Legendary figures in history

are often credited with more stories that are fiction than are fact.

They are almost always among

the dearly departed for quite a number of years along with all witnesses

to their lives.

A case in point is our own

John Henry Holliday, a.k.a. "Doc" Holliday.

His uncle, Dr. John Stiles

Holliday, built the house in Fayetteville currently under renovation by

its owner, the city of Fayetteville. My study of the family indicates

they were all very close and no doubt visited each other often.

One of the elder doctor's brothers,

Henry Burroughs Holliday, was a fascinating person himself. He fought

in the Mexican-American War in 1846 and returned with a 13-year-old Mexican

orphan, Francisco Hidalgo. The orphan had to be hidden in the cargo hold

of the train as he was not exactly a United States citizen. Hidalgo later

received that citizenship and fought in the War between the States, dying

just a few years later from respiratory problems received in the war.

One of the doctor's sisters,

Martha, married Col. James F. Johnson, who was one of those creating the

Fayetteville Academy in 1855. The doctor graciously allowed students and

faculty of the new school to live in his newly built home (the one being

currently renovated) for several years.

It is felt the Martha was not

happy with a lack of social status in her home county, and her husband

was instrumental in creating Clayton County in 1858, and they promptly

moved to Jonesboro. It is supposed she created a social climate she felt

befitting her personality.

Another of her brothers, Robert

K. Holliday, moved to Jonesboro not long after, served as a quartermaster

in the War between the States, and died a few years afterwards from illnesses

received in the war.

The Holliday family is fascinating

of itself and "Doc" is among those. Born with a cleft palate,

he was saved by the efforts of his uncle, J. S. Holliday.

"Doc's" mother died

of tuberculosis, inadvertently giving it to him. This disease led him

west where he learned he could not make a living with his dental tools.

A maid in the Holliday household, Sophie, taught him to play cards at

an early age and John Henry was forced to use this knowledge to make a

living.

Was he a "gunslinger"?

Not in the sense one thinks of the word. While a deputy, he killed two

men, and while I am not trivializing a death of any kind, it was "legal."

As far as can be ascertained, he killed no one else.

Not only have tales about him

in the West survived, but many have grown here in Fayette County. Among

some I have been fighting for the past six years is that Margaret Mitchell

used to visit the Hollidays in the J. S. Holliday house, often staying

overnight.

False! By the time she would

have "visited," the Hollidays had been out of the house for

70 years.

Visitors have been shown an

upstairs bedroom and told John Henry and his cousin, Melanie, played there

and were sweet on each other. Again, a check of dates shows this couldn't

have been so.

The real gem that has been

passed along is that the set of "original dental tools" he owned

were on display. A collateral descendant of his, Karen Holliday Tanner,

traveled to every town her cousin visited and each one claimed to have

his "original set" of dental tools. One charlatan owner had

an entrepreneurial brainstorm and placed his "original" set

in the house in Fayetteville. Later taking it back, he advertised it as

coming out of the Holliday house in Fayetteville, which technically it

did, and sold it for $100,000.

My own editor, bless his heart,

added several sentences to a story I wrote two weeks ago, one of which

said "Doc" was a former resident of Fayetteville. Sorry, Mr.

Editor, but I'm afraid this isn't so.

Folks, this was a neat family,

always adding to the community and doing for others. They and their descendants

deserve only the truth being told about them, and this includes "Doc."

What really breaks my heart

is that hundreds of school children have visited the J. S. Holliday house

and have been told a long string of "stories." When I speak

in the schools and they repeat them to me, I gently try to convince them

these stories are incorrect. But try and dissuade a fifth grader who has

already made up his mind about a "famous gunslinger" he thinks

is from his county.

[Carolyn Cary is Fayette

County's official historian and editor of "The History of Fayette

County," published by the Fayette County Historical Society. Contact

her at [email protected].]