UNICOI COUNTY HISTORY
The
Hanging of Mary the Elephant
By Hilda Padgett - Erwin, Tennessee, 1996
More than eighty years ago, on
September 13, 1916, something happened in Erwin, Tennessee that even
today causes disagreement among the natives. Mary the elephant was
hanged by a railroad derrick car at the Clinchfield Railroad yard. The
hanging of Mary has been referred to in many writings. It was a question
on a TV quiz show and even the focus of an article in Playboy
magazine.
A number of Erwinites would like to
have the story buried and forgotten and never heard of again.
There are also a number of people who are interested in the story and
would like to know all of the facts. After all, this actually
happened and is part of the history of our town. My friend, Ruth
Pieper, who moved to Erwin nine years ago, has been fascinated with the
story. She has spent much of her time, effort, and money on
tracing the history of the Spark's World Famous Show.
Charles H. Sparks owned the show and it
had a reputation in the entertainment world as being a 100% "Sunday
School" Circus. That is, no short change artist-a clean family
entertainment. Charles Sparks had been in the circus business
since the late 1800's. The circus purchased its first elephant in
1896. That was Mary. She was four years old and four feet
high. At that time the show was a horse and wagon show. By 1905,
they had grown to railroad transportation with one railroad car.
By 1906, they had three rail cars; by 1916, the show had expanded to
fifteen rail cars and five elephants.
In some writings about Mary it is
speculated that she was a 'killer elephant' that had been sold from one
circus to another. That is not true. Mary had been with the
Spark's circus for twenty years, as their first wild animal.
Charles Sparks and his wife, Addie, were very caring people. They
saw that the animals connected with their show were well cared for.
The trainers were instructed to use 'gentling care.'
The Spark's show played in Jenkins,
Kentucky, then on to St. Paul, Virginia where they connected with the
Clinchfield Railroad on September 9, 1916. Late in the summer,
Louis Reed, the regular elephant trainer, had to leave the show. Paul
Jacoby, who had previously been the elephant trainer, took over the job.
By the time they got to St. Paul they needed an 'under keeper' for the
elephants.
On Sunday, October 10th or Monday
September 11th, Walter "Red" Eldridge was hired as 'under keeper.' Ruth
has spent many hours trying to get the background of Red Eldridge. His
age was estimated as between 23 and 38 years. He was hired in St. Paul
but apparently had no family there. It was learned that he had been
working in a hotel in St. Paul before he was hired for the circus. Also,
one lead was that he was from Mt. Vernon, Indiana. That was checked out
with no results. His death certificate did not give names of parents or
birthplace. Ruth would be very interested to learn if anyone knows
anything about Red Eldridge.
The circus went from St. Paul to
Kingsport where they played on September 12th. Between shows the
elephants were driven to a watering hole. On the way back to the tent,
Mary went for a piece of watermelon beside the road. Red prodded
her sensitive ear with a bull hook and she became enraged. She
grabbed Red with her trunk and threw against a drink stand. Then
she stepped on his head until it was flat.
The people were terrified. They
began screaming, "Kill the elephant!" A blacksmith tried, but the guns
that day were not powerful enough. Charlie Sparks soon arrived on
the scene and calmed Mary. Mayor Miller and Sheriff Hickman
'arrested' Mary and staked her by the county jail where many onlookers
came by to see her. They gave a statement to the Johnson City
Staff newspaper that steps would be taken to see that the elephant did
not come into contact with the people of Johnson City.
That night, Charlie and Addie Sparks
had to make the most difficult decision of their circus careers. After
all those years with Mary they had become so attached to her, but they
couldn't take a chance that she might harm a circus patron. They decided
to have her destroyed. But how were they to destroy a 7500 pound
elephant? Shooting her in four soft spots on her head might have
worked but was too risky with the crowd of curiosity seekers that the
story attracted. She was too smart to eat food laced with
cyanide.
In 1903, an elephant [named
Topsy*] had been electrocuted at Coney
Island, with the help of Thomas Edison. Kingsport or Erwin
did not have enough electrical power for an electrocution. Clinchfield could use two engines to crush Mary, or the derrick could be
used for hanging her. Technically, Mary killed Red in Kingsport, so
Sullivan County should be where she met her fate.
The summer of 1916 had torrential rains
that caused floods and washouts on the railroad tracks. Clinchfield
would not risk sending its derrick car 80 miles, round trip, north to
Kingsport when it might be needed south, over the Blue Ridge Mountains
into North Carolina. Before midnight on September 12th Charlie
Sparks made the decision to take Mary to Erwin to be hanged. That
decision would also hang on Erwin the fame of elephant killer for the
next 80 years.
Wednesday, September 13th was overcast
from several days of rain. The five elephants were moved from the circus
lot to the railroad siding where the hanging was to take place. It
was about 5 PM. Mary's foot was chained to the track and the
derrick chain put on her neck. A witness described the derrick chain
breaking as she was lifted. The reason, the ankle chain had not been
released. The witness said he could hear the ankle tendons being torn.
When the chain broke, Mary fell back on the track and was stunned and
not able to get up. They quickly got another chain around her neck and
hoisted her into the air once more. Within a few minutes she was
dead. Mary was buried on railroad property near where she was
hanged. A few people today say they can point to the spot. No one
has ever been allowed to dig up her bones.
Today if an elephant is judged to be
dangerous it would be an entirely different story. Because at the
present time there are sanctuaries for old, sick, and needy animals. One
such place is the Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee. It is located
at Hohenwald, in Lewis County. They now have two elephants and room to
expand to care for as many as ten more. If such a place had
existed in 1916 perhaps Mary could have been sent there and today Erwin
would not be known as the town that hanged the elephant.
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