Photo: A true crime historical novel by E. Victor Wilcox
Ancestry. None of us can escape it. How the members of our family tree acted before our branch leafed out may not necessarily determine who we are, but it has a strong influence. If you have ever researched your genealogy, along with who begat who till it comes down to you, discovering their exploits helps give a picture of who you clan was before you entered the picture. Imagine discovering a bizarre string of murders within the family.
That’s what happened to Linda Wilcox as she combed through a mountain of dusty records in researching her family tree. What she learned was so shocking that her husband, historian E. Victor (Vic) Wilcox found the material for his first novel, “Murder on the Mountain: A Land Family Tragedy.”
1869 was the year and Alexander County was the place. Just a few growing seasons after the Civil War, times were still hard in western North Carolina, as it was all over the war-ravaged South. The Land family had seen the war take members of their family, though not in ways you might expect.
This is a story as sorted and strange as Tom Dula’s or that of Frankie Silver, both also true mountain folklore about people who killed the one they supposedly loved. This tale equals the both of them put together, at least in body count.
Without giving away too much, the book starts with the trial and the verdict rendered. However, just before the jury announces their decision, Vic takes us back to the days when the Land family was scratching out a living on a farm, giving us an idea of what life was like for parents James and Jinny, their sons Nimrod, Eli and David, and their daughter Sarah, whose husband had not returned from the war.
The Lands were a deeply religious family. Vic reveals their devotion to the faith with compelling scenes of revival, Bible study and adherence to church doctrine. How it all went wrong becomes a page-turner as we become more familiar with their lives. If you are one of those readers who likes to predict what will happen next, this one will stump you. On a cold February night comes the first incident. Then, with several members of the family incarcerated in Taylorsville, comes the next. If that isn’t enough suspense, the trial, held in Lenoir in the effort to get an impartial jury, takes another twist.
Beyond asking “how could this happen?” comes the question of how has a case this freakish been forgotten. In its time, the story ran in the pages of the Liverpool Mercury, in England, as well as papers in Australia and across the United States. Vic himself admitted, “it amazed me that as incredible as these events were, I had never heard of it,” adding that he and his wife Linda “decided that this particular story was just too unbelievable not to tell.”
So he wrote and published “Murder on the Mountain: A Land Family Tragedy.” It is available by contacting the author at vicw3495@gmail.com. He would be glad to ship one out to you. If you want a true crime story as compelling as anything you have ever read about this area, get the book.
