The Turnbo Manuscripts
by Silas Claiborne Turnbo
1844-1925
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A WOMANS DRESS SATURATED WITH THE BLOOD
OF HER DEAD HUSBAND
By S. C. Turnbo
The sickening details of the killing of two men during the turbulent days of the Civil War was given me by Mr. Ewing Hogan son of Joe Hogan who was one of the earliest settlers on White River near where the village of Oakland Marion County, Ark. now stands. Mr. Hogan was only a little boy when the clash between the north and south occurred. In giving the account of the death of the two men he said that their names were Jim Elliot and Bill McClure and they were shot and killed in the field just below the mouth of Little North Fork and Gooleys Spring Creek, but the land where they were shot to death on was not in cultivation then but was cleared up after the war. The exact spot where they were killed was near 200 yards from where the John Due Ferry is or east of the ferry boat landing on the left bank. "I saw both the bodies in a half an hour after they were shot and they were the first dead men I ever saw that had been shot to death. Mr. Elliots wifes name was Delila. Two negro boys named Isom and Jack that belonged to Jake Yocum assisted Mrs. Becea Yocum wife of Harve Yocum and other women to take the bodies across the river and give them interment in the grave yard on the Jake and Harve Yocum farm. Mr. Elliots wife helped to carry the bleeding form of her dead husband to the river where the ferry boat landing is now and after the dead men were conveyed across the river she did all she could to assist them in carrying them both to the grave yard where a grave was dug and the bodies were put in an ordinary box together and lowered into the grave and the dirt filled in and a new mound of dirt made to show where two more victims of the war were laid to rest. I well remember" continued Mr. Hogan "that Mrs. Elliots dress was besmeared with blood that had drained from the bullet wound on her husbands body while she was assisting to carry it. This was only one among the awful incidents of murder and strife along White River in the angry days of war" said Mr. Hogan as he ended this sad account.
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