The Ballad of Frankie Silver (52 page)

Drimmer, Frederick.
Until You Are Dead: The Book of Executions in America.
New York: Pinnacle, 1992.

Ervin, Senator Sam J., Jr.
Burke County Courthouses and Related Matters.
Morganton, NC: Historic Burke Foundation, 1985.

Holland, Eliza Woodfin. “A Grand-Daughter’s Tribute to Her Grandfather.”
Asheville Citizen
, May 3, 1921.

Powell, William S.
Dictionary of North Carolina Biography
. 6 vols. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1979–96.

Sakowski, Carolyn. “The Life and Death of Frankie Silver.” Article, privately printed, May 1973.

Sheppard, Muriel Early.
Cabins in the Laurel.
Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1935.

Silver, Wayne.
Frankie’s Song: A Collection from the Kona Baptist Church Library.
Privately printed, n.d.

Stockton, Dennis. “Diary of a Death Row Inmate.” Series of articles published in the
Roanoke Times & World News
, July 26–September 28, 1995.

Triebert, H. Russell, Jean Conyers Ervin, and Marjorie Miller Triebert, eds.
The Heritage of Burke County
. Morganton, NC: Burke County Historical Society, 1981.

Wellman, Manly Wade.
Dead and Gone.
Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1955.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

(Compiled by Sharyn McCrumb)

  1. Why did the author choose to tell the story from the point of view of Burgess Gaither instead of using Frankie Silver herself as narrator?

  2. In Frankie Silver’s time, Burke County stretched all the way to the Tennessee line, with Morganton as county seat for all of it. Today the Silvers’ home is located in Mitchell County (a county founded in 1861), whose county seat, Bakersville, is less than ten miles from their home. Would a trial conducted by mountain people in Bakersville instead of by the planter class in Morganton have had any effect on the outcome?

  3. Twenty-seven years after the execution of Frankie Silver, the Civil War began, and North Carolina seceded from the Union. The flatland part of the state was devoutly Confederate, but the mountain part of North Carolina favored the Union. Can you see that political split between flatland and mountain foreshadowed in the circumstances of the case of Frankie Silver?

  4. How does the case of Fate Harkryder parallel the case of Frankie Silver? Why was it included in the novel?

  5. If you were defending Frankie Silver in court, how would you have handled the case and what evidence would you have presented?

  6. How does this case change Burgess Gaither?

  7. Both John Sevier and Frankie Silver escaped from the Morganton jail. Find out what became of John Sevier. How do you explain the difference in their fates?

  8. Talk about Miss Mary. Was she born ahead of her time? What would she be like today?

  9. Why did Isaiah Stewart tell Frankie to die without speaking?

10. Why did the governor refuse to pardon Frankie Silver even though half of the original jury signed the petition requesting it?

Also by Sharyn McCrumb

THE BALLAD NOVELS

If Ever I Return, Pretty Peggy-O

The Hangman’s Beautiful Daughter

She Walks These Hills

The Rosewood Casket

The Songcatcher

Ghost Riders

The Devil Amongst the Lawyers

The Ballad of Tom Dooley

THE NASCAR NOVELS

St. Dale

Once Around the Track

Faster Pastor
(with Adam Edwards)

EARLY WORKS

The Elizabeth MacPherson Novels

Sick of Shadows

Lovely in Her Bones

Highland Laddie Gone

Paying the Piper

The Windsor Knot

Missing Susan

MacPherson’s Lament

If I’d Killed Him When I Met Him

The PMS Outlaws

The Jay Omega Novels

Bimbos of the Death Sun

Zombies of the Gene Pool

SHORT STORY COLLECTION

Foggy Mountain Breakdown

PRAISE FOR SHARYN M
C
CRUMB

For
The Ballad of Tom Dooley

“Ms. McCrumb may have written the Americana historical thriller of the year.”

 —
Midwest Book Review

“McCrumb … demonstrates the novelist’s genius.”

—
Asheville Citizen-Times

“Sharyn McCrumb uses historical records and masterful storytelling to put a fresh spin on the infamous North Carolina crime.”

—
The Charlotte Observer

“In a story with parallels to
Wuthering Heights,
McCrumb makes a strong case for a sociopathic servant as the catalyst for the deadly events that ensue. True to the language and culture of its time and place, this latest entry in the Ballad series could be headed for bestsellerdom.”

—
Library Journal

“McCrumb’s tale is impeccably researched.… McCrumb’s novel casts light on the often bleak context surrounding characters who have become legend.”

—
Publishers Weekly

For
The Devil Amongst the Lawyers

“The old families who live in proud seclusion up in these hills produce a number of wise souls whose voices are pure poetry.”

—
The New York Times Book Review

“This is storytelling as those Celtic bards meant it to be: lyrical, haunting, and truly unforgettable.”

—Cathie Pelletier, author of
Running the Bulls

“Flat-out brilliant and transcendent, a book that gets everything exactly right. Simply put, novels don’t come any better than this.”

—Martin Clark, author of
The Legal Limit

“A superb novel that, once started, is so well written and so expertly researched that readers will find it impossible to put down.”

—Ron Rash, author of
Serena

“A natural storyteller who blends colloquialisms with literary references.”

—
News & Observer
(Raleigh, North Carolina)

“McCrumb demonstrates her usual mastery of historical detail and pointed description of place.”

—
BookPage

“Being a McCrumb novel,
The Devil Amongst the Lawyers
brims with compelling characters who are passionate, flawed, and unforgettable.”

—
Rapid River Magazine

For
The Rosewood Casket

“McCrumb’s love for the mystical beauty of modern Appalachia … and her fascination with the history of the region add depth and charm to a story that’s warm without being sentimental. A bestseller in the making!”

—
Booklist

“With fluid writing and sensitive telling, McCrumb presents her Appalachian series as perfectly as dogwood in the spring.”

—
Houston Chronicle

“The lyric writing pulls the reader from page to page. There also are the colors of the South that McCrumb stitches so masterfully into this hauntingly beautiful quilt. This book should be on everyone’s summer reading list.”

—
Richmond Times-Dispatch

“What a voice this writer has.… She is superb at telling tales as sweet as wild honey and as special as the changing colors of the leaves.”

—
The Washington Times

“Grave, poignant, and altogether magical.”

—
Kirkus Reviews

“Sharyn McCrumb deftly manipulates reality and fantasy here by fusing fact with the rich lore of rural mysticism. She crystallizes Appalachian vernacular around a fascinating plot.”

—
Southern Living

“This mystical book is a must-read for anyone who believes that the spirit of the pioneer should not disappear from the land—a wonderful book.”

—
The Courier-Journal
(Louisville, Kentucky)

“Suspenseful … spellbinding.”

—
The Washington Post

“An original storyteller, plying surprises and twists throughout.”

—
The Denver Post

“In her Ballad novels, author Sharyn McCrumb, creator of Nora Bonesteel, lays down a theme track, scores it with fascinating characters, and repeats the melody through subplot after subplot until readers are bewitched. So it is with
The Rosewood Casket
.”

—
Herald-Journal
(Spartanburg, South Carolina)

“What a rich and hearty Appalachian stew McCrumb has cooked up this time—and how satisfying to body and soul, especially for those of us who love these hallowed hills of which she writes.”

—Jerry Bledsoe, author of
Before He Wakes

For
The Ballad of Frankie Silver

“A dense and lovely but very dark design that illustrates the social hypocrisy of the legal system as much as the harshness of mountain justice—then and now.”

—
The New York Times Book Review

“Reading a novel by Sharyn McCrumb is like listening to the movements of a symphony.”

—
BookPage

“Some stories wait more than a hundred years for the right teller to come along.… McCrumb shifts easily back and forth in time, combining police procedural with an old-fashioned historical narrative worthy of Dickens or Jane Austen.”

—
Asheville Citizen-Times

“From snippets of rural life, scraps of memories, and fragments of tragedy, [McCrumb] has stitched together a vivid American heirloom.”

—
Newsday

“A novel of mesmerizing beauty and power.”

—
Richmond Times-Dispatch

“One of our most gifted authors … She has never been better in this masterful blend of fact and fiction, in which men and women—some real, some imaginary, all convincing—play out their lives in ways both tragic and inspiring against the ghost-haunted backdrops of the Appalachians.”

—
The San Diego Union-Tribune

“This literate and provocative novel about poor people as defendants, rich people as officers of the court, and the clash of their cultural values is McCrumb’s best book yet.”

—
The Plain Dealer
(Cleveland, Ohio)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Sharyn McCrumb is the author of
The Rosewood Casket, She Walks These Hills,
and many other acclaimed novels. Her books have been named Notable Books of the Year by
The New York Times
and the
Los Angeles Times
. She lives and writes in the Virginia Blue Ridge, less than a hundred miles from where her family settled in 1790.

For more information, please visit her Web site at
www.sharynmccrumb.com
.

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

THOMAS DUNNE BOOKS.

An imprint of St. Martin’s Press.

THE BALLAD OF FRANKIE SILVER.
Copyright © 1998 by Sharyn McCrumb. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

www.thomasdunnebooks.com

www.stmartins.com

Cover photographs: woman by collaboration JS/Arcangel Images; cabin by Ron Crabtree/Getty Images; landscape by Plainpicture/Design Pics

ISBN 978-0-312-38887-4 (trade paperback)

ISBN 9781250022684 (e-book)

First St. Martin’s Griffin Edition: March 2013