“Speak no ill of the dead,” a maxim I inherited from antiquity, came down to me via my more immediate ancestors. The sentiment is ancient; indeed, its origin is attributed to the Spartan Philosopher Chilon, that subsequently the Romans—appropriated in typical Imperial fashion—promulgated in Latin as De mortis nil nisi bonum (Of the dead [speak] nothing but good). And since I also was taught in the Southern American tradition that if I could say nothing good I should say nothing at all, there were some things about which we never spoke . . . ever. Such is the case of the tragic events surrounding the lives of my namesake Samuel Hilburn Holland (1862-1915) and his son Samuel Britt Holland (1896-1975). My mother named me intentionally in honor of her grandfather Samuel, of whom I knew little, and only incidentally for her uncle Sam Britt, of whom I knew nothing whatsoever as I was growing up. So I have always wondered about my namesake, my great grandfather Sam and what he was like. Of my forgotten granduncle I thought nothing at all.
Who was Samuel H. Holland, My Namesake?
What I did know about my mother’s grandfather consisted of a single fact: he died a violent death at the hands of a “black man.” I resolved that when I took up the task of unraveling my family history and genealogy I would uncover all I could about this horrific—and legendary— event that had reverberated down the generations, albeit silently, more as a tremulous existential vibration than in any audible story.
My mother Audrey was born the eighth of nine children to Katie Roberta “Bertia” Holland Moates, ten years and some months after her grandfather’s murder. When his death happened on 18 Dec 1915, her mother, “Ma Bertie”—as I knew her—at age 27, was already married eight years to my “Pa” and had four children of her own, my elder aunts and uncles. By the time I came around in the 1950s and 60s and began to form memories of my maternal grandmother, her Dad—Great-Grandpa Samuel—lay buried in Dothan, Alabama already for forty or so years. Still, I detected (and she admitted to a fellow grandchild)—I suspected because of his death—a spiritual struggle with a deep-seated and persistent animus in my devout Ma Bertie, directed reflexively toward all people of color. She once remarked how you might not like black people “if your father had been murdered by one.”
If anyone ever had reason for such a feeling of perpetual animosity, she did. That being said, another grandchild corrected my implication that our mutual grandmother shared the animus of our segregationist Southern society. My cousin stated “She loved people who were poverty stricken, financially wealthy, healthy, sickly, black, white or brown–never even seeing the difference.” Nonetheless, in the early 1960s, I and all those I knew shared no expressed sympathy for the grievances we heard voiced in the civil rights movement. News of the alarming rhetoric and civil non-violent disobedience was met with distrust, fear, and outrage, or most often. with complicit silence. I wondered and never fully understood whether this subversive hatred was actually due to a generalized prejudice arising from any private legacy of trauma or was the result of absorption of the racial bigotry that pervaded the Jim Crow society of southeastern Alabama and northwest Florida that, like the unnoticed but ever-present salt dust born of the gulf shore surf, spread far-and-wide over the land as if carried by on-shore breezes. Such a compound is subversively corrosive to all that is exposed to it. I concluded finally, too, that we all may imbibe the ethos of a society but pay it no mind, and like fish in water do, we gulp it down uncritically as “just the natural order of things.” I have come to realize also that no event happens in isolation and the repercussions are never felt by a single individual alone. The metaphor of ripples and waves on the sea is much used because it mirrors reality. Life and history are also, in fact, a tangle of cause and effect as much as are the roots of the tidal wetlands of palmetto and mangrove where the surf spends itself after traversing the wide gulf. My mother’s grandmother whom all called “Sweet Mama” endured unbelievable heartache, apparently with little complaint. She gave birth to ten children, but between 1900 and 1902 (before my grandmother was a teenager) Sweet Mama, Mary Cornelia Arnold Holland, buried three of her sweet infants. Thus, by age six the toddler Sam Britt Holland was left as the youngest surviving baby of the family. I can only imagine the anguish Mary endured. No one ever mentioned it to me in my family, not my mother nor my grandmother—no one. Below are reproductions of photographs of those women, (left to right) my mother Audrey Moates Matteson (1926-1998), her mother “Bertia” Holland Moates (1888-1966), and my great grandmother Mary Cornelia Arnold Holland (1868-1923). These three women passed down other stories and attitudes to me, but nothing spoke of the sadness of Sweet Mama’s life.
What “Sweet Mama” Suffered
I learned from documents that Mary Cornelia began her life with Samuel Hilburn Holland on 16 Nov 1884 in Headland, Alabama when they were married. Below is a rare photograph of the couple early in their marriage, perhaps before 1890. The unsmiling couple do not appear happy, but it may have only been the customary serious formality of early portrait photography.
I infer from an advertisement for a farm implement in the Dothan Eagle the regional newspaper that Sam enjoyed a reputation as a hard working farmer who provided for his family on their place a few miles from Dothan and Headland out Route 1 near Abbeville in southeastern Alabama. Piecing together the record of their residences I have deduced that the Holland family, that began in the area north of Dothan, migrated slowly southward, ultimately relocating from south of Dothan in about 1913 to the Dekle Plantation near Greenwood, Florida. There Samuel may have worked as a foreman/overseer or a field hand. No physical record remains of his rank. The Dekles were prominent land owners in northwest Florida in the early 1900s. Below is a reproduction of a contemporaneous newspaper photograph of the experimental alfalfa fields of the M. L. Dekle farm. M.L. and his son E.N. Dekle farmed over 1000 acres in the region.
Despite claims in the Pensacola Journal boasting of an extremely low crime rate in Jackson County, the newspapers of the period are rife with salacious stories of violence and murder; for example, at about the time Sam Holland and Mary with their son Sam Britt were moving to the area, a smoldering grudge erupted in nearby Blountsville, Florida. Mr. W. L. Spivey, the overseer of M. L. Dekle’s farm was dispatched with a blow from a monkey wrench wielded by Jimmie Lee Fields. The late Mr. Spivey had, likewise, emigrated to west Florida from Alabama. Apparently Mr. Fields eluded the law and was never brought to justice.
Samuel Hilburn Holland similarly met his end in a violent interlude on the Dekle “Plantation.” December 18 was a Saturday, a Sabbath day, a week before Christmas. It was then that Samuel H. Holland had an altercation with a field worker over a pair of shoes that Sam had sold the man, according to the fragmentary, whispered family story. The worker complained that the shoes were too small and he wanted his money back. Sam refused, remarking that he could not resell them if they had been worn (presumably because the man was a “Negro”). Details are sketchy but the outcome is clear from newspaper accounts: the nameless man (called only “a Negro”) killed my great grandfather with two blasts from a shot gun.
The news of the homicide spread quickly, recounted in numerous journals. Initial reports were that the unnamed assailant was apprehended, but later reports were that he had eluded the Sheriff and would soon be found by the posse. One of my contemporary historical correspondents suggested that the newspaper reports in this age of “yellow journalism” were more “aspirational” rather than factual. The absence of any subsequent mention of a hearing or trial further suggests that the “Negro” evaded capture and prosecution. If the individual had indeed been jailed he had been released, apparently without charge. We are left guessing as to what transpired that Saturday near Greenwood, Florida.
Early Twentieth Century Alabama/Florida: An Age of Violence
It seems odd to me that such a relatively minor disagreement would turn deadly. Thus, I continued searching more broadly, looking over a wider time period in hope of getting a sense of the times. What my search brought to my attention was a newspaper article in the 19 July 1895 Boston Globe. The story shocked me. The lede told that Sam H. Holland of Abbeville, Alabama “drew a long knife and stabbed Manley [actually J. C. Money] to death” in an argument. I then read several other accounts, the gist of which was that J. C. Money and Samuel H. Holland had partnered in the purchase of a seine with which to net fish. Mr. Money showed up at the Holland farm on 16 July 1895 with his son to claim the net for his anticipated outing. Unfortunately, Sam had planned an excursion on that same Tuesday afternoon. The two farmers exchanged heated words and the situation escalated when Mr. Money slapped Mr. Holland, who then proceeded to stab Mr. Money in the chest “to the hollow” and cut Money’s son when the young man tried to intervene. Mr. Holland fled the scene, convinced that he had mortally wounded his friend. Fortunately, Money recovered from his wounds and even outlived by many years his knife-wielding former partner.
No charges were ever filed. Nobody in my family ever mentioned the event either . . . that I know of.
Clearly, my great grandfather Sam was given to violence. The incident suggests an “impulsivity and dis-inhibition” characteristic of mental illness. The stabbing occurred while my grandmother lived at home (age about 7), surely old enough to remember the event but young enough to fail to comprehend what transpired. I wonder, however, about other events that might have occurred that were left unreported. Such violent behavior is rarely an isolated event. On his tombstone Sam is lauded by an epitaph reading “His words were kindness/ His deeds were love/ His spirit humble/ He rests above.” My cynical mind replies: Nil nisi bonum.
I wondered if other factors might have contributed to the volatile mix that led to Sam’s assault in 1895 and his death in 1915. A 1909 editorial praises Sam for seeing the error of his ways “a short time ago” and coming out in favor of prohibition, joining his brother Thomas Holland in support of the 18th amendment prohibiting the manufacture, distribution, and sale of alcoholic beverages. We might surmise that alcohol had been a major part of Sam’s life up until that time. His other, older brother Britt Holland, however, was both the town Marshall and a saloon keeper in neighboring Columbia, Alabama and had a very different view of things. Sam may have struggled with alcoholism, being torn between his two brother’s divergent points of view. But such things are rarely spoken of.
These foregoing revelations cast a different light on the drama that might have played out in Greenwood in 1915. If Sam’s disagreement with the farm hand over a pair of unsatisfactory shoes had grown too rancorous, it would not be surprising to see Sam Holland pull a knife to exact satisfaction for an insult as he had done two decades earlier, especially if his judgement was impaired due to inebriation. It could have been that he brought a proverbial knife to a gun fight and his unnamed assailant fired the lethal shots in self-defense. This scenario would account for no charges ever being filed. But we do not know. The record is silent.
The Sins of the Father
Whatever the details were, the outcome was profound. Mrs. Mary Cornelia Holland was suddenly widowed miles from family with a teenage son (18) just spreading his wings while suddenly bereft of the steadying hand of a father. Samuel Britt Holland soon began to appear in the newspapers himself.
In my search of the newspapers (using the collection and search engine at newspapers.com) for “Sam Holland” I stumbled upon the story (5 June 1916) of a bail jumping young Sam Holland “of Ozark,” Alabama. The papers report that young Sam Holland was apprehended by the Sheriff in Pensacola. A careful reading of the several stories that followed his case establishes that it is indeed the Sam Holland whose father died just a few months earlier. The younger Samuel, at first, spun a tale that he had been kidnapped by his fellow co-conspirators in a meat stealing caper (to which he had confessed) but later admitted that he had paid them to take him to Escambia County, Florida so that he could “join the Navy.” He hoped, I surmise, that by joining the military he would evade having to rat out his partners in larceny. Apparently, the 18-year-old delinquent did indeed weasel out of any charges and escaped prosecution by joining the Alabama National Guard about two weeks later. Very soon the 1st Infantry of the Alabama Guard was sent to Nogales, Arizona. He is listed proudly in the local newspaper among the county boys who joined up. The young recruit was deployed outside of the jurisdiction of the Alabama authorities in support of General Pershing’s pursuit of Poncho Villa into Mexico. If his mother Mary had hoped her wayward son would learn some disciple in the army, she was soon to be disappointed. His new associates were rather shady and prone to dissolution. Many of the recruits in his unit were young men who had never before had any money nor been out from under the watchful gaze of their families. In Nogales the Alabama National Guardsmen earned a reputation for prodigality, drunkenness, brawling, and frequenting the bordellos on the border. Gen. Edward H. Plummer remarked of these boys, “In time of war, send me all the Alabamians you can get, but in time of peace, for Lord’s sake, send them to somebody else!”
After about a year on the border, Pvt. Holland was discharged (2 May 1917) because of his dependent relatives (probably his widowed mother.) Another Alabama guardsman was discharged at the same time who would play an important part in his future, Sam Cotton of Ozark, Alabama. Pvt. Cotton had a sister Ann Marie Cotton who would become Mrs. Sam Holland a few years later. But civilian life was not for Samuel Britt when a war was raging and there was a chance for adventure. While his former unit was mobilized and absorbed into the 31st “Dixie” Division of the U/S. Army, Holland enlisted on 26 April 1918 in the newly formed 48th Infantry, a mechanized infantry unit of the regular Army. There he may have received training in automotive repair and maintenance that he would exploit later.
According to regimental history and roster reports listing Samuel B. Holland (Service Number 814232), the 48th was posted to New York to perform guard duty. Soon he was promoted to the rank of Corporal in June but was transferred to Camp Sevier, South Carolina for training. A few months later his rank was reduced again for unknown reasons. It appears that his training was not complete before the armistice on 11 Nov 1918 and he did not transport to France as he expected. Private Holland was honorably discharged on 22 January 1919.
We can infer that Sam Holland and Ann Marie Cotton married after his return from the Army sometime in the spring of 1919 since, 38 weeks later, their child Charles Wimberley Holland was born (8 Jan 1920) just in time for the trio to appear in the 1920 census, living next door to Ann Marie’s parents and Sam Holland’s comrade from Nogales, Sam Cotton.
Bad Choices Beget Bad Consequences
Sam B. Holland found work in Panama City, Florida in a garage associated with an automobile dealership. It was there that he developed an acquaintance with a young man recently released from the notorious Alabama Industrial School for Boys. It was an unfortunate choice of pal for Sam. I have pieced together from contemporary newspaper accounts and other documents the tale of the shocking events that transpired in 1920.
Leslie Lammon appears from reports to have been a “hard case.” He had been arrested and incarcerated several times for grand larceny as well as for manslaughter. This freckled faced youth of 19 (in 1920) belied the evil influence he apparently exerted on the older (21-year-old) Holland. These two auto mechanics were fired in mid-May 1920, possibly for some larcenous plan gone awry. Stranded in Panama City, Florida, the pair hatched an impulsive and ill-conceived scheme to steal an automobile and drive home to Dale County, Alabama. A person in his right mind would have seen that such an escapade would not end well. The newspapers tell how the two partners in crime appeared one rainy Sunday evening (possibly inebriated) on the doorstep of Alice Canty’s boarding house east of downtown Panama City in the predominantly black Millville district. Widow Canty was an Afro-American entrepreneur who had recently purchased a fine new vehicle. Perhaps they knew of her through their contact in the car repair and maintenance business where they worked. The boys spun a yarn to the sympathetic matron about being stuck a few mile out of Millville. They asked to “borrow” her new vehicle, a 1920 Sullivan Salient 6 similar to the vintage model in the photograph to retrieve the ladies they had left alone in the fictional auto.
Mrs. Canty declined to loan her vehicle, but her daughter volunteered to chauffeur the white boys back to their vehicle and pull them out of the hole they claimed to be stuck in. Rosa Canty Kirkland was 23 and a professional driver as was her mother Alice, according to the 1920 Census. As a nod to propriety, Mrs. Bessie King, a boarder, volunteered to ride along as chaperone.
What we can glean from various published accounts, a few miles north of town, Rosa began to get suspicious and threatened to turn back. At that point Lammon pulled out a pistol and threatened her. Rosa leaped from the seat and ran. Lammon fired at her retreating figure. The bullet grazed Rosa’s skull and she pitched forward. Leslie D. Lammon fell upon her, violently stabbing Mrs. Kirkland’s unconscious body. When Bessie tried to stop him, Lammon cut her as well. Then he turned on her. Bessie later reported according to the Bay County Sheriff that, at that point, Holland intervened, chivalrously putting himself between the injured Bessie and her assailant; thus, Sam sustained wounds also from the hand of Leslie. Apparently Sam was able to calm Lammon enough that the trio with the—now deceased—Mrs. Kirkland’s body in tow climbed back into the car and drove north. At some point Sam persuaded Lammon to try to get Bessie medical attention. Sam had an Uncle Sterling Price Holland living near Dothan who was a physician. Sam is reported to have suggested they head there to seek triage for Bessie, who was bleeding severely. They proceeded north toward Columbia, Alabama, perhaps passing through Greenwood, Florida near where Sam’s father met his end just five years earlier. About halfway to Columbia the vehicle crossed Cowart’s Creek. The two men pulled the corpse from the backseat and tossed it into the creek bed. Failing to find Dr. Holland at home, they left Miss King in the care of some “colored” neighbors and continued north. That family, of course, notified the Sheriff, who soon apprehended Lammon and Holland in Columbia.
The pair were indicted and brought to trial in Panama City, Florida, but not before they made a jail break and went on the lam. That escapade lasted only a few hours before the jail birds were re-captured. In November the perpetrators of the “most heinous crime in recent memory” as the newspapers opined were to come to trial. In a last-ditch effort to subvert justice some compatriots of Holland and Lammon set fire to the Bay Count Courthouse. The building was gutted by the arson but the trial was not delayed. Instead the court moved down the street to the theater, where the arguments were heard and the two were convicted of second degree murder and sentenced to life in prison, 19 Nov 1920.
The partners in crime rode—manacled—to the Florida State Penitentiary in Raiford, Florida. The prison is legendary for the “chain gangs” that worked the prison farm. After two years, Sam petitioned for a pardon from the Board of Pardon and Parole according to the Tampa Times newspaper. Apparently it was denied since his name was not among those granted release in a follow-up story a few days later. Perhaps it was galling to Sam that in 1925, Leslie D. Lammon was more successful when he was pardoned “because of his youth at the time of the crime.” We deduce, however, that Leslie did not escape prison unscathed. Years later when he registered for the draft, his paralysis was noted. Ultimately he died of a stroke but only after living as a free man with his father and mother, Archie and Lula Lammon, for years. He continued working as an auto mechanic in Montgomery, Alabama it appears. He returned briefly to a life of crime (along with his brother Olin) in the late 1930s, serving a few months for auto thief. Nevertheless, he survived until 1961, when he died in Houston, Texas at the age of 60.
Sam, meanwhile, was tortured by misfortune. His beloved mother, Mary Cornelia died in early November, 1923, likely from injuries she sustained in a sensational train wreck the month before in which she was (erroneously) reported to have died along with a cousin Fanny Holland, whom he may have been close to; we surmise this relationship because he listed a Fanny Holland as a “sister” on his draft registration. The railroad accident resulted from an L&N colliding with a sight-seeing excursion train near Greenwood, Florida. The irony is sobering in that Mary Cornelia was injured in an accident occurring near the site of the murder of her husband, less than nine years earlier. One report reveals that she was occupied by a small child. It could have been Charles W. Holland who would have been about three at the time. Charles’ granddaughter claimed that he was Sweet Mama’s “pick” of her grandchildren. A few weeks later Sam was transferred from prison to the care of the psychiatric of the Veterans Hospital in Fayetteville, Arkansas according to military records. The following May 1924, Marie Holland sued Sam B Holland for divorce. A story shared with the author by one of Sam Holland’s great grandchildren confirmed that Marie Cotton (Holland) Pouncey remained estranged from her ex-husband until her death. Indeed, the family story is that the former Mrs. Holland instructed the black nanny of her child, Charles Wimberley Holland, that the “mammy” should hide the child from Sam if he ever came around. Charles’ granddaughter surmised that her great grandmother’s stipulation arose out of a fear that, due to Sam’s alleged bad character and mental health issues, he might harm the child, physically or psychologically.
I have learned from one of Charles’ granddaughters that ultimately Sam did reach out to re-connect with his grown son later in life, possibly in the 1940s and 50s. The granddaughter reported that her granddad Charles retold her fantastical-sounding tales that seemed dubious to her: stories of World War I exploits on the border with Mexico [true]; membership in the French Foreign Legion [probably a hyperbolic extrapolation of service in the France-bound 48th Infantry of US Army]; an arrest for stealing meat and jumping bail [true]; a conviction for murder [true]; incarceration in prison [true]; his commitment to the insane asylum in the VA Hospital [true]; a second family with a “Mexican lady” [probably a confabulation arising from Sam’s exploits in Arizona or an actual second unconfirmed marriage]. When I shared the documentary evidence with my correspondent, she was flabbergasted at the veracity of much she had completely discounted as tall tales. Still some stories beggar belief.
His story was not fully told, however, since the 1940 US Census lists Samuel Britt Holland as an “inmate” in the VA Hospital in North Little Rock, Arkansas. It further identified him as “married,” apparently not to Marie Cotton, however. This may be an error or wishful exaggeration or may suggest an unidentified spouse. While, it is possible that sometime between about 1930 and 1940, Sam did indeed meet and marry a “Mexican lady,” whose identity currently eludes us. A recent interview with Sam’s great niece who knew him in his final years undermines this idea, however. According to William Edward Holland’s (Sam’s brother’s) granddaughter, Sam remained true to Marie Ann Cotton the rest of his life. She knew of no other family except his ex-wife Marie Cotton and Charles W. Holland. On the other hand she recalls calling Charles’ sister “in Texas,” a fact that suggests that Charles’ had at least one half-sibling. If any additional information comes to light we will amend this essay with any revelations.
As our knowledge stands at the present, Sam only appears in documents in the period from 1940 until 1975 mentioned in the aforementioned census of 1940 of the VA Hospital in North Little Rock, Arkansas and as a survivor in two obituaries of siblings as “in the Veterans Hospital” (1952) or residing in “Tuscaloosa” (presumably at the VA Hospital in 1966). The latter inference is consistent with Sam’s grandniece’s account that he had lived in the VA Hospital in Tuscaloosa “for years.” In fact, she recounted how she had to “move heaven and earth” to get the VA to release him to the private nursing home Oakview Manor in Ozark, Alabama, the VA-approved nursing home nearest to her residence at the time. She visited him often and showed great kindness to him. As she told the story, Sam said that he had sustained a gunshot wound to his head during the war and had a plate up there, a statement she took at face value and never checked out. When he was wounded—he told her—he was at first presumed dead. He told how he had been thrown on the charnel wagon where he languished for over twenty-four hours among the corpses. Later his comrades were alerted by his moans and rescued him. According to her “Uncle Sam Holland” he had been in hospital ever since that day. However, based on Sam’s military records that report that he was not wounded in action, not disabled, and never served abroad, this story appears to be a fabrication designed to arouse sympathy and compassion in his caregivers. Or it could have been a fantasy that Sam truly believed, a product of a faulty memory. Apparently, the ruse was believable, because my correspondent was shocked and incredulous when I reported what I had uncovered of his early life. She dismissed at first what my research had uncovered as “trash” and malicious lies. The facts that I shared she derided as surely being those of another Sam Holland, not her beloved Great Uncle. Thus, it became clear to me that I risk causing great offense among some of my family by shining a light into the dark corners of our family history and reporting what I find there, especially if it contradicts long-held, tender memories of a person. Nil nisi bonum, indeed.
Some might suggest that my dark biographies are slanderous and unfair, since the subject is powerless to defend himself. Although one cannot be held liable by Common Law for slandering the dead, I–nevertheless–hope to report accurately the facts. What is certain is the man my cousin knew in his sixties and seventies was a broken man but still a kind gentleman. He told her (and the VA reported to her, as she shared with to me) that he had been continuously under the care of the VA since he first entered the hospital. Moreover, her anecdotes confirmed to me that he suffered from the effects of past trauma. Once when she and her father, Sam’s nephew, took the old veteran on an excursion to Ft. Rucker for the July 4th fireworks, he became extremely upset when the explosions began. It seemed as if he were reliving some horrible, presumably wartime, experience in the concussions of the aerial display. Today we would describe what she recounted as PTSD, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. But I wonder if it was the stress of his war experiences (real or imagined) or of the tragic events that led to his imprisonment and the hardships of prison life that rendered Sam incapable of living in society? In any case, Samuel Britt Holland was subject to a true life sentence of institutional incarceration (at least intermittently) beginning in about 1920 until the day he died in 1975. His was a life sentence without possibility of parole.
During our inquiry we were able to acquire a copy of Samuel Britt Holland’s death certificate that reveals that he spent his last years (at least from the spring of 1974) in the Oakview Manor Nursing Home of Ozark, Alabama, succumbing at last to congestive heart failure possibly as a consequent of Alcohol Dependence Syndrome (i.e. Alcoholism) in his youth or a genetic predisposition to the disease that also resulted in his dotage in Arteriosclerosis and Cardio-Vascular-Renal Disease complicated further in the end by pneumonia and uremia. Sam breathed his last at 10:40 a.m. on 15 Jan 1975 at age 76 in the Dale County Hospital in Ozark, Alabama only a few miles from my relatives in Dothan. At the time I was in Texas laboring away in graduate school and was oblivious to my great uncle’s troubles or even his existence. Mercifully, he did know some kindness at the hands of my second cousins.
But Wait! There’s more
I thought that I might have reached the end of Samuel Britt Holland’s sad story, but when I searched more widely among newspaper articles, I ultimately came across three other men with the same name as my great uncle, a Sam Sr, a Sam Jr, and a Sam III. I was surprised to discover these individuals who shared the identical moniker with my relative. Who might these individuals be? I pursued the connection until I uncovered that they are indeed my 3rd cousins, descendants of one James Otho Holland (1888-1982), a 1st cousin to my grandmother (their fathers were brothers); James was born in 16 Nov 1888 in Abbeville, Alabama, just four months after and 18 miles away from the site of my maternal grandmother’s nativity. The two cousins surely were acquainted. James must have known his Uncles Samuel Hilburn Holland (also of Abbeville, Alabama) and Britt Holland (Samuel Britt’s uncle of Columbia,, Alabama) both of whom died the same pre-Christmas week in 1915, one by homicide and the other by illness. My Great Uncle Samuel Britt was apparently named both in honor of his father (as was I) and his Uncle Britt. Cousin James was very likely also aware of his Sam Holland’s exploits and misadventures. Sam’s troubles were widely reported and were also probably the subject of family gossip. From accounts of his grandfather James Otho, I learned that James the cousin was of a like-mind and spirit as my grandmother’s brother, fond of strong drink and given to impulsive violence and often devoid of inhibition.
From newspaper accounts I confirmed that James Holland exhibited a violent impulsiveness and dis-inhibition, especially when inebriated. On one occasion, an article reported, at the age of 81, he suffered a broken shoulder blade and cuts to his face and ear (from his own knife in the hands of the alleged assailant) when he instigated a drunken altercation with another patron of a bar. In addition, James’ grandson told me the story that his father had told him of Grandpa Holland’s excessive alcohol use and his violence. Once, as he (allegedly) chanced to see a neighbor pass on the sidewalk outside, he dashed from the house shouting “I am going to kill that woman!” Reputedly a Dixie cup half-filled with grain alcohol was an essential part of his morning wake-up ritual. In 1920, about the time of Sam Holland and Leslie Lammon’s trial, James Otho Holland lived in Noma, Florida, sixty miles and about one to two hour’s drive from the Bay County Courthouse in Panama City. James Otho Holland seems capable of arson, although no physical evidence has ever come to light that he was among the friends of my Great Uncle Samuel Britt Holland who ignited the courthouse. Such a suspicion is consistent with a tale from James’ youth in which he reputedly built a fire around a stubborn ox intending to rouse the brute to rising to pull a cart but that, instead, resulted in the beast’s immolation. Whatever his culpability, clearly, James admired his cousin, for in 1961 he named a son in honor of his still-living relative who resided in the VA hospital in Tuscaloosa, as well as for his two long-deceased uncles, Samuel Hilburn and Britt Holland.
These salacious anecdotes of our ancestors may cause us embarrassment and some discomfort. In fact, the truth may have been obscured. Samuel Britt Holland (1898) exhibited from time to time a cavalier approach to reality. Recall how he implicated his co-conspirators in a false kidnap plot when he was a youth. Later, he lied to Mrs. Canty to get access to her fine automobile. (Unfortunately for all, events did not go to plan.) The tall tales that Sam told his son strained the truth and the listener’s credibility. So we should not be surprised to hear that Uncle Sam repainted his past with a more flattering brush than brutal honesty would. Of course, we feel at least a tinge of shame at their outrageous behavior. Revisionist memories are much easier to live with.
Things Unspoken
In every family there are things that are not discussed or are whispered. So it is in my family. These stories are the proverbial skeletons in the closet, I suppose. Nevertheless, I believe that we do better not to suppress knowledge of past unpleasant events in our family histories or airbrush the imperfections of our antecedents. If we are not clear eyed and honest, we risk preserving memories that border on hagiography which render our patriarchs as paper saints rather than the real broken, but precious people they were. While imperfect humans, they are our ancestors to whom we are beholden. Furthermore, we risk missing the lessons of the cautionary tales of their lives. Alcoholism and mental illness are as heritable as a propensity for heart disease, I have read. Genetics accounts for 30 to 70 percent of a predisposition to such diseases. Hopefully we view, nowadays, these traits more as disabilities rather than as moral failings. On the other hand, we are not fated by our genes to anti-social behavior or an inevitable coronary. Our early life experiences and our intentional choices are also significant in our development.
As I have examined the circumstances of the lives of my forebears, I have become slower to judge than I was before. Samuel Hilburn Holland and his son, Samuel Britt Holland were born into an age of violence. They experienced loss and struggles that I do not know. What is more, they each probably inherited a strong propensity for substance dependence and for impulsive and dis-inhibited behavior that manifested in aggressiveness and belligerence. Of course, as one wag has noted, “a tendency to violent aggressiveness in obviously genetic since the majority of violent offenders have a Y chromosome,” that is they are male and subject to the hormone testosterone. But forewarned is fore-prepared. I have observed a high incidence of substance dependence (alcoholism and psychotropic drug dependence) in a significant fraction of my relatives who are also descendants of Thomas Holland and Emeline Holland nee Holland. (Yes, they were half first cousins, sharing Moses Holland as a grandfather, but with different grandmothers. This is a co-sanguinity which was common in the 19th century but evoked an “Eewwww!” from my granddaughters when they heard of it. Thomas and Emeline were grandparents of both James Otho Holland and of my grandmother. Whether this is relevant is unclear, but it is a fact.
Knowing what I now know, I am both saddened and grateful. I grieve the pain my ancestors endured and inflicted on others. I cannot excuse their guilt but I can better understand what led them down a path to destruction. At the same time I can forgive them their broken humanity and say “except by the grace of God there go I.” Thus, I am grateful for all those who endured and survived to give life to their offspring. I resolve not to let the lesson of their struggles be in vain. I resolve to be wiser and kinder and repudiate hatred and dissolution. I take heart at something Anne Lamott, the motivational writer, frequently reminds us: “Grace bats last.” As I completed this essay, I heard an addendum from my cousin who was Uncle Sam’s last familial caregiver; it is something of a benediction. She told me that near the end, she shared her faith in God and invited Uncle Sam to seek God’s forgiveness. He did so, privately confessing “his many sins.” I hope that it brought him comfort as he faced the darkness.
As a consequence of my investigations, too, I have been inspired to propose a new, replacement motto: Nil nisi verum, [Of the dead speak] nothing but the truth. Thus, we will truly honor their memory and really know them, perhaps for the first time.
Acknowledgements
I would be remiss if I did not express my appreciation and gratitude for several individuals who generously shared their recollections of their grandparents and the stories that they have preserved about Samuel Britt Holland. To preserve their privacy I will not name them but I acknowledge my indebtedness to them, nonetheless. Their memories are their own; on the other hand, the conclusions I draw in this essay, however accurate or erroneous, are the responsibility of the author alone.
Sam Matteson 