Accident
Accidents were the leading cause of death in the CSI:D sample, and drowning was the leading cause of death among mortal accidents. There are myriad reasons why. Broad swaths of the American public did not know how to swim. Primary modes of transportation, especially early in the century, involved river routes. Mill ponds were prevalent. Children played outside—generally a good thing but occasionally a sad one. Perhaps the saddest of these incidents involved a mass May Day drowning at Boykin Mill Pond in 1860. Twenty-eight teenagers set off on a raft that hit a snag and more than twenty-five drowned, including all five children from one family. Sadder still may be the case of Noah Wesley Dawkins. In mid-June 1888, Dawkins and his friends, all African Americans, set off for a local watering hole where they ran into three white boys, one of whom offered Dawkins fifty cents if he would walk into a particular area in the creek, assuring him it wasn’t deep. It was deep, and Dawkins drowned. It is tempting to classify this as a homicide, but it is clear from testimony that the white children thought they were playing a cruel trick, not a deadly one.
Alcohol was such a critical indirect cause in so many of the accidental drownings, shootings, fires, and falls in CSI:D that it really ought to be regarded the deadliest force in nineteenth century South Carolina. In addition to these indirect roles, alcohol was the direct cause of accidental death in more than sixty cases. It was probably also a direct cause in many of the ‘exposure’ cases—bodies that were discovered outside and were thought to have died from exposure to the elements.
Nineteenth century law enforcement had no recourse to blood-alcohol tests. Even today, determining precise BACs postmortem, and working back from those to levels of inebriation at time of death, is fraught with difficulty. This meant that nineteenth-century coroners had to rely exclusively on witness testimony and the known habits of the deceased to determine alcohol’s role in producing death. Standing around a dead man, jurors found themselves passing judgment on just how drunk he had been the night before. According to witnesses, John Goodlett “seemed to be drunk.” John Agner was “sorry he was drunk.” Abe Waganan was “very funny & lively”—very drunk as [was] his custom.” Is ‘very drunk’ drop-dead drunk? It is hard to know. On the night of January 15, 1816, Angus McQueen drank more than half a gallon of spirits. “The dec’d was very much intoxicated,” noted one witness, “and fell down four times during which time he vomited upon the carpet.” Because McQueen kept getting up and falling down, the jurors determined that the falls (and the winter cold) contributed to his demise, though it is equally possible that McQueen died of alcohol poisoning. Juries were more likely to fix upon ‘intemperance’ as a clear cause of death if the deceased was a notorious addict. In December 1842, H. P. Church was discovered by his land-lady sprawled half on and half off of his bed. A “habitual drunkard” who had been continuously drinking for two weeks, she did not even bother to try and shake him awake. The inquest did not hesitate in finding that Church had died of intoxication.
The third leading cause of accidental deaths were ‘vehicular’ accidents, a catch-all category that includes drunken falls from a train and sober buckings from a horse. Further complicating this picture is the fact that many of the drownings probably belong in this category. There is little difference between falling unwitnessed off of a train and off of a boat, except that in one case you land on tracks and are quickly found where in the other you wash downstream, far from the site of the accident.
Bartholomew Darby was thrown from the saddle and hit his head on a stump, his wagon then “running over his head ... & breaking his neck & deeply cutting him under the right ear.” Steve Yeldell fell out of his cart and broke his neck.
All such accidents pale in comparison to the staggering mortality brought to South Carolina by train. Richard Springs was “run over by a train.” Fannie Ford was “run over by a train.”A slave named Sam was “Run over by [a] train.” Almost as soon as trains arrived in these counties, there were sots to fall off of them, laborers to be crushed by them, and depressives to jump in front of them. Indeed, it is hard to imagine a technological innovation responsible for a sharper uptick in the per capita death rate. It is also clear that coroners and inquest juries were unprepared for the level of bodily violence meted out by train. The body of a slave named Berry was “very much mashed and limbs and bones severed.” William Abbott’s body was “mangled, bruised, cut and crushed.” Even so coroners and their juries were often at pains to absolve the railroad itself of any wrong-doing. Hosea Jackson “came to his death by his own carelessness and from no carelessness whatever on the part of the engineer.” The crushing of William Roberts was likewise “not caused by any dereliction of duty on the part of the rail-road employees.” With train accidents we see for the first time the question of corporate responsibility, and potential corporate liability, creeping into the inquest process.
The larger point, however, is a physical one. Moving the body at a faster speed than the body was designed to go is an enormous convenience that has to be paid for. Today vehicular accidents (car, motorcycle, and all-terrain-vehicle) are the fourth-leading cause of death among Americans after heart disease, cancer, and stroke. The nineteenth century was not particularly different, except that families moved by horse, wagon, and train—and died less often of cancer.
The fourth leading cause of accidental death in the CSI:D sample involved the discharge of firearms. Some were simple cases of men who were cleaning or handling weapons that suddenly went off. The vast majority of cases, however, involve an unfortunate bystander. In 1849, Tilman Attaway was mistaken for a turkey by his hunting buddy. In 1808, James Spradley was leaning in to watch two dogs fight over a dead deer. Fourteen-year old George Nettles sought to break up the dogs by bashing one of them with the butt of his gun. Instead the gun discharged into Spradley’s face. As this case attests, guns and children made as disastrous a pairing then as they do now. In 1820 ten-year old Mancel King accidentally shot and killed his brother. In 1899 ten-year old John McManus shot and killed his friend. “I was fooling with the pistol and it went off,” he told the inquest.
Undoubtedly some of these gun-related ‘accidents’ were not accidents at all. A dead man alone in a room might have been cleaning his gun, or he might have harbored hidden miseries. Similarly some of the accidental misfires on bystanders were probably intentional homicides. Unless new evidence emerges at this late date, however, such cases will have to remain categorized as accidents.
The fifth leading cause of death by accident in the CSI:D sample was death by suffocation—another category that speaks more to what a coroner was called to investigate than to what people actually died from. A majority of the ‘smothering’ deaths were probably SIDS victims. In white households such cases would not have been investigated—infant mortality was relatively high in the period and a white family’s ‘dear pledges’ were often ‘recalled to God.’ But in a society where every enslaved child was as potentially valuable as a Lexus, infant death in the quarter was more rigorously investigated. Coupled with deep prejudices against enslaved mothers, inquests typically found that an unnamed “negro Child” was “negligently Smothered” by its mother, or that the enslaved child Lora was “accidentally smothered” in the family bed, or that the enslaved children Henry and Alcy were crushed in the night, having being “overlaid” by their parents. It is possible that such ‘negligence’ did occur among overworked and overtired slaves, and such findings were far preferable to those cases where enslaved parents were charged with infanticide.
The sixth leading cause of death by accident in the CSI:D sample was death by fire. Most homes in the period were made of wood. Most had fireplaces. None had a fire extinguisher. Fire was light and life, but it was also occasionally death. In 1866 a freedman named Sloan was burnt to death in a gin house. In 1890 a child named Julia Hightower wandered too close to the family fireplace. Her younger sister tried to dowse her with water to no avail.
These six types of accidental death—drowning, alcohol abuse, transportation mishaps, gun miscues, suffocations, and fires—account for 75% of the accidental deaths in the CSI:D sample. Other relatively common accidents involved falling trees and limbs, industrial accidents, and poisonings and overdoses. Rounding out the sample were accidents that were more unique. Home alone, Medora Williams had an epileptic seizure and fell into her own fireplace. Traveling with the Bailey & Company circus, George West was gored by his own elephant. (Some might not consider this an ‘accident’ since the elephant had ‘cause’; and acted with ‘intent.’)
NEXT: Natural Causes
Accident Inquests
Name | Deceased Description | Date | Inquest Location | Death Method | Inquest Finding |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Edward F. Lyles | June 12, 1879 | at Wm J. Martin's, Fairfield County, SC |
upon their oaths, do say the deceased came to his death by a gunshot wound accidentally discharged in his own hands. |
||
Thomas Bramblet | May 28, 1889 | at Laurens Court House, Laurens County, SC |
upon their oaths do say that the said Thomas Bramblet came to his death by being accidentally struck by the Hose Reel, near the Greenville Laurens RR trestle on the evening of the 27 of May 1889. |
||
Mrs. M. C. Williams | October 13, 1908 | [at] Mrs. Williams, Chesterfield County, SC |
Upon their oaths, do say: that the aforesaid Mrs. M.C. Williams did some to her death by a gun shot wound by George Williams . . . |
||
Josephine A. Brookes Thrift | infant child | March 28, 1860 | at Delila Jenkinses, Union County, SC |
upon their oaths do say . . .that the child came to its death by being smothered by its mother by accident |
|
Sam | October 31, 1840 | at the house of Nelson [?], Fairfield County, SC |
upon their oaths do say that the said boy Sam came to his death by the shot of a gun -which gun was accidently shot by a negro boy Allen about 8 years of age |
||
Sarah Ann Howell | May 5, 1860 | at Boykin's Mill, Kershaw County, SC | |||
Samuel Whillow | December 17, 1818 | Laurens County, SC |
We the Jurors after having been lawfully summoned, & sworn by James Watts having examined the body of decsd. Give it as our opinion that sd. Whillow came to his death by reason of his being very much intoxicated with ardent spirits & in attempting to go home some time about dark forced his young horse in saluda river at Childs' Ferry & drowned... |
||
A. G. Howard | February 28, 1860 | at Grannet Ville Depot, Edgefield County, SC |
upon their oaths do say that. . .he came to his death by accident that is by being struck a falling pine tree which stood by the side of the road where he was passing which tree was burned down having caught fire from the burning of the woods around it |
||
William Watson | near the Harrison Ferry on the Wateree River, Fairfield County, SC |
upon their oaths do say that the aforesaid William Watson came to his death by the accidental discharge of a gun in his own hands, on the bank of the Wateree river on the afternoon of 30th day of Jan AD 1894[.] |
|||
Sebron Machan | November 27, 1878 | at James A [?], Greenville County, SC |
upon their oaths do say that said Sebron Macham came to his death by some means to the jury unknown |
||
Older son of Joe Cunningham | Older son of Joe Cunningham | March 26, 1908 | [no location given], Chesterfield County, SC |
[No official declaration] |
|
Lila Washington | February 20, 1879 | at Wesley Barns Mill, Edgefield County, SC |
upon their oaths do say that the said Lila Washington came to her death by accident in catching on fire and Burning to death |
||
Isaac | slave | May 16, 1836 | near Cowpen Furnace, Spartanburg County, SC |
do say upon their oaths that the said Isaac came to his death by accident or misfortune by the bank falling on him ... in the iron mine |
|
Titus | July 19, 1857 | at the Thoroughfair landing, Horry County, SC |
upon their Oaths do say, that the said negro slave Titus came to his death by accidental drowning |
||
Harcolas | slave, negro man | November 18, 1842 | at an old house Standing in the plantation of Mrs. Susannah Turners, Union County, SC |
upon their oaths do say that . . .they do believe that from Exposure age and a burn which he had received some days previous was the cause of his death |
|
Unknown | December 10, 1877 | at Alexander Harris', Fairfield County, SC |
do say that the deceased came to its death by being Smothered in bed. & that infant in manner and form afore-Said, came to its death by misfortune or accident |
||
Avery | slave | November 14, 1831 | at a fording place of Singleton's Creek in the plantation of Jacob Champion, Kershaw County, SC |
do say upon their oaths that. . .the boy Avery came to his Death by Drowning by being Intoxicated |
|
Cland Elam | child | March 17, 1892 | at A. J. Norris Place, Edgefield County, SC |
upon their oaths do Say that the Child Came to its death from a wound inflicted by fire accidentily |
|
Milton Barter[?] | youth | August 24, 1849 | at Capt. Andrew J Hammonds Mills, Edgefield County, SC |
upon their Oaths do say . . .by accidental drowning in Mr Andrew Hammonds Mill Pond |
|
Lizzie Coleman | at A.P. Irby's plantation, Fairfield County, SC |
upon their oaths do say that the child Lizzie, Coleman, came to her death by burning in a house on the Plantation of Capt A.P. Irby's the 21st of Nov 1884 the origin of the fire unknown to the jury[.] |
|||
Georgianna Watts | October 11, 1891 | at R.O. Hairstons, Laurens County, SC |
by their oaths do say, that she came to her death, By being burnt in the house, it being burnt on her By Accident. |
||
negro Child | negro Child | August 27, 1849 | at James C. Mingo, Union County, SC |
upon their oaths do say . . .that the said child was axcidently or negligently Smothered and killed by its mother in her Sleep |
|
John Downey | February 26, 1873 | at Winnsboro, Fairfield County, SC |
We the undersigned Jurors, find the following verdict, That the Deceased, John Downey, cam to his death the twenty fifth day of February 1873. From rupture of the spleen caus by misfortune or accident |
||
John Madison Winburn | April 21, 1887 | at J. C. Winburn's, Chesterfield County, SC |
upon their oaths do say that the said John Madison Winburn came to his death by Accidental drowning at J. C. Winburns Still |
||
Elizabeth McKagen | May 5, 1860 | at Boykin's Mill, Kershaw County, SC | |||
William Perry | January 7, 1894 | in the county and state aforesaid, Edgefield County, SC |
upon their oaths do say, that the aforesaid William Perry came to his death from gun shot wound in the hands of Calib Hunter. . .said wound was accidental |
||
Crosby Irby | at Perry Irby's, Fairfield County, SC |
upon their Oaths do say that the deceased came to his death at his home. . .from a gun shot wound accidently fired[.] |
|||
Pressly Foster | boy | August 1, 1882 | at Mr. Wm G[?], Greenville County, SC |
upon their oaths do say that . . .came to his death by falling in a branch in an epileptic fit & causing strangulation |
|
Jack | slave [runaway] | November 21, 1835 | at Andersonville, Anderson County, SC |
do say that Elias E. Harrison ... a certain gun of the value of seven dollars then and there charged with gun powder and leaden buck shot, which he the said Elias E. Harrison then and there had and held in both is hands, then and there accidently and by misfortune and against the will of him the said Elias E. Harrison discharged and....and shot out of the said gun him the said negro man in and upon the right arm, shoulder and back of the head....ten wounds with said shot, which were mortal wounds |
|
Isaac Oliphant | November 9, 1882 | at Ritch Thomson, Edgefield County, SC |
upon there oaths do say the said Isaac Oliphant Came to his death by a Gun Shot Wound unfortunately or accidentally in his own hands |
||
H. C. Rudisail | December 31, 1881 | at Campobello, Spartanburg County, SC |
upon their oaths do say taht the said H. C. Rudisail deceased came to his death by apoplexy caused from over work by violent exertion of the body |
||
John R. Edwards | March 24, 1858 | Spartanburg County, SC |
find J.R. Edwards came to his death by fall or drowning |
||
James McCannon | May 1, 1821 | at Joseph Hughes, Union County, SC |
say on our oths that the said James McCannon did come to his death by the act of God . . .by attmting to Crose a Creek by the name of Hughs Creek and was forthwith drownded |
||
John | slave | November 13, 1849 | at the house of Mrs. J.S. McRae, Kershaw County, SC |
upon their oaths do say the deceased came to his death by the falling of a tree |
|
Samuel | Negro Man | Anderson County, SC |
the Decd had been missing ever since Sunday. . .he would search the Mill pond as he had been seen in the neighborhood?and found him floating on the water in the pond about 12 feet from the Dam. . .That he knew of no enemy the Decd had had never heard of any threats--thought it was accidental. |
||
Furman Smith | December 16, 1874 | at Snow Hill, Chesterfield County, SC |
upon their oaths, do say: That the said William Smith & Furman Smith came to their death by misfortune or accidently being burned |
||
George Gardner | January 22, 1935 | in Chesterfield County, Chesterfield County, SC |
upon their Oaths do say that George Gardner received . . . mortal wound by Rifle Shot in the hand of Rance Cue some being unavoidable accident |
||
Callen O'Neall | November 11, 1855 | at Luke Havirds[?], Edgefield County, SC |
upon their Oaths do say, that the said Callen Oneall came to his death. . .By drinking too much liquor and supposed to have strangled to death by Throwing up |
||
Addora Wallace | Fairfield County, SC |
we the undersigned Jurymen do hereby find the following verdict That Addora Wallace came to her death by drowning not Known to the Jury. |
|||
James Crooks | March 29, 1807 | at little River Near Laurens Court house, Laurens County, SC |
upon their oath here insert that in Crossing a log he fell in & was Drowned. |
||
Charlie Woodard | November 15, 1915 | at H. L. Woodards, Chesterfield County, SC |
upon their oaths, do say: By accidental gunshot from his own hands |
||
Milledge Fuller | freedman | February 18, 1867 | at John Ransford plantation, Edgefield County, SC |
upon their oaths do say that. . .came to his death by a gun shot wound accidently done in the hands of Ellie a freedwoman |
|
James Hindman | February 11, 1875 | Spartanburg County, SC |
upon their oaths do say that in their opinion the said James Hindman came to his death by misfortune caused by fits or convulsions producing derangment ina high degree being found drowned in James Creek |
||
David Dantzler | June 29, 1829 | at Nazareth Meeting House, Spartanburg County, SC |
do say upon their oaths after examination [that] he came to his death by accidental drowning |
||
Fannie Patton | November 18, 1898 | at Francis Williams house, Edgefield County, SC |
upon their oaths do say that upon examination find that Fannie Patton Came to her death by accidental Drowning |
||
John McLeod | August 23, 1822 | at house of Widow McLeod in the fork of Lynches Creek, Kershaw County, SC |
have unanimously agreed that the said John McLeod has received his Death by unavoidable accident as he was pouring liquor into a barrel or cask . . . which liquor caught on fire and busted the said cask and as we suppose one of the staves struck the said deceased by which which we think he rec'd his death together with the volume of flame which issued from s'd spirits as on examination we found his face mortally cut and his body much burnt |
||
James Frazier | Babie | October 24, 1890 | at D. B Hollingworth, Edgefield County, SC |
upon their oaths aforesaid do say that the aforesaid James Frazier did die from Suffocation |
|
William McAbee | April 8, 1885 | Spartanburg County, SC | |||
Henry | negro man Slave | August 21, 1850 | at New Savannah in beach Island, Edgefield County, SC |
upon their oaths Say that the negro man Henry came to his death from being accidentally drowned in the Savannah river |
|
Isaac Davis | February 27, 1880 | at Jas. R. McGills, Fairfield County, SC |
upon their oaths do say, the deceased came to his death by a well caving in, covering and smothering him to death at Jas. R. McGills, near Monticello. And so the jurors aforesaid, upon their oaths, do say that Isaac Davis in manner and form aforesaid came to his death by misfortune or accident. |