What you got?
Here's my story:
This was a member of my extended family. My mother's people were Lawsons for which the town of Lawsonville NC was named (Stokes County). My branch of the family left NC in 1905 and moved west homesteading Montana.
Murder of the Lawson family
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Charles Davis Lawson (May 10, 1886–December 25, 1929) was an American tobacco farmer from Stokes County, North Carolina who is remembered for having committed one of the most notorious mass murders in the state's history on Christmas Day 1929.
Charlie Lawson's parents, Augustus and Nancy, lived in the unincorporated community known as Lawsonville, located ten miles from Danbury, the Stokes county seat. He was born there and, in 1911, married Fannie Manring. They had eight children, but the third, William, born in 1914, died of an illness in 1920. In 1918, following the move of his younger brothers, Marion and Elijah, to the Germanton area, Lawson followed suit with his family. The Lawsons worked as sharecroppers, saving enough money by 1927 to buy their own farm on Brook Cove Road.
In 1929, shortly before Christmas, Charlie Lawson took his family (37-year-old wife Fannie and their children: Marie, 17; Arthur, 16; Carrie, 12; Maybell; 7, James, 4; Raymond, 2; and Mary Lou, 4 months) into town to buy new clothes and to have a family portrait taken. Since they were far from wealthy, this seemed unusual. The new clothes ultimately became burial outfits. On that day he began the slaughter with his daughters, Carrie and Maybell, who were setting out to their uncle and aunt's house. Lawson waited for them by the tobacco barn; when they were in range, he shot them with a shotgun, then ensured that they were dead by bludgeoning them. He then placed the bodies in the tobacco barn.
Afterwards, he returned to the house and shot Fannie, who was on the porch. As soon as the gun was fired, Marie, who was inside, screamed, while the two small boys, James and Raymond, attempted to find a hiding place. Lawson shot Marie and then found and shot the two boys. Lastly, he killed the baby, Mary Lou. After the murders, he went into the nearby woods and, a few hours later, shot himself. The only survivor was his eldest son, 16 year-old Arthur, whom he had sent on an errand just before starting his deadly work. The bodies of the family members were found with their arms crossed and pillows under their heads. The gunshot signaling Charlie Lawson's own suicide was heard by the many people who learned of the gruesome event on the property and had already gathered there. Some rushed towards the direction of the sound and found Charlie Lawson dead, with his two dogs by their master's side. There were footprints, indicating he had been walking in a small circle for hours.
Shortly after the murders, Charlie's brother, Marion Lawson, opened the home on Brook Cove Road as a tourist attraction. A cake that Marie Lawson had baked on Christmas Day was displayed on the tour. Because visitors began to pick at the raisins on the cake to take as souvenirs, it was placed in a covered glass cake dish and thus preserved for many years.
Among the many remembrances of the event is a folk song entitled, "The Murder of the Lawson Family". This song was recorded by the Stanley Brothers in March 1956, released by Columbia Records on the CD "An evening long ago" in 2004.