Headless Outlaw of Tennessee, Part l

In the early part of the 1800s southern parents warned their children to stay on the righteous side of the law or John Murrell would eat them . . .

John Andrews Murrell

John A Murrell once was known as the most dangerous outlaw in the South. As a young boy he lived with his mother Zilpah Murrell at her tavern in Columbus, Tennessee. Some sources state she ran a brothel.

Murrell’s father was an itinerant preacher who encouraged him to be honest but it was his mother who had the greater influence upon him. Zilpah taught him to steal at an early age she also instilled in him a hate for anyone she perceived as being of the quality class—especially the religious.

By age 12, John was an accomplished thief. By age 16, he was a notorious robber who plagued travelers along the roads and trails in Williamson County—specifically along the Natchez Trace, which I write about here.

Murrell often cornered his victims by posing as a gentleman himself. His first brush with the law was when he was caught after he stole a fine mare from a widow.

He was branded in court on his thumb with the letters H.T. this stood for Horse Thief. He then was whipped, all without a noticeable flinch from him. He served a year in prison.

After this he hated people even more. He went from bad to worse.

Murrell was an accomplished con man. His appearance helped in this deception. He was tall, moved with grace and had fine boned features. His auburn curly hair attracted more than one fine lady. Murrell was a womanizer.

He was well spoken and often accepted without question into the finest homes. In contrast, he was fearless and had icy blue eyes. He also was a killer.

He often took on the guise of his father’s profession—a preacher. As he preached fire and brimstone in various churches his men where outside taking the congregations’ horses.

Murrell stealing a slave.

Good source material. 

For a while he had a lucrative business where he stole slaves. He would lure them away with a promise of freedom and then kill them. At first he would resale them, then he would steal them back but once he thought they might be recognized he killed them.

One source states he did this to 100 slaves.

He victimized people across the South from Arkansas to Louisiana. Here are two good sources about John Murrell that separate facts from fiction.

This sorted tale continues in Part ll of Headless Outlaw of Tennessee.

Headless Outlaw of Tennessee, Part ll

Portrait of Murrell
done while he
was in prison.

In the early 1800s John Andrews Murrell was the South's most notorious thief and murderer.

Despite  Murrell’s crimes he was able to maintain a respectable home in New Orleans with a wife and children. Some state his wife was actually a shady lady and just a business partner.

It was Murrell’s vanity that eventually brought him down. Virgil Stewart befriended him and played off Murrell’s self-importance. He pumped Murrell for the location of his hideouts etc. He then led the law to the outlaw in Tennessee.

In 1824, Murrell was captured. His elderly father paid his bail. He fled to Alabama where he was recaptured and returned to Tennessee for trial.

Stewart testified against him. He described Murrell as a cold-blooded killer who robbed and then killed his victims. In other instances, he stated Murrell killed people just to keep them quiet.

He testified that Murrell’s attitude was one of “all such fools should die as soon as possible.”

Murrell admitted to robbing people but stated he was not a killer. People where he lived viewed him as a sort of hero and believed him. They viewed Stewart with distaste and felt he was just trying to make money from his association with Murrell.

Stewart did write a book, entitled, The Great Western Land Pirate using the name Augusta Q. Walton, which sensationalized the facts.

Stewart's book

Despite the evidence Murrell was not hanged instead he was convicted of stealing slaves. He was sentenced to prison hard labor.

Murrell entered the penitentiary in 1834. His wife immediately divorced him. Life in prison was not easy. During an attempt to escape, he broke his leg as he jumped from a brick wall.

After this, he contracted tuberculosis. In poor health, he was pardoned after serving ten years in 1844. He was considered an old man at the age of 40. He was encouraged to move to the mountains, an environment that would help his health.

He became a respected blacksmith in Bledsoe County north of Pikeville, Tennessee. His work was greatly admired. He now was a believer and attended church on a regular basis where his bass singing voice was enjoyed by all.

But within the year his TB worsened and he died in November of 1844. Near his death he confessed to most of his crimes. He stated, “He had never killed anyone that didn’t need killing.”

But his dealings with slaves point out he was a ruthless killer. The slaves he and his men killed were disemboweled and then rocks where put in their bellies so they would sink in the swamps and rivers where their bodies were disposed of.

The locals buried him in an unmarked grave. Soon after, however, a Nashville paper noted his death and mentioned where he was buried.

Two doctors got it into their heads they wanted to study him. They dug up his body and cut off his head. They also took his thumb with the brand. Later, a young lady out picking berries discovered his body, minus his head laid out across his coffin.

These two doctors fell out and others who had a mind to make money took his head to Jasper where they charged ten cents apiece for a peep at it. The once admired outlaw now was a sideshow freak.

His head was eventually taken to Nashville and then on to Philadelphia where it was reburied in an unknown location.

Murrell's thumb

Today, his thumb is located at the Tennessee State Museum where it is taken out and put on display once a year.

The rest of John Murrell’s body was placed back in his grave at Smyrna Cemetery. After this the citizens of Bledsoe County began to believe Murrell’s soul was uneasy.

Stories circulated that after sundown a dark headless apparition was seen wandering aimlessly among the tombstones. It was thought it was Murrell looking for his head.

By the 1950s and 60s locals took up a collection—one dollar at a time—at the local drugstore. A simple marker with Murrell’s name was placed over his grave.

This act appears to have settled down this haunting.

Read more about this twisted tale in Part l, Headless Outlaw of Tennessee.

Terrifying Tales: The Tailypo

“At night when the moon shines, and the wind blows, you can hear a voice say: Tailypo, tailypo, now I’ve got my tailypo.”

Tailypo is a North American folktale with roots both in Appalachia and the South. There are many versions of this story.

Johanna and Paul Galdone's version.

Most versions include an old man or hermit that lives in a small log cabin in an isolated area-- in the woods or near a swamp. He has three hunting dogs named, Uno, Ino, and Cumptico-Calico.

It was late in autumn, and the old man had not had much luck with his hunting. He prepared a meager meal of one thin rabbit for himself and his dogs.

Heading for bed, he spots a strange cat-like creature entering his cabin through a crack in the floor.

It was fat with a dark coat of fur. Its tail was large and bushy. The man still hungry grabbed a hatchet and chased the strange creature. He chopped off its tail and then it left the cabin the way it entered--screaming.

The old man then cooked the tail and ate it—it tasted so good he does not share it with his dogs. He then went to bed. Within the hour, he awakens to the sound of a loud thumping. He hears something scratching on the cabin wall.

A shrill voice says, “Tailypo, tailypo, who has my tailypo?”

He calls his dogs, “Here, here, here” and opens the cabin’s door. Chaos ensues with the dogs barking wildly, trying to follow the creature up the wall of the cabin. Their barking becomes faint as they chase the beast into the swamp.

When the dogs return, Uno is not with them—the man is unconcerned for his dogs often hunt on their own-- he returns to his bed as he hears the other two dogs settle down on the porch.

Around midnight he is awakened once more by a loud thump.

This time the scratching sound is at the back of his cabin—near where he lay. It sounded like the wood was being shredded and torn away fiercely.

For the second time, he hears, “Tailypo, tailypo, who has my tailypo?” His dogs rush around the side of the cabin barking and growling. He gets up in time to see just Cumptico-Calico chase the dark figure back into the swamp.

When Cumptico-Calico doesn’t return-- the man reassures himself that Calico like the other dog was hungry and had found something else to hunt—exhausted the man goes back to bed.

Just before dawn, he is awakened for the third time. Now the thumping is at the foot of his bed, and he once more hears the scratching. He watches as his covers are pulled off. Frightened, the man dares not look anymore.

He feels the creature jump on the bed and then it pokes him with its sharp claws as it walks from his feet to his neck.

It then demands loudly, “Tailypo, tailypo where is my tailypo?” The man unable to move spots its' gleaming yellow eyes.

Several days later, a neighbor found the old man’s bed shredded to pieces with random bones laying about. His dogs were never seen again.

They say when the moon shines bright, one can hear way off in the swamp, “Tailypo, tailypo, now I have my tailypo.”

Here is a link that lists several versions of this folktale.

One favorite version of this story is presented in Johanna Galdone’s picture book entitled, The Tailypo: A Ghost Story. Her tale leaves so much to the reader’s imagination that it actually is one of the scariest versions.

The Swamp Fox and the Ghostly Sentry

To look at Francis Marion, no one would have guessed that he would be one of the heroes of the American Revolutionary War. He was small of a statue standing at only five feet tall, and he had malformed ankles. 

History has viewed him in two very different lights. Americans view him as the crafty “Swamp Fox” who won the war in the South for America. 

The British viewed him as a cruel butcher who killed Indians for fun during the French and Indian War and raped the female slaves he owned. The truth lies somewhere in the middle of these two views.

Francis Marion never claimed to be noble, he instead was a product of the times he lived in. He did own slaves, and he was a vicious fighter during the French and Indian War in 1760. It was during this fight that Marion learned valuable lessons in warfare that would help America. 

He observed that the Cherokee Indians while fighting, used the surrounding landscape to their advantage. They would conceal themselves in the Carolina backwoods and then ambush the unsuspecting colonists. 

Decades later Marion used these same tactics--that would eventually become known as “guerrilla warfare”-- against the British.

In 1775 Marion was newly elected to the South Carolina Provincial Congress when the Revolutionary War began, after the battles of Lexington and Concord. 

He joined the fight as a Patriot and for the first few years he was in charge of guarding Fort Sullivan. Which he did successfully. 

In 1780, while attending a dinner party, Marion suffered through the traditional toast after toast. The host had locked all the doors in the home and Marion never one to overindulge managed to escape the house by jumping from a second story window--he broke his ankle in the fall. 

As he was recuperating in the country the British took Charleston--Marion laid up evaded capture. As fate would have it, this changed the course of the war in the South.

Recovered, Marion took command of his first militia where he and fifty men--both white and black-- raided a large British encampment by hiding in dense foliage--they attacked from behind and managed to rescue 150 American prisoners. 

Often outnumbered, Marion's militia continued to use guerilla tactics to surprise the Redcoats. This strategy was very successful-- for the British never knew where he would attack next. 

Marion was able to both constantly needle the enemy--he was particularly adroit at disrupting the British supply lines-- and inspire patriotism among the locals.

By November of 1780, Marion earned the name, “Swamp Fox” which he is remembered by today. 

A British Lieutenant Colonel gave him the name after he chased him for seven hours over 26 miles at which point Marion managed to escape into a swamp. 

The Colonel stated, “As for that damned old fox, the Devil himself could not catch him.” The story spread, and the locals who loathed British occupation now cheered the Swamp Fox.

Francis Marion never commanded a large army or led a major battle, but his efforts after the devastating defeat at Charleston helped keep the cause for American independence alive in the South. 

After the war ended, Marion served in the South Carolina Assembly. He was opposed to punishing Americans who had remained loyal to the British during the war. This is another reason Americans admired him. *

The Swamp Fox had an unusual ally during the Revolutionary War. 

William Wragg who owned Wedgefield Plantation near Georgetown was a staunch Tory--meaning he was a loyalist who supported the British. His home was often used to keep Patriot prisoners that were captured. 

Unbeknownst to Wragg, his daughter was a staunch Patriot who became a spy for the Swamp Fox. She communicated with Marion by leaving notes in a crack in a tombstone in Prince George Churchyard.

One note she left for the Swamp Fox resulted in a haunting that has continued for over 130 years. 

Wragg’s daughter told the Swamp Fox that the father of one of his men had been captured along with several other Patriots and they were imprisoned in her home. 

She informed Marion that the entire household including all but one British sentry was to attend a party at a neighboring Tory Plantation the following Friday. He quickly planned a rescue.

As the Swamp Fox and his men entered Wedgefield’s yard the one remaining sentry did not suspect foul play, in fact, he greeted the group. 

As legend has it, Marion or one of his men took out their saber and chopped off this man’s head. Morbidly, it is noted his decapitated body fell to the ground and continued to twitch like a chicken without its head. 

The prisoners were released, and Wragg finding them gone was incensed. He had no idea his daughter had aided their freedom.

Late one night, several weeks later Wragg’s daughter was awakened by the sound of pounding horse hoofs. She flew to her second-floor bedroom window to see who had entered the yard. 

Curiously, she spied no horses below. But what she did see horrified her. She saw a headless figure dressed in a British uniform stagger up onto the veranda and then just disappear. 

She was just the first witness to see this odd apparition. Many others have seen this headless figure at Wedgefield, over the years. The most recent sighting happened in the 1930s just before the old house was torn down.

*  After the war, General Marion was a national hero second only to George Washington.

The Defiant Knight Company

“We stood firm to the union when secession swept like an avalanche over the state. For this course alone we have been treated as savages instead of freemen by the rebel authorities.”

--Newton Knight (petition to Governor William Sharkey, July 15, 1865)

Soon after Abraham Lincoln was elected president of the United States in November of 1860, Mississippi, led by slave-owning planters, seceded from the Union in January of 1861. 

However, not everyone who lived in Mississippi agreed with this decision. In fact, some Mississippians’ viewed the rebellious Confederate government as the invading body. This is the story of Newton Knight and his opposition to the Civil War.

Newton Knight was born in Jones County, Mississippi in 1837 when the landscape was still dominated by virgin longleaf pines stood, and wolves and panthers still roamed the land. 

In 1858 he married Serena Turner and moved to Jasper County to set up a homestead where they grew corn and sweet potatoes, and raised hogs and cattle. Newt worked hard and tilled the land himself. According to his family, Newt was a loving father who never drank or cursed.

When Mississippi seceded from the union most of the people in Jones County, Mississippi were poor farmers who did not own slaves. They did not care about their states right to maintain the institution of slavery. In fact, Jones County had the smallest number of slaves in the state.

Mississippi swept up in war fever didn’t take kindly to any southerner who opposed the war. Those who did were labeled cowards and traitors. In fact, during this time anyone who refused to join the Confederate Army knew the penalty was death. So many Mississippians joined against their will. 

Newt Knight reluctantly enlisted in the Confederate Army in the fall of 1861 but soon after he was furloughed so he could return home to see his father, who was dying.

In May of 1862, Newt enlisted as a private with his friends and neighbors into Company F of the Seventh Battalion, Mississippi infantry in Jasper County. They joined together so they could avoid a draft that would have sent them to serve with strangers. Years later Newt stated he only agreed to serve as an orderly so he could care for the sick and wounded.

During this time the Confederate Congress passed the infamous “Twenty-Negro Law,” which exempted planters who owned twenty or more slaves from having to fight. This law basically made sure that a rich man’s war was to be fought by poor men. 

Newt hearing that the Confederate cavalry had taken his families’ horses went AWOL in November of 1862. He made the 200-mile journey back to Jones County—managing to avoid capture by the Confederate patrollers who searched the roads for deserters.

Once home, Newt was shocked to find most of the farms in ruin. The war had taken all the local men—so there was no one to tend the crops, etc. The women of Jones, Jasper, and Smith counties were all struggling to feed their children. 

Things were made worse by the “tax-in-kind” system the Confederates had put in place, which allowed tax collectors to take what they wanted for the Confederate armies. Most of the animals and food stores and even the cloth the women used to make clothes for their children had been claimed. This left all these families to suffer.

“If something is not done by the legislature to open the corn cribs that are now closed against the widow and orphan, and the soldier's destitute families I know that we are undone. Men cannot be expected to fight for the Government that permits their wives and children to starve.”

         --A neighboring planter in Smith County warned Governor John J. Pettus

In May of 1863, the Seventh Battalion rushed into the Battle of Vicksburg. When Newt refused to go back into the Confederate Army, he was arrested and imprisoned. The Confederates tortured him and destroyed everything he owned—leaving his family destitute. 

Vicksburg was a six-week siege, which trapped the Confederate soldiers in a nightmare. After the Confederate’s defeat at Vicksburg, in July of 1863, many soldiers deserted. One soldier who walked home to Jones County after this battle found his wife dead. She had given what little food there was to their children and starved to death.

In August of 1863, the Confederates sent Major Amos McLemore to round up the deserters. Newt organized a company of men, approximately 125, from Jones, Jasper, Covington, and Smith counties to defend themselves against the Confederates. 

This group became known as the Knight Company. Newt, a tall, powerful man, who was known for his imposing presence, was elected captain. He was an expert with his double-barreled, muzzle-loading shotgun, and he proved to be a skilled and resourceful guerrilla war captain.

To avoid capture, the Knight men would disappear into swamp hideouts, called “Devil’s Den” and “Panther Creek.” They communicated with each other by blowing signals into hollow cattle horns. Sympathetic locals both white and black aided the Knight Company.  One slave woman by the name of Rachel supplied Newt with food and useful information.

Major Amos McLemore was shot and killed in the home of Amos Deason in Ellisville, Mississippi. Most felt it was Newt Knight who pulled the trigger. 

A storm raged outside as McLemore collapsed, his blood seeped into the pine floor in front of the fireplace, and no matter how much scrubbing was done by Eleanor Deason it would reappear every time it rained, or the wind howled. 

After many years of seeing the blood, descendants of the Deason family finally covered the wooden floor with new flooring. This covered up the bloodstain, but it can still be seen under the house where the blood came through the floor onto the rafters.

Today, the Deason house is said to still be haunted. On the anniversary of the murder each year the front door of the house bursts open without cause. The house was given in 1991 to the local chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution. 

They began restoring the house, so it could be opened to the public—several members of the DAR confessed that they were too uncomfortable to stay in the home alone, day or night.

As for the Knight Company men, their fate was not kind. 

The Confederate authorities embarrassed by the defiance of Knights’ men determined to stamp them out. Most were caught, some were mauled by Confederate hound dogs unleashed to flush them out, others were hung, their bodies left dangling from the trees as a warning to others. In the end, many were returned to their Confederate units. But the authorities never caught Newt Knight.

When the Civil War ended in 1865, Mississippi was occupied by Federal troops. They called Captain Newt Knight into service as commissioner in charge of distributing thousands of pounds of food to the sick and starving people in Jones County. Newt was also sent to rescue several black children who were still being held in slavery in Smith County.

In 1875 Newt returned to his farm in Jasper County, he brought with him his wartime ally, Rachel, now a former slave. His wife Serena left, and he married Rachel. She bore him several children. 

Newton died in 1890, at the age of 85. Under the Mississippi Constitution of 1890 whites and blacks could not be buried in the same cemetery. Defiant to the end Newt requested he be buried in a simple pine box on a high ridge, next to Rachel who had died in 1889, overlooking his old farmstead. 

The inscription on his tombstone reads, “He Lived for Others.”