A Reckoning

Courtesy reveals actual commitment to equal rights.

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Friday / March 10, 1933 / Monroe Iowa / 8:00 AM: Five rounds from a pump-action 12-gauge shotgun took the lives of four souls - Floyd Sanford (shot twice), Bessie Lee Sanford, and Rosalie Sanford. Each died from close-range blasts that splattered blood, flesh and bone. The fifth shot was delivered to the chest of the murderer – Mahlon Robert Shipley – by himself.

Uncle Mahlon was an uncle I never heard of until 2002. The occasion was a family gathering that was unremarkable until someone casually asked, ”Where did Dad go that time he left”. What! Most of the family had no idea Grampa Joe had ever, “left”. Many questions followed.

Then the story that had gone untold for sixty-nine years was finally told.

Uncle Roscoe thought he was probably a freshman in high school at the time. Roscoe said, “Well . . . I only remember that I came home from school one day and Dad wasn’t there. So, I did the chores. Next morning, Dad still wasn’t around, so I did the morning chores and went on to school.

And so it continued for several days - nearly a week.

When Grandpa Joe did return, he had nothing to say. At least not to Roscoe.

Aunt Maudine was very young when all this happened. She didn’t remember her Dad’s absence. Although, later in life, she did read cousin Mina’s newspaper clippings about Uncle Mahlon, Iowa and a shooting. After hearing Roscoe’s story of Grandpa Joe’s absence Maudine connected Roscoe’s memory to those events of 1933. My Dad and Uncle Gordan were too young to have any memory of any of it.

Details about the shooting were provided by the1933 Monroe newspaper’s account. Cousin Mina had sent for copies in 1933 and had kept them ever since. Aunt Maudine made copies of the old copies and sent them to me.

Grandpa’s half-sister, Lake Shipley Power, recalled only, “The menfolk went up to Iowa to take care of things”. Those, “menfolk”, were likely: my Grandpa Joe; his half-brother; Elgin; and their Dad, my Great Grandfather, Ed Shipley. They buried Uncle Mahlon in Iowa. And that was it. Nobody seemed to have anything more to say about the matter. The story was buried along with Mahon.

How was such dismissal possible?

I think I know.

First of all, it was a disgraceful event. Nobody wants to remember disgraceful events. Second, remembering a murder doesn’t bring in the crops, or feed the livestock. Thirdly, my clan is not much given to unpleasant talk. In fact, My Uncle Roscoe is reluctant to say anything at all unless he really has to. I guess he thought the murders of Uncle Mahlon were best left undiscussed. Although, when prodded by the innocent question, he did tell the tale.

Mina’s Clippings: Abridged from the Newton Daily News / March 13, 1933 / Newton Iowa 7:00 AM / Friday / March 10.

The Sanford family, along with Mahlon, were finishing breakfast. Fourteen-year-old Lucille rose from the table to set off on her pony to school, as usual. Around an hour later, at about 8:00, neighbors heard shots coming from the direction of the Sanford farm. They weren’t alarmed. One man said he thought it was just somebody banging away at a chicken hawk.

All was quiet until late afternoon. Lucille returned from what she thought was just another day at school - to ineffable horror.

Her twelve-year-old sister, Rosalie, had been shot in the side of her head. Her mother (Bessie Lee) had been shot in the face. Her father (Floyd) was lying face-down near the corncrib He had been shot twice. One shot blasting away an elbow, the second shot to his back killed him. Mahlon lay dead in the kitchen, alongside mother and daughter.

The blood of all three ran thoughtlessly together in unkind communion.

Lucille looked no further than her father’s lifeless bloody body. In anguish and confusion, she mounted her pony and galloped half a mile to the neighboring Veldon farm. Mrs. Veldon did what she could to calm her. Mr. Veldon called Sheriff Earl Shields.

Next day the bodies were attended to, and the legal work begun. The bodies had lain untouched for a day and a night.

Sheriff Shields constructed a plausible re-enactment based on the position of the shell casings, bodies and blood splatters - along with the testimony of the lone survivor, Lucille Sanford.

Not long after Lucille left for school, Mahlon and Mr. Sanford left the kitchen. Mr. Sanford went to his farm work. Mahlon went for his shotgun. Were harsh words exchanged at table after Lucille left? Did Mahlon wait for Lucille to leave? Why would he? What really happened?

The answers to these questions will never be known, at least not in this world.

Mahlon probably started shooting as soon as he entered the kitchen. Whatever terror mother and daughter felt likely lasted only a few seconds. After killing both, Mahlon went out on the porch, shotgun still smoking. Sanford was running toward the house when a shot from Mahlon took off his elbow. Sanford turned and ran. Mahlon’s next shot hit him in the back, killing him instantly. Mahlon then returned to the kitchen. He braced the stock of the gun against the windowsill, the barrel against his chest - and pulled the trigger.

First blast to last lasted no more than minutes - possibly seconds. Sheriff Shields called it the work of a madman.

I’m not so sure.

In the mid 1990’s, I wrote an essay called, Celtic Rage Syndrome. I intended it as slightly tongue-in-cheek. Maybe I should have taken the notion more seriously. I suggested there may be a recessive gene in Scots-Irish genetic heritage that in the blink of an eye can spark a massive overload in the temper-control circuity; a spark that temporarily shuts down the whole apparatus. The manifest result is demented overwhelming anger. I compared it to watching a nice young bank clerk suddenly turn into a 10 ft. tall, roaring, drooling werewolf.

It’s unsettling.

It’s usually over in seconds.

Unfortunately, the damage can be substantial.

I gave several examples - mostly from history. At some point in the essay I wrote that I didn’t know of any serious such episodes in my own family’s history. Uncle Mahlon’s story tells me otherwise. Was it a case of Celtic Rage Syndrome? Maybe. Maybe it was something else working in parallel.

Maybe it was an ancient imperative that isn’t much considered anymore – a matter of honor. To understand matters of honor we must also accept an immutable reality that these days is held in contemptuous disbelief.

Men are different from women.

What! Gasp! No! What are you saying? Yes, yes, I know - the shock . . . I’ll pause to allow politically-correct heads to stop spinning.

Women think matters of honor are silly.

Men think matters of honor are worth the spilling of blood.

Of course I’m oversimplifying. Some woman think honor is important, some men don’t. The general rule holds. I think Uncle Mahlon thought a particular matter of honor was worth the spilling of blood – including his own.

Does that sound crazy? Let’s consider the testimony of Lucille Sanford.

Sheriff Shields asked Lucille if she could think of anything that might explain Mahlon’s inexplicable violence. She thought awhile… and said, ”That man, Shipley. He stayed sullen about all the time”. The sheriff asked if he had been more sullen yesterday morning than at any other time. “No, she replied“. Did you ever hear, Mr. Shipley ever threaten anyone at the house? “No” said Lucille. Had he ever done anything at the house to irritate any of you? “Yes”. What had he done? “Well, when he had been down at the barn, he would get hay and straw in his overall cuffs and spill it on Momma’s nice clean rug, and tobacco, too, and . . he would drink as high as six cups of coffee and set around hollering”.

I read Lucille’s remarks as, ill-mannered, snobbish and condescending. How many times did Uncle Mahlon hear the same in Lucille’s snotty exasperated tone?

One time too many?

Even men who are only hired-help have pride. All men require some sense of personal dignity. The daily drip-drip-drip of contempt from not only Lucille, but very likely from the entire family may have simmered, then boiled, then finally… erupted.

I think it was a reckoning to settle all accounts.

That’s not excuse - only explanation.

Afterthoughts: The so-called senseless killings in our own time may be echoes of the grievance that set off Uncle Mahlon’s killings: lack of respect. For a while such killings were referred to as, “going postal”, because of a particular, “senseless”, killing, carried out by a disgruntled postal employee. The phrase fell into disuse, The killings continue.

We live in a culture that doesn’t have much respect for respect. How many, ”senseless”, killings might have been prevented by simple courtesy?

By K. L. Shipley

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