Tom Dooley was
innocent! Hanged for a murder he did not
commit? There is no one happy in
Happy Valley, NC as Tom Dooley (Dula) is last seen on the back of a wagon,
pickin’ a banjo and heading for Statesville to meet his Hangman. Word on the street is that Laura Foster was
killed by one of Tom Dooley’s other women; possibly Anne Foster. That “word on the street” never made a
difference for Tom in the late 1860s.
The events surrounding this murder just after the Civil War
galvanized the small and isolated community. Happy Valley was anything but…Happy. The microscope of public scrutiny revealed a lover’s triangle with a
twist of STDs. It was discovered that Tom had more than two lovers in the
community that could have given him syphilis. His anxiety led him to make heated and inflammatory statements that were
used against him in trial. But, no one
keeps a secret better than a spurned lover. It is rumored that Laura Foster was
stabbed in the chest and buried in a shallow grave by one of them, possibly Anne…Laura’s
cousin.
Today the truth is but a whisper among the old trees in this
beautiful corner of the North State. The Kingston Trio immortalized the tale in
their 1958 hit song. The lonely grave
can be seen, still, off of NC Highway 268 in Happy Valley (between Caldwell and
Wilkes Counties). A small white fence guards the final resting
place of Laura Foster in a field across from a stone marker erected by the Woodmen
of the World. A lonesome place for one
of the more morbid chapters of Southern folklore.
No comments:
Post a Comment