Die with it in you: The Legend of Frankie Silver (1831)

For over two centuries, the mountain folks of North Carolina have been intrigued by the legend of Frankie Silver a young woman sentenced to hang for the axe murder and burning of her husband Charley Silver. What was the secret she took with her to her grave? And why has the story captured the imagination of so many generations of poets, storytellers, and musicians?

Listener discretion is advised.

Included in the episode is the original song "Frankie Silver (Take it to the Grave)" performed by Couldn't Be Happiers (featuring Brown Mountain Lightening Bugs on banjo and backup vocals).
Used by permission.

Songwriters: Jodi Hildebran (BMI) and Jordan Crosby Lee (ASCAP)
Publishers:
BMI- Eddie C Life Music
ASCAP- Mediterranean Sun
Sync rights: Music of the Sea
https://couldntbehappiers.com/
*
"Francis Silvers' Confession"
The Lenoir Topic
North Carolina
Wednesday, March 24, 1886

This dreadful, dark and dismal day
Has swept my glories all away.
My sun goes down, my days are past,
And I must leave this world at last.

Oh! Lord, what will become of me?
I am condemned you all now see,
To heaven or hell my soul must fly
All in a moment when I die.

Judge Daniel has my sentence pass'd
Those prison walls I leave at last,
Nothing to cheer my drooping head
Until I'm numbered with the dead.

But oh! that Dreadful Judge I fear;
Shall I that awful sentence hear:
"Depart ye cursed down to hell
And forever there to dwell"?

I know that frightful ghosts I'll see
Gnawing their flesh in misery,
And then and there attended be
For murder in the first degree.

There shall I meet that mournful face
Whose blood I spilled upon this place;
With flaming eyes to me he'll say,
"Why did you take my life away?"

His feeble hands fell gently down,
His chattering tongue soon lost its sound,
To see his soul and body part
It strikes with terror to my heart.

I took his blooming days away,
Left him no time to God to pray,
And if his sins fall on his head
Must I not bear them in his stead?

The jealous thought that first gave strife
To make me take my husband's life,
For months and days I spent my time
Thinking how to commit this crime.

And on a dark and doleful night
I put his body out of sight,
With flames I tried him to consume, 
But time would not admit it done.

You all see me and on me gaze,
Be careful how you spend your days,
And never commit this awful crime,
But try to serve your God in time.

My mind on solemn subjects roll; 
My little child, God bless its soul!
All you that are of Adams race,
Let not my faults this child disgrace.

Farewell good people, you all now see
What my bad conduct's brought on me--
To die of shame and disgrace
Before this world of human race.
*

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About me: Retired as head of genealogy from Jefferson County Library, Missouri. Storyteller at heart.

Be sure to visit our sister site Murder and Mayhem in Jefferson County, Missouri for more tales of historical local true crime.