in 1839, some of the indigneous families remained in the area. See Yowani_Choctaws.
^ Grand Saline at Handbook of Texas Online
^ Wood County, Texas from Wikipedia

References

Doenitz, Duncan (1921), A Collection of Oral Wood County Histories, Commerce, Texas: East Texas Normal College Press
Rainwater, William (circa 1888), Letters of William Walton Rainwater, Quitman, Texas: unpublished {{citation}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
Republic of Texas from the Handbook of Texas Online

External Links

"Cherokee War" at The Handbook of Texas Online

[1] Joseph purchased the original 1280-acre tract of land from John Sparks, who had purchased it from its original Republic of Texas grantee, Edward Goodsir. According to prior agreement, the three brothers subdivided the land amongst themselves, casting lots or drawing straws to determine who received each portion.

[2] Located on Lake Fork Creek, Old Lake Fork was a natural lake inundated by the impoundment of Lake Fork Reservoir in 1980. Consequently, the location of Tooley's cabin and the grave of his wife and infant are submerged.

[3] Although hostilities between the area anglo settlers and the indigneous Cherokees and Choctaws ended with the defeat of Chief Bowles at the Battle of the Neches in 1839, some of the indigneous families remained in the area. See Yowani_Choctaws.

[4] Grand Saline at Handbook of Texas Online

[5] Wood County, Texas from Wikipedia

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