Comments on: John Dempsey: “They Kick Better Men Out of Hell Every Day”

By: Kendall Clark

Kendall Clark — Sat, 11 Feb 2012 19:38:41 +0000

Thomas Clark was my husband’s great grandfather, through his son John Smith Clark, who was 9 at the time of the incident. John Smith and his older brother Henry ended up in Springfield, OH. No one in my husband’s family would ever talk about the Clarks. I have been stuck for a long time without any information about the family beyond John Smith Clark. You can imagine my husband’s surprise and shock to find this story. Ardis, you have done a tremendous job to hunt this story down. I would love to have your references so we can also read the trial notes and court appeal and learn about this ancestor. Thomas Clark did not stay in prison. He is listed in the 1910 Census with Jane, John S, and other children, living in Wheeling, WV. Apparently, he either won his appeal, or his sentence was much reduced, or he was given parole fairly early. Thanks for posting.

By: t blankenship

t blankenship — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 02:41:07 +0000

This John Demspey is my great great grandfather. I did an article very similar on him in our “Mingo County genealogy” newsletter. A copy of an old tintype photo accompanied the article. Our family still owns the land where this happened. I never knew he was a Mormon until I read the court appeal of Thomas Clark.

By: Mina

Mina — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 16:21:11 +0000

Just popping by to magnify the praise…

By: Bruce Crow

Bruce Crow — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 16:16:24 +0000

I knew about the 1888 beatings. And you have posted here about Richards and Dempsey. I hadn't heard of George P. Canova. Sounds like I have some homework. So it may be superficial, but I have learned something already.

By: Ardis E. Parshall

Ardis E. Parshall — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 15:24:30 +0000

Mark B., he used rilly rilly big type and rilly rilly wide margins. (Aargh!) (Just so no one misunderstands: Mark is making fun of my typo, and I’m making fun of Mark. Neither of us is making any disparaging comment about Patrick Mason’s dissertation — it is an excellent work, and as I said earlier, is destined, I’m sure, to be the definitive work on violence against religious minorities in the South.)

Bruce, the particular article that sparked the search for the Dempsey story this week is “Eight Men Met Death at Hands of Persecutors,” Deseret News, Church Section, week ending 5 September 1959, 19, and lists four unnamed missionaries beaten in Tennessee in September 1888; names the four Mormon killed in the Cane Creek Massacre; and ends:

“Three other violent deaths of Church members in the south possibly should be mentioned int he list of martyrs, for their attackers probably were motivated in part, at least, by anti-Mormon prejudice. The three men were Alma P. Richards, a missionary; George P. Canova, president of the Sanderson Branch of the Florida Conference, and John Dempsey, a member of the Church in Eugene, W. Va. … Elder Dempsey also was the victim of an ambush, but in his case, the identity of his attacker was established. His neighbor, Thomas Clark, was very bitter in his opposition to the Church. ‘If Mormon elders were treated as they should be,’ Clark had said, ‘they would be ridden on rails out of the country.’ An apparently minor provocation was all the excuse he needed to take the life of his Mormon neighbor.” (Obviously this is based solely on the letter written to the Deseret News.)

So you can see it is a superficial article.

Thank you all for your comments. It’s so much fun to have a group like you to share these stories with — if it weren’t for Keepa and you ninnies I wouldn’t even be chasing down most of these stories in the first place. You’re directly responsible for the solution to several history mysteries and the writing of whatever essays have any lasting value.

By: Justin

Justin — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 15:00:09 +0000

Excellent work, Ardis. The case makes for fascinating reading.

By: Bruce Crow

Bruce Crow — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 14:46:28 +0000

Mark,
I like Mason’s dissertation. I think it reads well despite being so long. Of course his subject is near and dear to my heart, so I am a little biased. His paper contained several examples of violence against minority religions.

Ardis,
I’d be very interested in seeing the list of who were considered martyrs in 1959. For example, I’d love to know whether that list of martyrs includes someone like Joel Love, whose death is lost because of its proximity in time and location to the more well known Cane Creek Massacre.

By: Last Lemming

Last Lemming — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 14:19:37 +0000

I’m guessing that Last Lemming may have been referring to that line mistaking Clark’s name as Campbell. It’s ironic, at the very least, that Hubbard’s or the DesNews’s slip almost seems to transfer the guilt from Clark individually to the Campbellites as a whole — ironic because at that point Hubbard is complaining about Clark’s irrational bigotry.

Precisely.

Sorry I didn’t get back to this. I had some snowshovelling to do, then couldn’t access the site last night.

By: ji

ji — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 07:12:43 +0000

But maybe the murder can be called a martyrdom — the new hate crimes bill in the U. S. makes “hate crime” a federal offense, and a “hate crime” is defined as a crime where the criminal had unkind thoughts in his or her head about the victim. If the preacher could be guilty of a hate crime, then the victim can be called a martyr.

By: Mark B.

Mark B. — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 06:48:18 +0000

I shouldn’t quibble about typos, but did Patrick Mason really spend over 300 pages (p. 145-456) on this incident? : )

How long was that dissertation? There have been shorter dissertations than that cast down to hell every day.