Frances Stewart Silver, commonly known as Frankie Silver, is believed, erroneously, by many people to be the first woman to be executed in Burke County, North Carolina. In what many historians see as a miscarriage of justice, Silver was accused of murdering her allegedly abusive husband Charles on December 22, 1831. Silver’s tale and her supposed status as the first woman hanged in Burke County placed her story firmly in the local public consciousness. Therefore, Silver has been immortalized in literature, drama, dance, and song.
There are many different versions of Silver’s story. One version of the tale tells that Silver killed her handsome yet malicious husband in a jealous rage just before Christmas in 1831, when she suspected him of having an affair with another man’s wife. The legend then goes on to say that Silver decided to exact her revenge for this infidelity by attacking her husband with an ax as he lay sleeping on the floor next to the couple’s infant daughter, Nancy, whom Silver removed from the scene before striking her husband. The first blow left him fatally injured, and after a while he died. Silver then decapitated the corpse and chopped his body into pieces that she later burned in the fireplace. The next morning, having disposed of the corpse, Silver went to a relative’s house to declare that her husband had gone hunting but not returned. However, an alternative version tells that Silver hit her drunken husband with the ax when he tried to shoot her and her baby. Yet another account suggests that Silver struck her husband with the ax in self-defense after he attacked her. In all versions of the tale, Silver enlisted the help of her relatives to dispose of her husband’s body parts. After Silver reported her husband missing, the local river and surrounding countryside were searched, but nothing was found of the man, whose family, distressed at his disappearance, brought in a so-called slave conjure man from Tennessee. The conjure man was asked to divine where Silver’s husband had gone, and using a glass ball dangling from a piece of string, the conjure man divined that the missing husband was still at his home. This led authorities to search Silver’s home thoroughly, and eventually pieces of charred bone, part of a shoe, and a pool of dried blood were discovered, all of which pointed to the missing man having been murdered.
The discovery of the body parts, shoe, and blood led to Silver’s arrest, as well as the arrest of her mother, Barbara Stuart, and her brother, Blackston Stuart. Barbara and Blackston Stuart pleaded not guilty before the magistrate and were discharged, leaving Silver alone to face trial for murder. Silver was tried in Morganton, North Carolina, on charges of murder and attempting to conceal her crime by disposing of her husband’s remains in the fireplace. Many witnesses provided circumstantial evidence that Silver had committed the crime for which she was accused and had misled her husband’s family when they attempted to locate him.
Silver’s conviction in March 1832 prompted much discussion of issues of truth and justice, and many men, including members of the jury that convicted her, petitioned Governor Montfort Stokes for Silver to be pardoned. Soon after Silver’s conviction it became public knowledge that spousal abuse and self-defense were Silver’s probable motives, and local public opinion turned from horror to sympathy for Silver. An increasing number of men as well as a group of influential Burke County women signed petitions addressed to the new governor, David L. Swain, asking that Silver be pardoned. These petitions were, however, unsuccessful, as were the many appeals lodged by Silver’s attorneys over the one-and-a-half years that she was in jail, often chained in a dungeon. During this time in jail, Silver became ill, and when her appeals failed, her family broke her out of jail, cutting her hair short as a disguise. The ploy did not work, however, and she was recaptured and ultimately hanged on July 12, 1833.
According to legend, Silver was led to the scaffold, where the sheriff asked if she wished to say anything before her death. Before Silver could answer, her father is said to have exclaimed, “Die with it in ye, Frankie!” Silver did not heed her father’s advice, however, and informed the sheriff that she did want to say something, but she wanted to sing her reply as a ballad or poem. Silver’s response would later be known as Frankie Silver’s Confession. Another version of this tale tells that Silver wrote down her confession. However, this story seems to be without foundation as Silver was in fact illiterate and therefore unlikely to have written a poem. Once Silver finished singing her ballad, the hangman’s noose was placed around her neck, and Silver entered American folklore as the first woman to be hanged in North Carolina. It should be noted, however, that recent research reveals that Silver was not the first woman to be hanged in Burke County or in North Carolina, nor was she the first white woman to be hanged in the state, for at least nine other North Carolinian women (both white and black) were executed by hanging or by burning at the stake before Silver was hanged.
Silver’s father wanted to bring her corpse home so that it could be buried on her family’s plot. However, high temperatures and humidity in North Carolina forced Silver’s father to bury her unembalmed body in an unmarked grave a few miles from Morganton. The precise location of the grave was unknown for many years, but it is now thought to be located at Devault Farm Burial Ground. In 1952 a granite marker was placed at the grave’s probable location by the editor of a local newspaper, though, unfortunately the grave’s inscription inaccurately refers to Silver as “Frankie Silvers: Only Woman Ever Hanged in Burke County.”
The lack of factual basis undergirding much of Silver’s tale has not prevented the story from becoming ingrained in local, even national, folklore. Silver has also become the basis for many true-story crime magazine articles, websites, academic discussions, plays, and books. These include the 2001 play Frankie by William Gregg and Perry D. Young and the best-selling novel The Ballad of Frankie Silver (1998) by Sharyn McCrumb. A Swiss dance company also produced a ballet called The Ballad of Frankie Silver in 1996. Such works have helped to ensure that the story of Frankie Silver stays in the consciousness of North Carolinians.
Victoria Williams
See also Ballad; Borden, Lizzie; Women in Folklore
Further Reading
Jennings, Rachel. “Celtic Women and White Guilt: Frankie Silver and Chipita Rodriguez in Folk Memory.” MELUS 28 (1): 17–37.
Martin, Jonathan. 2015. “Frankie Silver Murder Case of 1833.” North Carolina History Project website. http://www.northcarolinahistory.org/encyclopedia/833/entry/. Accessed July 2, 2015.
McNeill Ashburn, Gwen. 1994. “Silence in the Courtroom: Language, Literature, and the Law in The Ballad of Frankie Silver.” Literature and Law, edited by Michael J. Meyer. New York: Rodopi BV.
Patterson, Beverly. 1997. “‘Give Me the Truth!’: The Frankie Silver Story in Contemporary North Carolina.” Folkstreams.net. http://www.folkstreams.net/context,160. Accessed July 2, 2015.
Tomberlin, Jason. 2004. “July 1833—Frankie Silver Hanged.” Learn NC: Antebellum North Carolina: This Month in North Carolina History website. http://www.learnnc.org/lp/editions/nchist-antebellum/5457. Accessed July 2, 2015.
Williamson, David 1998. “Author Discovers Frankie Silver Not First North Carolina Woman Hanged.” Carolina News. July 27. http://www.unc.edu/news/archives/jul98/young1.htm. Accessed June 30, 2015.