LEGEND OF
THE BLOODY BUTCHER CORN
Bloody
Butcher corn is described as a blood red corn originating in the 1800's by the
mixing of Native American corn with the white settlers' seed. It is found on
front doors when the air turns crisp and used in culinary dishes by world enowned
chefs. But for us, the Meadows family, it is a reminder of our ancestors and
this why we strive to preserve the heirloom. According to legend, the bloody
butcher seed first came into our family around the 1800's through Betsey Gibson
who was half white and half Pottawatomie Indian. At the age of ten, Betsey
Gibson and her Wolf dog were captured
by Native Americans. Betsey befriended the Native Americans and learned their
culture waiting until she could make an escape. Betsey and her Wolf s escape
happened a year after her capture when she swam across the Ohio
River. When she returned back to the white civilization, Betsey
brought with her the bloody butcher seed and the beginning of our history.
Betsey
Gibson, about eight years later married and had a daughter named Delilah Deal.
Delilah Deal would later marry another key character in the legend named
"Bandy Bill" Mullins. Bandy Bill was known as being a wild man who
owned a large amount of property in Tennessee
and in Clay County, West Virginia. He was a large man of Australian and
Cherokee descent. Bandy Bill and Delilah Deal were married and moved to
Nicholas County, West Virginia,where he purchased several thousand acres for
his large family. Bandy Bill Mullins and Delilah Deal were told to have had twelve
children that inherited his empire. However, his daughter Ebby Mullins Meadows never
owned a share of the wealthy Mullin's farm after she chose to marry a traveling
preacher named Bill Meadows. Ebby was disowned by her family and forced to
forge her life on her own with only the bloody butcher seed and her Cherokee
roots to help her survive. Ebby never again attained the wealth she was born into. She but bought a small farm
on Cranberry Ridge in Webster county, West Virginia where she had several
children one of whom was Bob Meadows.
Bob
Meadows was a known horse trader in the Nicholas county area. He married a
wealthy woman from California named Laura
Walker and they bought a small farm in Cottle,
West Virginia where they raised
their children one of whom as
Edgar Meadows.
It was now
1921 and the Great Depression had begun and Edgar Meadows began his childhood in poverty. The Depression had
robbed the country of its wealth and the
Meadows family of their security. Edgar was forced to help onthe farm
more and go to school less. The family became poor with only the bloody butcher to keep them going.
Edgar
would walk in the snow barefoot in order to get the corn meal grist and keep the family going. It was during this
time that the bloody butcher played its most important part in our history
because with out it, the Meadows family would have starved.
Even after
the Depression, it became increasingly harder for the Meadows family to regain
the standard of life they were once used to. Edgar Meadows met and married Edna
Martin and they began to plan for a future. A future that would
not consist of hardship. They bought a small farm in Cottle where they raised
seven children and they started working the farm more and more. Edgar realized
that the only way they would ever rise above their predicament
was with the help of the land.
Now, in
2006, Edgar is in his older years and he still continues to raise the bloody
butcher. He plants, hoes, waters, and harvests the corn all himself the same as
he did as a child and as a young man. It is his therapy and there is not a year
that goes by that bloody butcher is not planted. It is the top priority in the
garden because it has proven its worth to him and his family. That is why the
recognition of the Meadows family bloody butcher corn meal is such a blessing
to the family and especially Edgar. It is almost like a piece of our history is
in every kernel of that corn. It is the telling of our ancestry and a tribute
to all that had been, all that is, and all that will be.
Legend
written by Julie Green, granddaughter of Edgar Meadows
