John Henry Holliday

John Henry Holliday wasn’t always Griffin, Georgia’s favorite son.  For generations, he was the black sheep of his hometown, the good boy gone bad who was rumored about behind his back.  How could a young man of such promise turn out so poorly?  Surely, his parents had raised him better than to spend his life as a killer and a drunk.  The Hollidays were, after all, fine Southern folk who been some of the pioneers in the area and helped to put Griffin on the map.  His mother’s family, the McKeys, were large landholders with a plantation along Indian Creek and several business buildings in town.  And weren’t they kin to the Elijah Cloud family who owned half of north Georgia and claimed Stone Mountain as their own private property?  And although his father, Henry Holliday, came from somewhat less prosperous circumstances – wasn’t his own father a tavern keeper over in Fayetteville? – Henry had made something of himself as a landholder, too, and been clerk of the first county court in Griffin before moving to South Georgia when the Yankees came through.  No, one couldn’t blame John Henry’s folks for not teaching him his responsibilities.  His mother was a refined, religious woman and his father had served honorably in three wars.  Yet somehow John Henry had turned out all wrong, wandering from Georgia to Texas and the frontier west to make his fame and infamy in gun battles and gambling halls.  That sort of story made for entertaining novels and movies, but it didn’t suit the reputation of a Southern town like Griffin. Continue reading