Legal hanging, 1841, Jonathan Davidson was hanged on gallows which was located about two hundred yards west of where T. D. Mullins resides.
Davidson killed Henry Langford by stabbing him to death on the street just in
front of where now stands the store of J. T. Adams on corner of Main and Church
streets. On day of execution, Davidson made a statement on the gallows which
amounted to a curse. Pointing to a man in the crowd, he said, "You caused this
murder. You nor any of your family will ever be a success at anything. You have
brought me to the gallows. You and yours shall suffer and wind up in blankness."
M. J. Miller was a witness to the killing. The writer gained most of this
information from him and D. N. Williams for this article. The writer's mother
mentioned in his presence many times the fact of Davidson's two little boys at
the behest of their mother, went out one night and cut down the gallows the
gallows on which their father was hanged, and burned it into ashes. What became
of the family no one in Rockcastle knows today. The curse uttered against the
other family seems to have been literally fulfilled.
