July 18, 2005

interesting story

Mommie told me a good story that I never heard before yesterday. My grandfather, when he was a young rounder, decided that he was going to kill a man. (He had a good reason for that plan.) He owned shotguns and rifles, but he wanted a pistol--- something that he could stick in his pocket and carry without the bad guy seeing it.

He bought a .32 revolver from a fellow moonshiner, who demanded a CHECK for the sale of the gun. Not many people in the hollows of eastern Kentucky HAD checking accounts back then, but my grandfather did, although his balance was usually about $2.00 after his charges at the company store were deducted from his paycheck.

He wrote a check for that pistol, then went looking for the bad guy. (That was sometime around 1935--- no telling how old the gun is.)

The reason the seller wanted a check was because he KNEW what my grandfather intended to do, and he didn't want to be connected with a murder. He wanted proof that he SOLD the pistol if it were used to kill somebody.

Luckily for all concerned, the law caught the guy before my grandfather did. The bad guy was sent back to the "pen" (he was out on parole at the time) and my grandfather kept that pistol until the day he died. I don't think he ever shot at anybody with it, but I remember seeing it around Mommie and Papaw's house when I was a young boy.

Mommie gave that pistol to my cousin Alan, who is a cop in Florida. (He just made Captain, by the way!) I told Mommie yesterday that I wish she had given it to me, because I might have framed that sucker and hung it on my wall as a family heirloom. After all, I AM her first grandchild.

She said that she gave it to Alan because she knew that he collected guns and he might need it in his line of work. I doubt that Alan would EVER use an ancient .32 in a gunfight (he's got a SERIOUS arsenal), but the pistol is in good hands. He'll take care of it.

But I've already put out the word. If Alan ever wants to sell it, I get first dibs on it.