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Huntsville Massacre
Madison
County, Arkansas
On
January 10th, 1863, nine men who were Southern
sympathizers, were removed from a guardhouse in the predawn
hours of a cold, icy morning and were taken to a field on the
banks of Vaughn’s Branch where they were lined up and shot by
members of Company G of the 8th Missouri Calvary commanded by
Lieutenant Colonel Elias Briggs Baldwin. Eight
of the men died as a result of this execution and the ninth man
survived but was shot in the back of the head with the bullet
going through his head, knocking out a lot of his teeth. He
succeeded in crawling about a quarter of a mile to the nearby
home of Mrs. Elizabeth Vaughn, where she nursed him for over a
month and after his recovery he returned to Mississippi. This
man told the story of what had happened and who was responsible
for it, as did Hugh Berry who survived for one day after being
shot.
Photographs and information courtesy of Joy Russell - jrussell44
@ aol.com.
Location of the Huntsville Massacre
on 10
January 1865
In
Memory of the Brave Men of Huntsville and Madison County, who
were executed at this location by Union Soldiers.
This
monument erected Summer 2005 by the Madison County Genealogical
& Historical Society and Huntsville Lodge #364, Free & Accepted
Masons.
Robert
Coleman Young; age 56 – also known as – “Parson Young”;
Baptist Minister.
Hugh Samuel
Berry: age 31 - son of the aforementioned William M. Berry;
Capt. in the Confederate army; home on leave.
John Hughes, connection unknown.
John
William Moody: age 32 – nephew-in-law to Chesley H.
Boatright; Deputy U.S. Marshal (1860 Census Enumerator), farmer;
Confederate Army Captain.
William Martin Berry:
age 60 - a prominent member of Odeon Masonic Lodge; brother of
State Senator John Berry; John Berry was also the father to
James R. Berry, son-in-law of Isaac.
Watson P. Stevens
age 29; cousin of the Berry’s
Chesley H. Boatright:
age 39 - a blacksmith, former
county treasurer, Deacon of the Huntsville Cumberland
Presbyterian Church, and prominent Mason
Askin Hughes, connection unknown.
Cassie Boehm and Shane Crusha placing
their tributes on the monument.
Members of the First Arkansas Light Artillery,
Sons of the Confederate Veterans, and local re-enactors salute
the men with three volleys.
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