Burke Spruill's Killing of Mother Ruled an Accident, Nov. 5, 1926

Hyde County Youth Freed of Charge of Murder

Burke Spruill, Hyde County boy charged with killing his mother last week was freed of the charge by Justice of the Peace George F. Ratcliffe of Swan Quarter Wednesday.

The sanity of young Spruill was not questioned by the court, but it was brought out at the trial that the shooting was purely accidental. Further details of the shooting from a former report are on page two, section two.

From the front page of The Independent, Elizabeth City, N.C., Nov. 5, 1926

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Hyde County Man Held for Death of Mother. . . Mrs. Henry Spruill, Who Lived on Alligator lake Shot Dead Last Week

Mrs. Henry L. Spruill, 45, living on the shores of Alligator lake in the most isolated region of Hyde County, is dead. Her son, Burk Spruill, is held in Hyde County jail, charged with the crime of slaying her. From this isolated section, 15 miles from Leechville and without telephone connections, news comes slowly, but according to reports, Burk is a young man of subnormal mentality who spends much of his time with traps and gun.

He came home the afternoon in question from a squirrel hunt, he and his mother quarreled and losing his temper, he shot her. Burk says the gun went off accidentally. The shot lodged in the right thigh, and she slowly bled to death, dying the next morning.

The father came home a little later and according to rumor flogged his son, having been driven to a frenzy by the shock of finding his wife dying.

Editor’s Note: Notice that the son’s first name is spelled “Burk” in one article and “Burke” in the other article, both articles appearing in the same newspaper.

From page 8 of The Independent, Elizabeth City, N.C., Nov. 5, 1926

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News Briefs From Across North Carolina, Nov. 5, 1926

State News. . . A Digest of Things Worth Knowing About Old North State Folks and Things

--Suffering from poison which she swallowed, Miss Nell Holcomb, 22, is in serious condition at a Winston-Salem hospital. In the personal effects of Miss Holcomb were papers which indicated difficulties had arisen in a love affair and it is believed these were responsible for her act.

--Teachers of the Northwestern District of the North Carolina Educational Association ended their annual meeting at Greensboro with a resolution calling upon the Legislature to submit the question of an eight-months minimum school term to the people in the form of a constitutional amendment.

--Gertrude Neal, 5-year-old daughter of H. A. Neal, was almost instantly killed at Durham when she was struck down by an automobile in front of her home. No action has been taken against the driver of the car, the unhappy affair being termed by the sheriff as an unavoidable accident.

--It was a case of “Beauty in Distress” with the Greensboro College Glee Club beauties for a few minutes at Albemarle just as their big bus rolled in. As the bus was climbing the long grade up East Main Street the engine commenced to backfire and then the machine burst into flames.

--Samuel Owen, about 60 years of age, was in a Brevard hospital and police were seeking Sylvanus McCall of Gloucester township, as a result of a shooting said to have climaxed an election argument. Mr. Owen, prominent Republican, is the father of the register of deeds in Transylvania county.

--A suit for $50,000 damages was commenced in Richmond County by B. V. Downer against W. S. Love for alleged alienation of the affections of Downer’s wife. Attachment proceedings were at the same time instituted against Love’s property, inasmuch as Love is not in the county. Allt he parties concerned live in Hamlet.

--Two men who came to Kinston from far distance points recently to see each other for the first time in 40 years were members of a family broken up by a cruel tragedy in reconstruction days. One traveled 3,000 miles to clasp the hand of his brother, who came more than 1,000 miles.

--As a prelude to the formal opening of the 101st annual session of the North Carolina Methodist Protestant Conference at Grace Church in Greensboro, the annual meeting of the conference faculty was held Tuesday. The conference opened Wednesday morning at 9:30 o’clock and will be in session for five days, ending next Monday at noon.

--Conducting two raids in Wilson County Tusday night, deputy sheriffs captured one distiller, two plants and a small quantity of brandy, wine and beer. Rev. J. Hoover Lamm, Holiness preacher, is alleged to have been operating the distillery. Rev. Lamm was bound over at a preliminary hearing held Wednesday.

--B. T. Cowan, foreman of the county convict road gang, was killed almost instantly at Durham when the truck on which he was riding with 23 convicts collided with a street car on Holloway street. Mr. Cowan, riding on the running board, was crushed between the truck and the car. His body was badly mangled and both legs were broken.

--Arrangements are being made to hold in Warsaw one, if not quite the biggest Armistice Day celebrations in the State. Tentative plans to this effect have been formulated by Commander John M. Pierce, Adjutant M. H. Thomas and their corps of assistants. Fort Bragg will again furnish a band, football players, and numbers of officers and soldiers.

--Following his investigation yesterday morning into the death of the week-old child of Hurley Edwards, the 19-year-old daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Lonnie Edwards, who lives two miles from Raleigh on the Fayetteville road. Coroner-Magistrate Waring issued a warrant for the arrest of Lonnie Edwards, charging him with incest. He is alleged to be the father of the dead child.

--An 8-month school term for every child is the next logical step in North Carolina educational progress which has been made under the leadership of the Democratic party, declared Josephus Daniels in a campaign speech in Lincolnton. He also advocated adoption of the Australian ballot as the local result of the success that has been achieved in Buncombe and a score of other counties in the State.

--Suit against the City of Rocky Mount for $75,000 as an aftermath of the drowning of Bernard P. Vaden, October 1, 1924, when the automobile he was driving ran into a swollen creek on Wilson road, at the outskirts of the city, where the bridge had been washed away by the flood waters which prevailed at the time, has been docketed for the November term of Edgecombe County Superior Court.

--Damage suit for $30,000, filed by Gilbert W. Hoskins, a minor, against the Rev. Thomas Carrick, a retired Baptist minister of High Point, will be aired out in tis term of Guilford County Superior Court. The case is an outgrowth of an attack with a shotgun by the aged minister upon several small boys, whom he charged with stealing turnips from his garden and in other ways damaging is property.

--Sales on the Wilson tobacco market passed the 36 million pound mark with an average price of approximately $27 per hundred-weight still prevailing. Official sales figures announced today by Bennett Hooks, supervisor fo sales, showed that for the almost 5 million pounds sold this week $1.5 million had been paid, an average of $30.09 per hundred-weight.

--About two miles from Jonesboro is a well only 15 feet deep that was dug 40 years ago and during the long period of time has never gone dry, while other wells and springs in the community went practically dry. S. B. Worthy, who had the well dug for the benefit of the passing public, is now erecting a cover over it as a protection from the sun’s rays and to make the surroundings more pleasant.

--Asking $100,000 for the death of his two daughters, Laura M. and Bertha A. Wright, who died of injuries received when an automobile in which they were riding was ruck by a railroad passenger train last August, W. T. Wright of Bessemer City filed suit against the Southern Railway Company. Six young girls died in the accident which occurred on highway No. 2 at a grade crossing two miles west of Gastonia.

--There lives today in the city of Jackson, Mich., a lady now 91 years old, who in 1854 taught in the schools of Henderson, then hardly more than a flag stop on the railroad. That lady is Mrs. Martha Crandell Reid. The fact that she still lives after these 72 years came to light in a letter received by Prof. J. T. Alderman, for nearly a quarter of a century superintendent of the Henderson public schools, now retired.

--In spite of Winston-Salem’s well-known priority as the federal tax-paying town of North Carolina, more people filed income tax returns in four other North Carolina cities, according to statistics published by the bureau of Internal Revenue. Charlotte led with 6,655 returns; Asheville second with 4,15; Raleigh third with 3,400; and Greensboro fourth with 3,865. Winston-Salem was fifth with 3,700 returns.

--Sales on the Rocky Mount tobacco market during the past week totaled 1,490,416 pounds. The average price was $2 per hundred, more than last week’s average. This week’s figure brought the total sales for the season up to $14,883,660 pounds with the general price average standing at $25.26 per hundred pounds. This total is in contrast to 14,388,392 pounds sold up to the same date last season, when the average price was $24.20 per hundred pounds.

--Chief of Police A. D. Gardner of Fountain, Pitt County, barely escaped being blown to atoms by a stick of dynamite placed by a would-be assassin. Mr. Gardner came to Greenville on business, a distance of about 18 miles, and upon starting he discovered that his six-cylinder car was hitting only on five but continued his journey home and immediately drove to a garage to have a mechanic to investigate the trouble. When the hood was raised there was discovered three sticks of dynamite.

--One hundred girls students of the LaGrange high school observed “Cotton Day,” and discarded silk hose for the day. A recent census showed that 19 out of 20 wore silk stockings regularly. The observance marked the beginning of a movement. The LaGrange misses resolved that they will “insofar as is practicable, substitute cotton fabrics in all wearing apparel,” and hurled a challenge to school girls and young women throughout North Carolina to match their sacrifice.

--The endowment campaign for Atlantic Christian College at Wilson will be ushered in with a general fellowship meeting of the brotherhood of the Disciples in the Carolinas to be held in Greenville on January 14 next. The campaign will be for $300,000 adidtional endowment and $10,000 annual maintenance income from churches and individuals over and above the income from the endowment. Wilson has subscribed $100,000 for additional buildings.

--With expenditures for roads totalling $32,588,514 in 1925, North Carolina ranked fifth among the States for the Union in the amount expended for highways during the year, according to reports compiled by the U.S. Bureau of Public Roads. The total expenditure by the State Highway Department of the country in 1925 for road and bridge construction on the several State highway systems amounted to $640,125,101, according to the compilation. Thus North Carolina spent a little over 5 per cent of the national total.

--Five champions of Volstead prohibition, including ex-Governor Pat M. Neff of Texas, appeared at Charlotte Sunday in 15 addresses delivered before church congregations and mass meetings, in an intensive one-day campaign launched against liquor traffic on behalf of the Anti-Saloon League of North Carolina. Ex-Governor Neff, distinguished attorney of Texas featured the onslaught with three addresses in which he scathingly denounced not only the prohibition law violators, but the laxness of officials and individuals in not making greater effort at enforcement of the law.

--Claiming damages of $25,000 for seduction, Effie Whitley, 19-year-old Wake County woman, started suit against James A. Phillips, Wake Count farmer. It is set forth that three years ago the plaintiff was a young and immature woman without knowledge of the ways of the world while the defendant was a man past middle age, well acquainted with the world. It is set forth that the defendant gained the confidence of the father of the girl and that about one year ago, after he had by superior will brought her under his subjugation, he gave her some candy, which it is said seemed to have some peculiar effect on her, and that the following day he took her out in the woods and wronged her. As a result, she became a mother and her health has been impaired and her reputation ruined.

From page 2 of The Independent, Elizabeth City, N.C., Nov. 5, 1926

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Ida Hinton Sawyer Died Following Long Illness, Nov. 5, 1926

Mrs. Ida Hinton Sawyer

Mrs. Ida Hinton Sawyer, who died Wednesday morning following a long illness, was buried Thursday afternoon.

She was one of the best known citizens of Newland township and had lived in Pasquotank all her life. Beside her husband, she is survived by a daughter, Miss Emma Sawyer, and three sons, E. P. Sawyer, W. L. Sawyer, and J. M. Sawyer.

From page 3 of The Independent, Elizabeth City, N.C., Nov. 5, 1926

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H.A. Breard Argues that Catholics Are People in Carolina Magazine, 1926

Are Catholics People

By H. A. Breard

How a certain "shooting parson" of Texas can stand in the pulpit day after day and harangue his credulous listeners with tales of barbaric cruelty and oppression as practiced by the Catholic church, and at the same time callously murder an unarmed citizen who had come to protest certain statements of the parson, is inexplicable.

But the same condition is true of any southern Protestant congregation. Knowing nothing about Catholicism as a religion, they characteristically fear the worst, and are content to believe the wildest tales, whether from the lips of the most illiterate minister, or from the sanctimonious lips of the demagogue. For an office-seeker to openly denounce the Catholic church as an intolerable and dangerous influence to the well-being of our government adds a comfortable quota of votes to his total.

Certain inspired, ignorant, and hard-shelled Protestants are continually blaring about that well-known and highly over-estimated octopus, Romanism, whose Italian tentacles are tearing at the best in one hundred per cent. Americans. They give us the most wonderful pictures, painted by perverted imaginations, of the pernicious practices of the Roman Church. Of these blatant scoffers, none have ever studied the Catholic faith or have been within a church of that persuasion. If they have, their distorted imaginations, having a greater cash value than the truth, are brought into play. They feed the intolerant that which they desire — alarming falsehoods.

Having been raised in the fold of the Catholic church, serving an early apprenticeship as altar boy, and having broken away from the Catholic church, as I have from the orthodox doctrines of all others, I can smile at the petty fear which seems to grip the minds of good Baptists and Methodists when the name Catholic is mentioned. Some seem to have the idea that once a person is allied with the Catholic church, certain forces are brought into play which will keep him forever from gaining his freedom. The only force used to keep me, or any other of the Romanist faith within the church is that of prayer and family persuasion.

Some non-Catholics are laboring under the delusion that the Pope is all powerful with the Catholics; that he wields a temporal influence superior to that of the rulers of the countries in which the Romanists happen to find themselves. This is without foundation. The Pope is all-powerful spiritually, and that alone. He lays down rules of doctrine, and interprets the laws of the Church. But even here he is hampered. He has as much, if not more, precedent to guide him than the Supreme Court of the United States. Catholics believe that he is infallible only when he speaks ex cathedra, that is in matters pertaining to the Church. Of course they do not believe that he is incapable of making mistakes and doing harm in his own private life. There is too much evidence to the contrary for them to hold such an idea.

As to temporal matters the Pope's powers are nil. Without doubt some would like to wield such power, but they realize that discretion is the better part of valor. The popes in ages past did supercede the rulers of the various countries, but this was due to force of circumstances — the invasion of the barbarians and the weakness of the petty states that sprang up after the collapse of the magnificent Roman Empire. A large number of the barbarians had been partially catholicized, and they stood in awe and fear only before the successors of St. Peter. After acquiring this power, the rulers of the Holy See were loath to give it up, but those days are past.

The last vestige of their temporal grandeur crumbled beneath them when the Papal States annexed themselves to the newly formed Kingdom of Italy. The inhabitants were good Catholics, but they voted to go over to Italy. They saw themselves primarily as Italians, secondarily as Catholics. As a protest against this action, the popes have never since left the Vatican grounds.

Some are opposed to the use of Latin and the ritualistic form in the Catholic service. Both have logical foundations. The former is used because it is a universal link. The Latin language ties all Catholic churches together into a great whole, makes all services uniform, and carries the congregation back to the days of the founding of the Church. Then, too, the great Supreme Being possibly understands Latin as well as any other language. It is to Him that the prayers are directed.

The ritual is that to which the Church owes its great strength. After all, religion is a thing of the heart and not of the mind, and what appeals more to the heart and carries one to greater ethereal heights than an imposing ritualistic mass interspersed with beautifully sentimental music? The poor sin-burdened worshipper seems to be raised above this sordid plane during such a ceremony. Protestants, also, realizing the power of music to charm, introduced it into their gatherings.

There is a common belief that the Roman Church forbids the reading of the Bible. This is erroneous. A certain portion of the Bible is read each day at the celebration of the mass, and the reading of Bible history is encouraged. The Holy Book, and prayer books taken from it, may be found in almost all Catholic homes. The Church requires, however, that its version be read, because Catholics are under the impression that their church is the true church and consequently that the Catholic version of the Holy Scriptures is the true version.

Some suspect and many are absolutely sure that the confessional is a means of extorting money from the sinner. This may occur. I will not flatly deny it. But all during my connection with the Catholic Church, I have never had the subject of money raised while in the confessional nor have I ever heard of it being extracted as a condition precedent to absolution. Some priests may do so, but I do not believe that extortion is nearly so prevalent in the Roman Church as in others. The priest has no incentive to extract money. He receives sufficient for his upkeep; the remainder of the money going into the church fund. And any one who knows the Catholic faith realizes that it is not within the power of the priest to forgive. He is merely an intermediary. The priest asks God to forgive the sinner if he is sorry for the sins that he has committed. If the sinner should not be repentant, the confession is of no avail and the sins are all the more magnified.

Some are of the opinion that Catholics think that all marriages outside of the Catholic Church are adulterous. This is not the case. Protestant marriages are considered valid because the Romanists believe that Protestants have not seen the true light, and are not responsible for what they do. This is the explanation given, but in truth, force of circumstance causes the Roman Church to recognize them. It realizes that its members would not follow it in a strict construction. However a Catholic who is married by other than a priest is considered as living in sin, at least by the officials of the Church. Only the more bigoted members give it a second thought. The Catholic Church teaches that marriage is a holy sacrament conferred upon man by God, and only one of God's true representatives is capable of performing the ceremony. Upon this theory no union may be liquidated; the knot has been tied in Heaven. The parties may separate, but only the death of one of them will dissolve the matrimonial hitch.

Purgatory seems to be a stumbling block for many. The logic of the matter seems to me to be very simple. It is merely a midway station between Heaven and earth where those who have not suffered sufficiently for the sins that they have committed may do a little extra duty, in military parlance. Only those who are absolutely clear of sin may enter into the presence of the Almighty. Hell would be overpopulated if those guilty of lesser sins were consigned to that station, so the Church invented an intermediate place. Of course if one is guilty of a mortal sin Satan takes immediate possession of his soul on its passage from its earthly abode, the body. Then too, Purgatory is an excellent means for the Church to save old hypocrites who stage last minute repentances. They have not suffered for their sins on earth. It is necessary for them to suffer somewhere. Purgatory is an excellent place. Masses are said for those in Purgatory in order to strengthen them in their suffering there to attain the Ethereal Presence. The masses are said at a dollar a piece if the relatives are able to pay, but they are said gratuitously upon request. The receipts from such masses go to pay off the indebtedness of the local church. No doubt it is this practice that gives rise to the assertion of outsiders that the priest pretends to have the power to pray sinners out of hell. The Catholic Church teaches that once in hell there is no redemption ; prayers will do no good. Aside from this, the priest can't pray for any one. One must pray for himself. The priest only prays that God grant the sinner strength to fight sin and to listen to his feeble prayers.

Indulgences have been a bone of contention ever since the days of Martin Luther. Their sale was a prime means of raising funds in his time, but this was done away with by the Counter-Reformation. They are now obtained by prayer and good works. If one gains an indulgence, a certain amount of temporal punishment due for his sins are remitted. Remission for sins committed in the future was never granted. Some zealous prelates, however, may have led some credulous communicants to believe to the contrary.

What part does statuary play in Catholic worship: Are they idolaters? By no means. I do not know what the ignorant believe, but I was taught along with many others that the statues arc only material reminders, a tangible representation used to bring to mind the holy one of whom one is seeking a favor. The saints prayed to are not on an equality with God. They are requested to intercede with God, that is to pray to Him, in favor of the repentant sinner, and to ask Him to grant strength to the hitter to carry on in the monumental struggle against sin. The Virgin is not considered the equal of her great Son, but she heads the list of saints. She is often requested in prayers to intercede with her Divinely Conceived Child in favor of some heart-sick sinner who seeks grace. Is this not natural? Are not concessions on this earth often obtained through the intercession of mothers? The beads or rosary that Catholics use are merely counting boards upon which they keep track of prayers said in a certain sequence.

The Church of Rome demands celibacy of its clergy because it believes that an unmarried priesthood will devote itself wholly to the work of saving souls; that there will be no conflict of family ties and church duties; and that there will be no disruption in the congregation, due to the strange makeup of the usual preacher's wife. Doubtless these are reasons enough, but since celibacy is against a law of nature, it is perhaps against a law of God.

From the October 1926 issue of Carolina Magazine, published in Chapel Hill by the Dialectic and Philanthropic Literary Societies of the University of North Carolina.

archive.org/details/carolinamagazine19261927/page/n19/mode/2up Editor’s Note: H. A. Breard was a senior at the University and was on the staff of The Magazine in 1925. From the front page of The Tar Heel, UNC-CH Student Newspaper, Oct. 9, 1926 newspapers.digitalnc.org/lccn/sn92073227/1926-10-09/ed-1/seq-1/

Sunday School Presents Postmaster Hooper with Silver Loving Cup, Nov. 5, 1926

When a Postmaster Wept

Tears came to the eyes of Elizabeth City’s postmaster and he could speak with difficulty when the members of the First Methodist Sunday School of Elizabeth City presented him with a magnificent silver loving cup the other Sunday upon the occasion of his retirement from the superintendency of the Sunday School. Mr. Hooper had served as Superintendent of the school for four years and won for himself the love and affection of one of the largest and most active Sunday School groups in Eastern North Carolina.

Photo by Zoeller shows Mr. Hooper holding the beautiful cup, which is more than 15 inches high.

From the front page of The Independent, Elizabeth City, N.C., Nov. 5, 1926

To see the newspaper photo of the postmaster and his impressive loving cup, go to:

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K.K.K. Endorsement Doesn't Impress Presiding Elder Culbreth, Nov. 5, 1926

Columbia Preacher Is Popular with Klan. . . Kluckers Petition the Presiding Elder to Send Rev. Crumpler Back Next Year

The popularity of Rev. A. B. Crumpler, pastor of the Columbia circuit M. E. Church South, with the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, is ably attested by a letter that has been received by Presiding Elder Culbreth. An urgent appeal was made in the letter which was written on Klan stationery, but signed only by the impressive symbols “K. K. K.” that Mr. Crumpler be returned by the conference for a second year.

The appeal of the Klan to return Rev. Crumpler back to Columbia will not be forwarded to the Bishop who presides over the conference next week. The letter went into the Elder’s stove. “If I proposed to work for the return of Mr. Crumpler,” says Mr. Culbreth, “that letter would be the last excuse in the world to bring up.”

The work and purposes of the Ku Klux Klan do not arouse enthusiasm in Rev. Culbreth. “The organization is diametrically opposed to the order of things we have given our efforts to build p, and has no place in American life today,” he says.

If Mr. Crumpler is in league with the Klan at Columbia, then his association certainly doesn’t have the endorsement of Elder Culbreth.

From the front page of The Independent, Elizabeth City, N.C., Nov. 5, 1926

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Schoolteacher Is Bride of William Darden, Nov. 5, 1926

Became a Bride on Saturday

MRS. WILLIAM l. DARDEN

Before her marriage on Saturday at Tabernacle Baptist Church Norfolk, she was Miss India Bartlett, popular teacher in the Elizabeth City Schools. She is the attractive daughter of Mr. and Mrs. W. S. Bartlett of South Mills, N.C. Mr. Darden, who is the son of Mr. and Mrs. J. B. Darden of Sessoms, Va., has a position of responsibility covering several states. The couple will make their home here.

From the front page of The Independent, Elizabeth City, N.C., Nov. 5, 1926

To see the photo of Mrs. William L. Darden, nee Miss India Bartlett, go to:

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