Music, Moonshine,and Murder (eBook)

Chapter One

October 15, 1935, was a beautiful day in Wilkes County, North Carolina. The trees were showing their brilliant fall shades of red, orange, and yellow. These magnificent mountains looked as if they were on fire. The autumn chill was in the air, and Maggie’s vegetable garden was filled with dying vines and a few leftover small, green tomatoes. The garden was withering away from an early frost.

Maggie had finished canning all the vegetables and berries. Her husband Jim dug the Irish potatoes and sweet potatoes, and he stored them in the cellar for the frosty winter ahead. Maggie and Jim Setzer lived happily in their meager clapboard, unpainted home for many years.

The kitchen was small, and the table and four chairs were handmade by Maggie’s husband Jim. In the corner stood a white-painted dish cabinet containing Maggie’s favorite blue-and-white dishes. A cast-iron, wood-burning cook stove had two warming ovens—one oven for sweet potatoes and one to keep biscuits warm for Maggie’s youngest son, Chelsie, to eat after school. He always spread a liberal amount of his mama’s homemade jam on that warm biscuit—a perfect snack for a growing boy heading out to go hunting.

Today black smoke was coming out of the tin stove pipe that reached through the ceiling and out of the rooftop. Maggie prepared a country breakfast for Jim and Chelsie. Homer, Maggie’s oldest son, was missing at the table because he didn’t come home last night. Maggie placed the hot breakfast on the table. Homemade biscuits, blackberry jam, ham, eggs, and gravy. A fresh pot of Eight O’Clock Coffee with chicory was hot on the stove. This was a typical country breakfast in the Setzer home. Chelsie was in a hurry to finish eating because he didn’t want to be late for school.

Maggie was hurrying him along, saying, “Chelsie, don’t forget your lunch.”

Chelsie loved his mama’s biscuits, so he grabbed one more to eat on his walk to school. He opened the door and stepped out onto the porch. He ran down the steps, quickly hurrying along to get to school on time in Ferguson.

Maggie called, “Chelsie, hurry home today from school because we have chores to do. We need to chop wood for the stove and clear our garden of all the dead plants and vines.”

Maggie continued, “Our garden must be ready for planting seeds in the spring; please do not hang around Ferguson.”

Chelsie called back to his mama, “I’ll come straight home, Mama.”

Chelsie didn’t realize this was the last time he would see or speak to his mama.

It was an ordinary Tuesday morning. Mr. Ed Forester was the local mail carrier. He crossed the wooden plank bridge in his 1935 black Ford, and he turned onto Long Fork Road to deliver mail to the Setzer home. When Mr. Forester arrived, he saw a terrible scene. Maggie Setzer was sitting upright on the ground, leaning against a Dogwood tree with a rifle cradled in her arms. A stick laid on the ground beside her. She was shot—her wound penetrated the left side of her chest, leaving a large and jagged wound. She was dead!

Mr. Forester quickly left Maggie Setzer and ran up the steps and onto the porch. He entered the house, where he immediately saw another horrible scene. Jim Setzer was shot in the throat, and he was dead lying on the floor in a pool of blood! Mr. Forester noticed there were bloody footprints all over the wide wooden plank floor.

Mr. Forester quickly ran out of the house and got into his car. He drove as fast as he could down the dirt road to the home of the nearest neighbor, Mr. Jenkins. He stopped his car and jumped out. He ran up the porch steps and onto the porch. He began pounding on the front door. Mr. Jenkins and a young man answered the door. Mr. Forester told them to hurry to the Setzer home; something horrible had happened.

The young man standing beside Mr. Jenkins became visibly upset. He rushed past the two men, running up the road, as fast as he could to his home. He was Maggie Setzer’s oldest son, Homer. Mr. Forester and Mr. Jenkins ran after Homer. As Homer approached his home, he witnessed a horrific sight, one that would never leave his mind. This was the most traumatic event that anyone could ever witness. He couldn’t believe his beloved mama Maggie had met with such an awful and brutal death.

Homer loved his mama, and he depended on her for everything because he grew up without a father. Maggie raised Homer with the help of her family, and now his beloved mama was gone! Homer left his mama’s side to go inside the house. He ran up the steps and onto the porch. The front door was flung open. He stepped inside and saw another bloody scene. His stepfather, Jim’s last cup of coffee sat untouched on the kitchen table, and the pantry door was flung open. Homer noticed Mama and Jim’s life savings were gone. Homer ran out of the house and back to the front yard, where his mother sat staring down with eyes devoid of life.

Homer cried out hysterically, “Mama, how did this happen to you? Mama, Chelsie,” he sobbed, “I can’t go on in this world without you!”

Mr. Ed Forester consoled Homer the best he could, saying, “Homer, we must call the sheriff as soon as possible.”

Mr. Forester and Mr. Jenkins moved away from Homer because they didn’t want Homer to hear them talking. Mr. Jenkins voiced his opinion about the stick that was lying beside Maggie’s dead body.

Mr. Jenkins said, “Mr. Forester, Maggie Setzer must have killed her husband Jim and then and used that stick to push the trigger on the rifle to kill herself.”

Mr. Ed Forester quickly replied, “Mr. Jenkins, we don’t know who killed Maggie and Jim; Sheriff Brown will determine what has happened here at the Setzer home!”

Mr. Forester asked Mr. Jenkins, “Please stay here with Homer, and I will go to the General Store in Ferguson and use the telephone to call the Sheriff Brown. I’ll tell him he must hurry to Long Fork because Maggie and Jim Setzer have been murdered. I will be back as soon as I make the call to Sheriff Brown.”

Mr. Forester jumped into his car and headed as fast as he could to the General Store in Ferguson to use the telephone. Homer was hysterical and could not be consoled. He sat down on the ground next to his mama. He laid his head on his knees and wept bitterly. Homer would never forget his mama. He knew how hard her life had been. She overcame so much hardship, and now she was a victim of such a terrible crime. Homer’s mama certainly had her share of adversity in her short life on this earth.

Maggie was a trusting woman willing to look for the goodness in mankind. She always believed there would be a brighter tomorrow. Through all her trials, she remained a loving Mama. Maggie spent her life teaching her boys the right way to live. Homer and Chelsie didn’t always listen to their mama’s words of wisdom. Maggie’s legacy in the eyes of her family will forever be that she was a good woman, doing the best she could for her family. She never stopped believing in her dreams for her future.

Long Fork was a small community. Jim was Homer and Chelsie’s stepfather, and he and Maggie raised the two boys together for many years. A dozen or more families lived in the picturesque little community of Long Fork. The neighbors reported they heard two shots around 10:00 a.m., but they didn’t realize two people had been murdered. Everyone thought someone was hunting squirrels or rabbits, as they often did in the community.

Sheriff Brown arrived at the Setzer home in Long Fork. Mr. Forester, Mr. Jenkins, and Homer were sitting on the porch. Sheriff Brown gave his condolences to Homer, and he promised he would do his best to find out who killed his mama and stepfather.

Sheriff Brown said, “Homer, this crime scene must be protected, so I need to find a place for you and your brother to live while I do my investigation. I don’t want anything touched or moved until I finish my investigation. Do ye have relatives you and Chelsie could live with? You and your brother must leave Long Fork because we need to think about Chelsie. He’s too young to witness the shock of this crime scene.”

Homer dried his eyes and spoke, “My brother and me can live with our aunt Jenny in the Lewis Fork community.”

Sheriff Brown said, “Good, Homer, I’ll drive ye to your aunt Jenny’s home after I get Chelsie out of school in Ferguson. I hate to bring such bad news to young Chelsie about his mama and his stepfather.”

Sheriff Brown shifted focus. “Homer,” he asked, “where were ye this morning? Did you hear rifle shots being fired this morning?”

Homer was a young man of twenty years old, and as most young boys his age, he often spent the night away from home.

Homer said, “Sheriff Brown, I spent the night at the home of Mr. Jenkins, and I was asleep.”

The Sheriff said, “Homer, you know this news about your parents will go hard on your brother Chelsie because he is only sixteen years old.”

Sheriff Brown paused with his head down and then he continued talking, “Homer, you know I was just here at this home a short time ago. The news I had to tell your mama and stepfather about Chelsie being caught selling illegal moonshine in Ferguson...