A STORY , ONLY A STORY . But True .

[chuck j]

My father was a Mason . He told me many stories of works that promoted my feelings and attitude toward the life before me as a young man . His teachings are my mainstay to this very day . Not many will share openly what they truly understand or believe , it is a shame .

In the 1930's a man confided with those he trusted that he believed to be good men that a neighbor man was drinking and abusing his wife and children by staying drunk off the labor of his wife ironing clothes for the public. He beat his wife and children and remained in a state of intoxication most of the time , unable or willing to hold a job . The man was concerned for them . The children were hungry .
Having come to the attention of a group of moral minded men , two model A fords parked in front of the mans house (here in Wichita Falls) . One of the group knocked on the front screen door . The man suspected of abusing his family staggered to the door and proceeded to screem at the group of men to leave or he would do something ! The men entered the house , two men took the wife and children aside and comforted them and told them everything would be alright .
The remainder of the men loaded the husband into a model A and drove him to a dry creek bed not far off . They tied him to a cottonwood tree , let him watch them soak a cotton rope in a bucket of water and then they and beat him with it . (My father was with them , I honestly do not know what part he played .)
The man was taken back home , the men dressed his wounds and left medicine for further treatment and comforted his family . Money was given to his wife to sustain them with instructions to insure their their safety .

What do you think about that ? It's pretty weird by today's standards ?

[JALLEN]

Back then sometimes the law didn't always afford practical remedies. It wasn't uncommon to deal with problems with the resources available.

When I was in junior high, a couple of entrepreneurs set up shop on the other side of the railroad tracks behind the school, selling whiskey for so much a capful. Pretty soon, the trail of "customers" attracted attention. Whether those guys decided to take their business somewhere else, or their bleached bones are still out in some remote part of the county, I can't say, but they were never heard from around here again. The same thing happened when a fellow who was employed at the church as youth counselor or some such was caught one night peeping. Nobody ever heard his name again. AFAIK, the criminal records don't show any charges filed etc. The only reason I knew about it was I overheard my parents, both of whom were on the board at the church, refer to it obliquely. This was a long, long time ago.

Of course, those things don't happen much anymore. Too much publicity, too much anonymity. Even the mob has trouble finding people who can keep their mouths shut.

[03Lightningrocks]

My grandfather was run over by a train after he fell asleep drunk on a railroad track in the eastern Kentucky. He worked for the railroad. This happened when my father was just a child and the family rarely spoke of it. My grandfather was a very bad drunk... Mean one. Back in those days, moonshine was pretty common amongst hill billy's in eastern Kentucky. I remember an uncle who would get drunk as a skunk and turn mean. We all knew to stay away from him while drinking.

[suthdj]

I am not as old as you guys but I do remember being told to stay out of the farmers field otherwise I might get a load of rock salt in the butt and this was in Illinios out in the country.

[The Annoyed Man]

One of my friends back in California was a member of the 1968 Ohio State football team that beat USC in the Rose Bowl on Jan 1st, 1969. He is black, and is a member of a black church in Pasadena. In this church, there are a number of former NFL and NCAA football players, and they deal with those kinds of things exactly the same way as your grandfather did. If they heard of a male member who was beating his wife, they'd send a few of those big cornfed deacons over to the house, set the guy down, and calmly tell him that if he ever laid hands on his wife again, they would be back and hurt him even worse than he did her, and that they'd start by breaking his fingers. And then they would pray together over the guy and ask him what they could do to maybe make the burden easier for him and his family until they got their marriage sorted out. But no more violence, or else.

[SewTexas]

One of my friends back in California was a member of the 1968 Ohio State football team that beat USC in the Rose Bowl on Jan 1st, 1969. He is black, and is a member of a black church in Pasadena. In this church, there are a number of former NFL and NCAA football players, and they deal with those kinds of things exactly the same way as your grandfather did. If they heard of a male member who was beating his wife, they'd send a few of those big cornfed deacons over to the house, set the guy down, and calmly tell him that if he ever laid hands on his wife again, they would be back and hurt him even worse than he did her, and that they'd start by breaking his fingers. And then they would pray together over the guy and ask him what they could do to maybe make the burden easier for him and his family until they got their marriage sorted out. But no more violence, or else.

good! that's the way it should be!

Good guys. Christians. Churches. Elders. whatever. have sat down and let the government take over everything. Apparently the Government is supposed to mentor marriages, families, run hospitals, take care of foster care and adoptions, education etc....All of this was done by Churches up until less than 100 years ago. and yet you ask a church and they will say they do enough and don't compromise?

[McKnife]

I absolutely love hearing stories and experiences from the past like the ones above.

[K.Mooneyham]

My grandfather was a young man during the Great Depression, and though I cannot remember the details because I was a little kid when he would tell these kinds of stories. In fact, I distinctly remember hearing stories much like chuck j started with. Things were handled at a lower level back then, and though it might not have been legal even in those days, from what I remember of the stories, it was often effective.

[puma guy]

More recent than the depression years and more extreme is Skidmore, Missouri citizens' handling of Ken McElroy.

[chuck j]

That was actually not the end of the story .

The husband recovered soon after and sought day labor to provide for his family and worked for several months . Unfortunatly the neighbor reported back to the lodge that the man had backslid and started drinking again , beating his wife and children and no longer able to hold a job due to the effects of his drinking .

A few days later after dark the same two model A's parked down the street and the same eight men came to the front door . This time they were let in by the man's wife who told them he was drunk and asleep in the bedroom . They gagged him and put him in the same car as before , drove to the same dry creek bed , tied him to the same cottonwood tree and explained to him how a good man should take care of his family as they let him watch the same rope be soaked in the same bucket . He was beaten in the same manner as before , great care was taken to repeat the first event in detail . During the beating advice was given as to how a good man treats his family , how a man is the spiritual leader of his family , how a man gauges actions in regard to his family he was beaten until he passed out .

He was returned to his home and tended to as before , his wife expressed her apprication to the group of men before they left . The neighbor man reported to the lodge a little later on that the husband had recovered sufficently to seek work to provide a living for his family and had gotten a job with the city driving a bus . He was taking them to church and showed an interest in making sure their needs were being met as a husband and father should .

[Charles L. Cotton]

I never thought anyone could make me look like a liberal (or perhaps a libertarian), but you folks may have accomplished just that.

The French Revolution started out with good intentions -- rid the country of tyrants. The problem began when all tyrants were beheaded and the fine, upstanding God-fearing freedom fighters had no one else of whom they could make examples "for the good of the people." So they lowered the standard for being labeled a tyrant, thousands more were taken to the Guillotine, and these fine, upstanding, God-fearing freedom fighters reveled in the blood of all those dead "tyrants." The Spanish Inquisition also went well. Countless thousands of "heretics" were tortured and murdered in the name of Christ. I wonder how those tormentors felt when they actually had a chance to see what Jesus thought of their deeds.

Getting drunk, not working, beating the children and beating the wife was the justification for a felonious assault, not once but twice. What if he had a good job, but did all of the rest? Would that be sufficient for a little home grown justice? What if he had a job and didn't beat his wife? Does that still deserve a beating? And what about the sins of those who decided to take him into the woods? It reminds me of Christ's warning about removing the beam from one's own eye before trying to remove the spec from another person's eye.

Once people think they have the right to dispense their own justice in violation of laws enacted by their legislatures, you have to ask yourself "where does this stop?" Let's modify the OP's story a bit and say the man didn't drink, held a good job and treated his wife as the Scriptures require all of us husbands to do. However, he spanked his children when he felt they deserved it. Would the fine Christ-followers in his church who don't believe in spanking kids be justified in taking him into the woods and beating him?

The Trayvon Martin protesters who are marching, assaulting and threatening people simply because they are white feel like they are dispensing justice that was denied them in Florida. This is a very slippery slope. I'm 63 years old and while there were some good things about days gone by, not everything was rosy. Time tends to blot out the bad times and we look fondly on the days of our youth, often far more so than is justified.

Chas.

[mojo84]

As I read some of the posts and was reminded of the good old days when cops would deliver a little roadside justice. Here's an interesting story. I had two brother in laws. One was a white guy that was a son of a cop in Midland. The other was a Hispanic kid that was pretty streetwise but not a totally bad kid. The two kids never knew each other as they grew up.

After they were adults and were married my sisters, they were sitting around one evening talking about old times. The moment became quite awkward when the two of them started talking about their youths and my Hispanic brother-in-law mentioned how he was in Midland one evening walking down the street when he was a teenager and was approached by a Midland cop that accused him of some wrongdoing (not sure what as I can't remember all the details). The story goes, my Hispanic brother-in-law denied the wrongdoing and proclaimed his innocence when he was approached by the cop. When he did so the cop and his partner decided to administer some roadside justice and they beat the living dog out of him using fists, feet and billy clubs. My brother-in-law had scars the day he died from that beating some 45 years later.

During the conversation my white brother-in-law mentioned he remembered his dad bragging about how they had to whip a little Mexican kid into shape one day when he was a patrol cop and the kid wouldn't "cooperate". He proclaimed it had to be a coincidence until my other brother-in-law said he remembered the officers name and described him in detail. It was also easy for him to remember him as the cop that beat him advanced in the ranks and was a fairly visible figure within the police department.

Therefore, I think the idea of returning to the good old days may not be such a good idea. I also believe it is worth protecting our individual rights and liberties from those in authority as well as those that think they have authority. The end does not justify the means.

The good news, the two brothers-in-law agreed to let bygones be bygones and not hold what the one's dad did against the other.

[PUCKER]

Very well said Mr. Cotton!

Now to add to the OP's story...what if the wife needed beating? What if the kids needed beating??

I know I did as a kid...well, maybe not constantly...although I had some cousins who did...they even got what I like to call "pre-beatings" when we went to Walmart, out in the parking lot..."you're not gonna beg for anything in the store, are ya??" SMACK with the belt...I swear it's true...I saw it...they still whined and begged for useless junk in the store....my Aunt carried the belt in her hand always ready to go...it got used quite a bit on her kids (my cousins), unfortunately it did not sink in to all of them, but it did to most of them.

[chuck j]

Charles your post was 100% correct in a legal sense . The revolution in France turned into a bloodbath when the people (vigilantes) took the country killing men , women and children . The guillotine was invented and they couldn't produce enough of them , it turned into entertainment and sport at the executioners block .
Closer to home the the San Francisco Committee of Vigilance in California would be a perfect example and happened right here in this country . many innocents died . Vigilantes running roughshod hanging whoever they as individuals had a grudge with .
Even God commands us to obey the law of the land even if we don't like it unless it contradicts his own . Even Christ in his great trial said ;Give unto Ceasar what is Ceasar's .

I have cause to rethink my dad's actions . in truth he was a criminal , a felon . Acting in collusion with others in a premeditated crime . I always thought he was trying to right a wrong .

[Diesel42]

I've enjoyed reading these stories and I want to compliment Mr. Cotten's wise observations.
Allow me to add this point, our memories of these old time stories is a reflection of what we learned. Some folks require stronger lessons than others. Yet, all of us had to learn the accepted behavior of our community or we would be forced out or ostracized.

When I was 10, my parents played penny poker with their friends in our home. One of their friends became mean when he drank and promised his wife and their two kids a beating when they got home. I watched my Mom get up and go to the kitchen where she made him a bourbon & Coke with the addition of two Valiums. She then acted the Vamp, sat in his lap, and made him drink her special drink made just for a manly man like him. Ten minutes later, he was unconscious on the couch. The adults loaded him in the car and Mom told his wife to let him sleep it off in the driveway after she got herself and the kids locked up in the house. The next day I asked Mom how she knew how many pills it would take to knock him out (I was the young scientist). Mom calmly replied that she didn't care if he lived or died. My learned lesson had two parts: you don't beat women or kids and my folks are prepared to commit murder if you do.

Thanks everyone!
Nick