Marie Meadows was my great grandmother.
She was the mother of 7 children, my grandmother,
the late Mary Emily Meadows-Davis (b.1917-d.1974)
being one of them. I only know sketchy details about her short life from the brief recollections of my grandmother.
She was said to have had a beautiful singing voice, could play piano, dance, etc. She had a bit of the entertainer
in her! She was born in Pomaria, SC on June 8th, 1894
to Frances Jeter Kelly (b. 1861-d.1971) and Lut Kelly (b.1862-d.1911) during a whirling thunderstorm!
Like that storm, she was a turbulent, strong-willed and somewhat enigmatic woman who was a launderess / cook to
make ends meet but who also ran a "liquor house", the southern equivalent to a nothern prohibition-era
"speak-easy" were homemade liquor (white lightning,
home brew, wine, etc.) were sold along with food,
music (live with piano or on the victrola) and
gambling (craps, horse shoes, poker).
It was during one of these intense poker games in the summer 1934, that a man who had lost all of his money and who had been ejected from the house for getting
too rowdy, returned later that evening with a pistol and began shooting randomly as the patrons all fled in terror!
He killed great-grandma Marie, her cousin and another man..then he wounded two others, one being my then elderly great-great grandmmother (Frances Jeter Kelly) who boldly confronted him and attempted to wrestle the gun from
his hand! She was shot in the hip and due to the almost non-exsistent professional medical care for blacks at that time in the south, carried that slug in her until the day she died, some 36 yrs later, at the age of 110!
That is all that I know about my great grandmother
at this point. She was 40 yrs old when she was killed.
She was the mother of 7 children, my grandmother,
the late Mary Emily Meadows-Davis (b.1917-d.1974)
being one of them. I only know sketchy details about her short life from the brief recollections of my grandmother.
She was said to have had a beautiful singing voice, could play piano, dance, etc. She had a bit of the entertainer
in her! She was born in Pomaria, SC on June 8th, 1894
to Frances Jeter Kelly (b. 1861-d.1971) and Lut Kelly (b.1862-d.1911) during a whirling thunderstorm!
Like that storm, she was a turbulent, strong-willed and somewhat enigmatic woman who was a launderess / cook to
make ends meet but who also ran a "liquor house", the southern equivalent to a nothern prohibition-era
"speak-easy" were homemade liquor (white lightning,
home brew, wine, etc.) were sold along with food,
music (live with piano or on the victrola) and
gambling (craps, horse shoes, poker).
It was during one of these intense poker games in the summer 1934, that a man who had lost all of his money and who had been ejected from the house for getting
too rowdy, returned later that evening with a pistol and began shooting randomly as the patrons all fled in terror!
He killed great-grandma Marie, her cousin and another man..then he wounded two others, one being my then elderly great-great grandmmother (Frances Jeter Kelly) who boldly confronted him and attempted to wrestle the gun from
his hand! She was shot in the hip and due to the almost non-exsistent professional medical care for blacks at that time in the south, carried that slug in her until the day she died, some 36 yrs later, at the age of 110!
That is all that I know about my great grandmother
at this point. She was 40 yrs old when she was killed.
Marie Meadows was my great grandmother.
She was the mother of 7 children, my grandmother,
the late Mary Emily Meadows-Davis (b.1917-d.1974)
being one of them. I only know sketchy details about her short life from the brief recollections of my grandmother.
She was said to have had a beautiful singing voice, could play piano, dance, etc. She had a bit of the entertainer
in her! She was born in Pomaria, SC on June 8th, 1894
to Frances Jeter Kelly (b. 1861-d.1971) and Lut Kelly (b.1862-d.1911) during a whirling thunderstorm!
Like that storm, she was a turbulent, strong-willed and somewhat enigmatic woman who was a launderess / cook to
make ends meet but who also ran a "liquor house", the southern equivalent to a nothern prohibition-era
"speak-easy" were homemade liquor (white lightning,
home brew, wine, etc.) were sold along with food,
music (live with piano or on the victrola) and
gambling (craps, horse shoes, poker).
It was during one of these intense poker games in the summer 1934, that a man who had lost all of his money and who had been ejected from the house for getting
too rowdy, returned later that evening with a pistol and began shooting randomly as the patrons all fled in terror!
He killed great-grandma Marie, her cousin and another man..then he wounded two others, one being my then elderly great-great grandmmother (Frances Jeter Kelly) who boldly confronted him and attempted to wrestle the gun from
his hand! She was shot in the hip and due to the almost non-exsistent professional medical care for blacks at that time in the south, carried that slug in her until the day she died, some 36 yrs later, at the age of 110!
That is all that I know about my great grandmother
at this point. She was 40 yrs old when she was killed.
She was the mother of 7 children, my grandmother,
the late Mary Emily Meadows-Davis (b.1917-d.1974)
being one of them. I only know sketchy details about her short life from the brief recollections of my grandmother.
She was said to have had a beautiful singing voice, could play piano, dance, etc. She had a bit of the entertainer
in her! She was born in Pomaria, SC on June 8th, 1894
to Frances Jeter Kelly (b. 1861-d.1971) and Lut Kelly (b.1862-d.1911) during a whirling thunderstorm!
Like that storm, she was a turbulent, strong-willed and somewhat enigmatic woman who was a launderess / cook to
make ends meet but who also ran a "liquor house", the southern equivalent to a nothern prohibition-era
"speak-easy" were homemade liquor (white lightning,
home brew, wine, etc.) were sold along with food,
music (live with piano or on the victrola) and
gambling (craps, horse shoes, poker).
It was during one of these intense poker games in the summer 1934, that a man who had lost all of his money and who had been ejected from the house for getting
too rowdy, returned later that evening with a pistol and began shooting randomly as the patrons all fled in terror!
He killed great-grandma Marie, her cousin and another man..then he wounded two others, one being my then elderly great-great grandmmother (Frances Jeter Kelly) who boldly confronted him and attempted to wrestle the gun from
his hand! She was shot in the hip and due to the almost non-exsistent professional medical care for blacks at that time in the south, carried that slug in her until the day she died, some 36 yrs later, at the age of 110!
That is all that I know about my great grandmother
at this point. She was 40 yrs old when she was killed.
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