A young woman murdered inside a tavern and a body hidden within its walls. A ghost is said to haunt the building, more than two centuries later. King’s Tavern has stood in Natchez, Mississippi, since the early days of the historic Natchez Trace. Over the years, the legend of a woman named Madeline has become inseparable from its haunted reputation.

In the final episode of The Devil's Road, Southern Mysteries explores the history of the tavern and the mysterious discoveries linked to Madeline's alleged murder.

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Episode Sources

• The Tensas Gazette (Louisiana), 1932. Historical account of King's Tavern and its early origins.
• Clarion-Ledger and Jackson Daily News, December 1970. Jeanenette Harrod's reporting on Annabel Young Maxie, the property's family history, and its sale to the Pilgrimage Garden Club.
• Natchez Democrat, February 23, 1974. Thomas E. Young's recollection of a reported apparition in the family home.
• Clarion-Ledger and Jackson Daily News, July 3, 1977. Sandra Bell's reporting on King's Tavern, the Madeline legend, alleged discoveries, and experiences described by restaurant employees.
• The Vicksburg Post, July 5, 1977. Reprint of Sandra Bell's King's Tavern story.
• Frances Benjamin Johnston, 1938. Historic architectural photographs of King's Tavern, Library of Congress.
• Natchez Area Paranormal Society. Research into the reported skeleton discoveries, the dagger, and the historical evidence surrounding Madeline.
• Rick Garner, November 3, 2000. Paranormal investigation report documenting reported experiences at King's Tavern.
• National Trust for Historic Preservation, 2016. Feature on King's Tavern and its reported hauntings.
• Business Insider, September 2022. Feature identifying haunted locations in each state, including King's Tavern in Mississippi.
• Natchez (2025), directed by Suzannah Herbert. Documentary examining historic preservation, tourism, and representations of the antebellum past in Natchez.
• Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture. Historical background on Micajah and Wiley Harpe.
• National Park Service, Natchez Trace Parkway. History of the original Natchez Trace and the development of the modern parkway.
• National Park Service, Natchez Trace Parkway. Historical information about Witch Dance.
• Mississippi Department of Archives and History. Historical resources on Natchez, the Natchez Pilgrimage, and preservation efforts.
• Natchez Trace Association historical materials. Roane Fleming Byrnes and the campaign to establish the Natchez Trace Parkway.

Episode Music

Out of the Mines, courtesy of Ross Gentry, Asheville, North Carolina.

Today, the Natchez Trace Parkway is a peaceful road through Mississippi, Alabama and Tennessee. But the old Trace was once known as the Devil’s Backbone, a dangerous route marked by robbery, murder and stories that became legend. In The Devil’s Road, a four-part October series, Southern Mysteries explores the darker history and folklore of the Natchez Trace. Part One begins at ancient Native American mound sites along the route and at Pharr Mounds in northern Mississippi, where a brutal murder in 1992 brought a much more recent story to this ancient landscape.

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Episode Sources

• National Park Service, Natchez Trace Parkway. “History & Culture.”
• National Park Service, Natchez Trace Parkway. “American Indian Mounds Along the Natchez Trace Parkway.”
• National Park Service, Natchez Trace Parkway. “Pharr Mounds, Milepost 286.7.”
• National Park Service, Natchez Trace Parkway. “Bynum Mounds, Milepost 232.4.”
• National Park Service, Natchez Trace Parkway. “Emerald Mound.”
• National Park Service, Natchez Trace Parkway. “Historic Places.”
• National Park Service, Natchez Trace Parkway. “Old Natchez Trace Sections.”
• National Park Service, Natchez Trace Parkway. “Trade From Afar,” Pharr Mounds interpretive exhibit and transcript.
• National Park Service, Natchez Trace Parkway. “Objects and Ideas,” Pharr Mounds interpretive exhibit and transcript.
• National Park Service, Natchez Trace Parkway. Natchez Trace mound-site interpretive exhibits and archaeological timeline.
• United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. United States of America v. Danny McGee, No. 93-7503, July 8, 1994.
• United States District Court for the Northern District of Mississippi. Federal proceedings arising from the murder of Thomas Alan Byram at Pharr Mounds.
• Tishomingo County News/The Vidette and Belmont News. “One Arrested in Murder of Iuka Man,” September 10, 1992.
• Tishomingo County News/The Vidette and Belmont News. Coverage of the federal indictments of Danny McGee and Greg Dingler, October 8, 1992.
• Tishomingo County News/The Vidette and Belmont News. Coverage of the upcoming federal murder trials and preliminary-hearing testimony, November 5, 1992.
• Tishomingo County News/The Vidette and Belmont News. Coverage of Danny McGee’s conviction and sentencing, 1993.
• Tishomingo County News/The Vidette and Belmont News. Coverage of Greg Dingler’s second-degree murder conviction, August 5, 1993.

Episode Music

Out of the Mines and Burial Grounds, courtesy of Ross Gentry, Asheville, North Carolina.

In the early 1800s, travelers carrying money north from Natchez became targets for highway robbers along the isolated Natchez Trace.In Part Two of The Devil’s Road, Southern Mysteries follows Samuel Mason and Joseph Thompson Hare, two notorious land pirates whose robberies, violence and encounters with the law helped shape the road’s dangerous reputation. Mason’s story ends in mystery, while Hare’s own confession reveals how he preyed on unsuspecting travelers.

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Episode Sources

• Mississippi Department of Archives and History. Samuel Mason Trial Records, Z/0273.000, 1803.
• Mississippi Department of Archives and History. English translation of the Samuel Mason Trial Records, Z/0273.000.
• Mississippi Department of Archives and History. Territorial Records, Administration Papers, records concerning Samuel Mason and his accomplices, 1803–1804.
• Claiborne, William C. C. Letter Books of W. C. C. Claiborne, correspondence concerning Samuel Mason, highway robbery, the Mississippi River and roads between the Mississippi Territory and Tennessee, 1802–1804.
• Claiborne, William C. C. Letter to James Madison concerning Samuel Mason, robberies and protection of travelers, July 1803.
• Vidal, Nicholas Maria. Correspondence to Governor William C. C. Claiborne concerning Samuel Mason and his accomplices, their prosecution by Spanish authorities and transfer to American custody, 1803.
• Rothert, Otto A. The Outlaws of Cave-in-Rock: Historical Accounts of the Famous Highwaymen and River Pirates Who Operated in Pioneer Days upon the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers and over the Natchez Trace.
• Hare, Joseph Thompson. Dying Confession of Joseph Hare, Alias Joseph T. Hare, One of the Mail Robbers. 1818.
• Hare, Joseph Thompson. The Life and Dying Confession of Joseph T. Hare: The Noted Robber Who Was Executed at Baltimore in September Last for Robbing the Mail. 1818.
• United States v. Hare, Circuit Court, District of Maryland, May 1818.
• Alexandria Gazette & Daily Advertiser. “Joseph Thompson Hare,” September 19, 1818.
• Daily National Intelligencer. Report of the executions of Joseph Thompson Hare and John Alexander, September 14, 1818.
• National Park Service, Natchez Trace Parkway. Historical interpretation of the Old Natchez Trace, early travel and transportation.
• National Park Service, Natchez Trace Parkway. Historical interpretation concerning boatmen, travelers and the development of the Natchez Trace.
• Tennessee Encyclopedia. “Natchez Trace.”
• Mississippi Department of Archives and History. Territorial records concerning highway robbery, piracy and law enforcement in the Mississippi Territory during the early nineteenth century.

Episode Music

Out of the Mines, courtesy of Ross Gentry, Asheville, North Carolina.

Once a thriving community along the Natchez Trace, Rocky Springs, Mississippi, has nearly vanished into the woods. An old brick church, a cemetery, and a handful of remnants are all that remain of a town once home to thousands. In Part Three of The Devil's Road, Southern Mysteries explores the forgotten history and haunting legends of one of Mississippi's most intriguing ghost towns.

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Episode Sources

• National Park Service. Rocky Springs Town Site. Natchez Trace Parkway.
• National Park Service. Civil War: Rocky Springs Area. Natchez Trace Parkway.
• National Park Service. Hiking the Rocky Springs Section of the Natchez Trace National Scenic Trail.
• Historic American Buildings Survey. Rocky Springs Park, Mission 66 Structures. HABS No. MS-291.
• Historical Marker Database. The Town of Rocky Springs Historical Marker.
• Mississippi Genealogy and History Network. Rocky Springs Historic Cemetery. Claiborne County, Mississippi.
• Mississippi State University Extension Service. Rocky Springs, MS. Bug's Eye View, Vol. 2, No. 27, 2016.
• John Y. Simon, editor. The Papers of Ulysses S. Grant, Volume 8: April 1–July 6, 1863. Southern Illinois University Press, 1979.
• U.S. War Department. The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies. Series I, Volume XXIV.
• Mississippi State University Libraries. Orville Elias Babcock Diaries.
• Emilye Crosby. A Little Taste of Freedom: The Black Freedom Struggle in Claiborne County, Mississippi. University of North Carolina Press, 2005.
• J. L. Power. The Epidemic of 1878 in Mississippi: Report of the Yellow Fever Relief Work. 1879.
• Mississippi Encyclopedia. “Yellow Fever.”
• The Richmond Planet. “Horrible Crimes.” May 12, 1894.
• Equal Justice Initiative. Lynching in America: Confronting the Legacy of Racial Terror.
• Mississippi Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church. 2010 Conference Journal.
• Alan Huffman. “Finis.” April 18, 2010.
• Karen Steele. “Learning from the Grandmothers: Sarah.”
• Karen Steele. “Learning from the Grandmothers: Joan.”

Episode Music

Out of the Mines, courtesy of Ross Gentry, Asheville, North Carolina.

In February 1972, Bryce, Virginia and Bobby Durham were found murdered in their Boone, North Carolina, home during a heavy snowstorm. Within months, four men were charged and two were eventually indicted for murder, but the case against them collapsed. Nearly fifty years later, a story remembered by the son of a Georgia criminal led investigators to four entirely different men and an unexpected explanation for what happened that night.

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Episode Sources

• Watauga County Sheriff’s Office, “Sheriff Hagaman Announces That 50-Year-Old Triple Homicide ‘Durham Case’ Solved”
• Watauga Democrat, “Suspects Get Counsel for Current Term,” May 15, 1972
• Watauga Democrat, “Investigation of Durham Family’s Slaying Continues”
• Watauga Democrat, contemporary coverage of the June 1972 preliminary hearing in the Durham murder case
• Watauga Democrat, contemporary coverage of the September 1972 grand jury indictments of Jerry Ray Cassada and Dean Chandler
• Watauga Democrat, contemporary coverage of Dean Chandler’s 1973 speedy-trial motion and scheduled trial
• Winston-Salem Journal, contemporary February 1972 coverage of the Durham family murders and early investigation
• The Charlotte Observer, “Family Was Found Dead in a Bathtub 50 Years Ago. Now NC Cops Say They Know the Killers”
• The News & Observer, retrospective coverage of the Durham family murders and crime scene
• Associated Press, contemporary coverage of the dismissal of the remaining murder charges against Jerry Ray Cassada
• Watauga County Sheriff’s Office / Watauga Online, “Sheriff Hagaman Announces That 50-Year-Old Triple Homicide ‘Durham Case’ Solved”
• High Country Press, “Watauga County Historical Society Speaker Series: ‘Convoluted: The 1972 Durham Family Triple Homicide,’ with Terry Harmon”
• Missing in the Carolinas, “Episode 130: The 1972 Murders of Bryce, Virginia, and Bobby Durham in Boone”
• WSOC-TV, 2022 coverage of the Watauga County Sheriff’s Office announcement identifying the men investigators believe killed the Durham family
• WBTV, 2022 coverage of the Watauga County Sheriff’s Office announcement that the Durham case had been solved
• Georgia Supreme Court, Birt v. State
• Georgia court records concerning the murders of Reid and Lois Fleming
• Federal court records concerning Bobby Gene Gaddis and crimes associated with Billy Sunday Birt
• The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, reporting on Billy Sunday Birt, his family and his criminal history
• North Carolina Newspapers / DigitalNC, Watauga Democrat archive, 1972–1973
• Terry Harmon, Convoluted: The 1972 Durham Family Triple Homicide

Episode Music

Out of the Mines, courtesy of Ross Gentry, Asheville, North Carolina.

In this updated and remastered Southern Mysteries Classic, we revisit the strange disappearance of Connie Franklin and the mystery of the man who returned from the dead. In 1929, five men in Stone County, Arkansas, were charged with the murder of Franklin, a drifter who had vanished from the Ozarks. A teenage girl said he had been brutally attacked and his body burned in the woods, and investigators believed they had found his charred remains. Then, just days before the murder trial began, a man appeared claiming to be Connie Franklin. The bizarre case drew reporters from across the country and became known as the Arkansas Ghost Trial.

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Episode Sources

• Brooks Blevins, Ghost of the Ozarks: Murder and Memory in the Upland South, University of Illinois Press, 2012.
• Brooks Blevins, “The Arkansas Ghost Trial: The Connie Franklin Case and the Ozarks in the National Media,” Arkansas Historical Quarterly, Vol. 68, No. 3, Autumn 2009, pp. 245–271.
• Encyclopedia of Arkansas, “Connie Franklin (Alleged Murder of).”
• Deane Allen, “Man at Batesville Identified as Franklin,” Arkansas Democrat, Dec. 8, 1929, pp. 1, 8.
• “Connie Franklin Reported Living,” Arkansas Gazette, Dec. 5, 1929, p. 1.
• “Five Indicted as Climax to Murder Probe,” Arkansas Democrat, Nov. 24, 1929, pp. 1, 6.
• Fletcher Chenout, “Four Cleared of Slaying Franklin,” Arkansas Gazette, Dec. 20, 1929, pp. 1, 7.
• Carl Olsson, “Startling Franklin Case Development Predicted,” Arkansas Democrat, Dec. 15, 1929, p. 1.
• TIME, “The States: Arkansas Vindicated,” Dec. 30, 1929.
• “From Baxter Bulletin Files,” Baxter County History, Vol. 7, 1981, pp. 41–42.
• Steven Teske, Unvarnished Arkansas: The Naked Truth about Nine Famous Arkansans, Butler Center Books, 2012.
• University of Illinois Press, “Q&A with Ghost of the Ozarks Author Brooks Blevins,” July 6, 2012.
• KSMU Ozarks Public Radio, “Ghost of the Ozarks: Murder and Scandal in the Hills,” April 30, 2012.
• Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, March 11, 1942, retrospective account of the Connie Franklin case.

Episode Music

Out of the Mines, courtesy of Ross Gentry, Asheville, North Carolina.

In April 1963, civil rights activist William Lewis Moore set out alone on a 320-mile walk from Chattanooga, Tennessee, to Jackson, Mississippi, carrying a letter for segregationist Gov. Ross Barnett. On April 23, the 35-year-old postal worker was found shot to death in northeast Alabama.In this episode of Southern Mysteries, we explore Moore's life beyond his final walk, the family he left behind, the threats and warnings he encountered along the road, the investigation into his killing, and the questions that remain more than 60 years later.

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Episode Sources

• William Lewis Moore — Wikipedia
• The Unsolved Civil Rights Murder of William Lewis Moore — Morbidology
• Slaying of Baltimore civil rights protester still unsolved — The Baltimore Sun (2013)
• A Postman's 1963 Walk for Justice, Cut Short on an Alabama Road — NPR (2013)
• The Murder of William Moore — Equal Justice Initiative
• William L. Moore — Un(re)solved, FRONTLINE / PBS
• Historical Marker Alongside Alabama Highway Will Honor Civil Rights Martyr William Lewis Moore — Southern Poverty Law Center (2019)
• Freedom Walk: Mississippi or Bust — Mary Stanton, University Press of Mississippi (2003)
• The Mind in Chains: The Autobiography of a Schizophrenic — William Lewis Moore
• Civil Rights Memorial — Southern Poverty Law Center, Montgomery, Alabama
• A Stain in Alabama — Los Angeles Times (Oct. 27, 2002)
• The Injustice Files: He Walked Alone — Investigation Discovery (2011)

Episode Music

Out of the Mines, courtesy of Ross Gentry, Asheville, North Carolina.