Col. Robert M. Martin was an “unreconstructed Confederate” til the day he died.
That phrase means that he refused to take the oath of allegiance to the United States that was required to reinstate his citizenship. He even fought a court battle over the oath, much to the delight of New York newspapers, which labeled him an eccentric.
Martin, after the Civil War, returned to the very city he attempted to burn in an attempt to recover the fortune he lost in the tobacco industry.
A heroic figure to Southerners during the war, Martin had served with and saved the life of Gen. John Hunt Morgan near the public square in McMinnville.
Martin saw Union cavalry riding down on Morgan and attacked instead of saving himself.
Shouting, “run for it” to Morgan, Martin put his horse reins between his teeth and charged the Union horsemen while he blasted away with both pistols. Martin caught a bullet in his chest, but managed to escape along with Morgan.
Later, the two men had a falling out over a bank robbery committed in Mount Sterling, Ky. by some of Morgan’s men. When Morgan tried to cover up the incident, Martin protested up the Confederate chain of command all the way to Richmond. Morgan branded him a liar.
The colonel then offered his services to the Confederate “Secret Service” and was assigned various duties including the attempt to take the war to New York City. He was also assigned to kidnap Vice President Andrew Johnson, but that plot failed when Johnson changed travel plans.
Amazingly, Martin survived his adventures without being executed for treason like his cohort James Cobb Kennedy.
But his considerable fortune was severely eroded, and that didn’t keep him from moving his family to a prominent Manhattan address just off Fifth Avenue after a fire at his home in Louisville.
Martin, after the war, had married a sophisticated educator, Caroline B. Wardlaw, who had two sisters, Mary and Virginia. They were the daughters of a famous Virginia clergyman, John Baptist Wardlaw, who was born in 1816 in Gwinnett, Ga., and died in 1896 in Murfreesboro.
Together Martin and his bride had two children, both who died in very mysterious circumstances. The death of their daughter, Oceana, is the stuff of American folklore.
Their first child, a son, was the first member of the family to suffer a tragic death. At age 7, he fell down a long flight of stairs at their home at 37 East 39th St. in New York City.
The youngster suffered serious injuries. Before he could recover, “brain fever” set in, and he died two or three days later.
Eventually, Caroline’s notoriety would surpass that of her husband. The story of the “Three Sisters in Black” would become a turn-of-the-century sensation.
Caroline’s sister Mary married Fletcher Tillman Snead and had three children, Fletcher Wardlaw Snead, John Wardlaw Snead and Albert Sneed. Two of those siblings were drawn into the saga with John mysteriously set on fire. As for Fletcher, he was to marry his first cousin, Oceana Martin.
It was in Murfreesboro – or was it New York City? – where the gallant Confederate met Miss Wardlaw. Eventually, the sisters administered Soule College on Maple Street in Murfreesboro.
The college first occupied the site of The Female Academy, which was established in 1825 by Misses Mary and Nancy Banks.
Soule College was named for Bishop Joshua Soule of the Methodist Episcopal Church. The Rev. Thomas Madden, pastor of the Murfreesboro Methodist Church, organized it in 1851 and offered one to two years of college education.
“The goals of the college were to provide a thorough education of the mind and heart and to impart sound and useful knowledge. Throughout the history of the school, the pupils were supervised closely in all matters of a moral and religious nature.”
Soule College, after its building was damaged, closed during the Civil War, but reopened soon afterwards, remaining in Methodist control until 1892.
That same year, Virginia Wardlaw was named president of the college. Her older sisters Caroline and Mary joined her.
Murfreesboro was a small town in those days, and it didn’t take long for the sisters to develop a mysterious, eccentric reputation, which was eventually amplified by news reports.
The Wardlaw sisters were at Soule College for more than a decade. “While Miss Wardlaw was always considered a fine educator and a woman of fine business capacity, though, somewhat eccentric, her sister, Mrs. Martin, was peculiar in her actions,” reported The New York Times.
From Murfreesboro the sisters moved to Christiansburg, Va., where their aunt, Oceana S. Pollock operated the Montgomery Female College.
In 1903, Pollock's niece, Virginia Wardlaw was named principal of Montgomery Female College. Her two sisters soon joined her. Under their operation, the school declined and gained local notoriety as the scene of strange events.
The Wardlaws became known as "the black sisters" for their practice of appearing always in black dresses and heavy mourning-style veils.
It didn’t take long for the sisters to slip quickly into debt and the Female College closed in 1908 with the sisters heading to New Jersey.
Once there the family’s story soon unraveled into a series of fires, murders, suspicious deaths and suicides.
The family of Col. Robert M. Martin seemed to be followed by a strange fatality ... in most cases associated with insurance policies. |
Email
Print
Digg
Facebook
MySpace
Yahoo!