Robert E. Johnson Charged with Immoral Relations with Daughters, Dec. 6, 1924

Daughter Made Serious Charge Against Father. . . Daughter Promised Mother on Death Bed to Expose Father in Order to Save Baby

Gastonia, Dec. 5—Robert E. Johnson, prominent in business and social circles in Gastonia, head of the Johnson seed company, a large wholesale concern, and elder in the First Associate Reformed Church, and a Shriner, was arrested at his home here at 10 o’clock tonight on a warrant charging him with immoral relations with his own daughters, now married, the warrant being sworn out on information furnished by the young women to O.F. Adderholdt, chief of police.

Johnson is being held in jail without bail for a preliminary hearing before Municipal Judge Jones, which will probably be held tomorrow morning. He was unable to make arrangements for bail tonight because of the absence of Judge Jones from the city. It is understood that the offense is a bailable one. Johnson has not volunteered any statement as to his guilt or innocence.

Statements concerning the guilt of Johnson were made by his daughter, Mrs. Ralph Jordan of Spartanburg, S.C., with the concurrence of her husband, and involved another daughter, Mrs. Joseph Wayman of Boone, who is also in Gastonia, but who was too ill tonight to be called upon for testimony.

Mrs. Johnson died Wednesday at the home of Mrs. Wayman, in Boone, where she had gone in the interest of her health. It is alleged that she exacted a promise from the girls on her death bed that they would expose their father in order to save another girl child, 6 years in age, who is in the home of her father here. Mrs. Johnson was buried yesterday at Gastonia.

The testimony of Mrs. Jordan was volunteered to the chief of police in the presence of the district solicitor, the city solicitor and others, and that the chief then swore out the warrant for the arrest of Johnson. Johnson’s young son, who is in business with him, is said to have concurred with his sisters in the statement exposing the alleged reprehensible conduct of their father. Friends of the family were previously consulted. The matter has created a considerable sensation in Gastonia where the Johnsons have moved in prominent circles for years.

Johnson is about 48 years old and a native of Gaston county. He has been in business in Gastonia for perhaps 20 years. He is said to be a man of quiet and affable disposition. There had been no previous suspicion that anything was wrong in his domestic life. Mrs. Johnson was presumed to have been suffering with tuberculosis. She had been in bad health for a year previous to her death.

Mrs. Jordan, the daughter who makes the charges, is a bride of only a few months. Her husband is said to be standing by her loyally. The other daughter, Mrs. Wayman, has been married longer. She is alleged to have approved the course taken by her sister, but herself collapsed after the death of her mother and before the horrible disclosure could be made public. It is said that these sisters are determined that the other members of the family, a small child, should be saved from the fate that they allege had overtaken them.

From the front page of The Concord Daily Tribune, Saturday, Dec. 6, 1924

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