Free White Christmas, bloody Christmas by M. Bruce Jones, Trudy J Smith

fires and "Charlie Lawson" was gone. In the misty light of the wet dawn, the experience of the previous hours seemed somehow distant and strange. They began to wonder if they had actually seen "Charlie Lawson" at all in the middle of that dark, rainy night...
    Authors Note:
    (Much later, they learned that there was, indeed, another Charlie Lawson. The man they met that night was Charlie Lawson s uncle, a brother of Lawson s father, Augustus. Perhaps the younger Lawson was named in his honor.)
    -97-

    There was a front porch that stretched across the length of the front of the house. The single front window was situated on the right side of the house.
    An extremely narrow stairwell (about twenty-eight inches wide) led to the upstairs bedroom. Before the house was torn down, I walked up these steep, foot-worn steps. They had borne the weight of so many footsteps that they were worn down several inches in the middle. This gave them the appearance of sagging, but they were very strongly constructed. This upstairs bedroom is where several of the older Lawson children slept.
    The large living room on the lower floor contained two
    standard-size beds, one of which was a trundle bed, a chest of drawers with a large mirror (see page 1H), an upright
    phonograph,and some chairs. Close by her mother's bed and near the warmth of the fireplace, was tiny Mary Lou's crib.
    The house was heated by two large fireplaces. The fireplace in the upstairs was identical to the one on the lower floor. Understandably, these fireplaces were quite inadequate to warm these large rooms during the coldest nights of the winters,and several heavy quilts were necessary to keep the family members warm as they slept.
    In Fannie's kitchen, there was one long table to accommodate her very large family at meal times. On both sides of the table were two long benches. In the corner, beside the stove, was a wooden barrel which served as her "meal chest." In this barrel, Fannie kept all of her flour and cornmeal safely stored away from any pests that might try to get it. Also inside with the flour and cornmeal, Fannie kept her "dough bowl" which she would bring out to use when making bread.
    In another corner, there was an old "safe." Safes were used for storing food away from flies and sticky little fingers until they were to be served at the next meal. Along the wall beside the back entrance, there was a set of shelves on which a bucket of fresh water was kept for drinking and other uses.
    -99-

    Also on these shelves was an empty bucket and various pans for washing dishes and bathing. The house did not have the luxury of running water. Water was brought by hand to the house from a well that was located directly behind the house or from a nearby "spring." For those not familiar with springs, they are locations where cold, underground water has broken through and found an escape to the surface. In the absence of ice, many perishables such as milk and butter could be submerged in the cold water and temporarily stored. Another way perishables were kept was in a "milk well." This was a hole, around eight to ten feet deep that was dug on a hillside to insure it stayed dry. They usually had the appearance of a regular well. A platform was rigged inside of it to raise and lower containers of milk or butter. The temperature this far down in the ground stayed cool enough to help preserve foods. The temperature was approximately sixty-eight degrees.
    The Lawsons also owned a coffee grinder in which Fannie ground the beans herself for their coffee. Of course, the wood cookstove that little Raymond would often play behind on cold days was also located in the kitchen. Since this lean-to kitchen was almost as large as the main part of the house, the stove was instrumental in helping to warm that part of the house on those cold, windswept days of winter.

    The Murder Of The Lawson Family
    Twas on last Christmas evening; The snow was on the ground. In a home in North Carolina, Where