The Tragic, Lusty, and Short Romance of Annie Stone and Abraham Rothschild

            

Bessie Moore, AKA Diamond Bessie, nee Annie Stone

      Annie Stone was born in Syracuse, New York, in 1854, the daughter of a successful shoe store owner.  She was a lovely child, with creamy complexion, raven black hair, and ice-blue eyes.  Annie quickly grew into a strikingly beautiful woman with an endless supply of suitors who were more than willing to teach her the facts of life.   She learned well, and at age 15, the promiscuous young beauty became the mistress of a businessman named Moore and changed her name to Bessie Moore, probably to protect her family honor.

      After the short affair with Moore ended, Bessie, well-educated for a woman in that day but no longer welcome at her parent's home, chose to become a prostitute.  She thoroughly enjoyed the work and was well-equipped for it.   The talented teenager practiced her craft in brothels from Cincinnati to New Orleans and her happy, satisfied clients showered her with expensive gifts and diamond jewelry.  She worked in the “Mansion of Joy” in Cincinnati, and wintered in an equally joyous Bourbon Street hotel.  The cool of the Ozarks drew her to Hot Springs, Arkansas, in the summers.

     Abraham Rothschild was born in August of 1854 in Cincinnati, Ohio, the son of Meyer Rothschild, a wealthy diamond merchant.  Abe, a handsome and gregarious young man, began a career as a drummer--travelling salesman--for his father’s company, visiting cities throughout the country selling jewelry.  He loved to travel and enjoyed his work, but soon discovered the pleasures of saloons and brothels, and devoted less and less time to serious activities.  Abraham fell into disfavor with his parents and was considered a drunkard and the family black sheep, which bothered him not a whit.  He liked barrooms and whorehouses and whiskey and women.

Abraham Rothschild, AKA A. Munroe

     Abe and Bessie crossed paths in Hot Springs, Arkansas in 1875.  They may have been acquainted from Bessie’s days at the Mansion of Joy in Cincinnati, but after meeting in Hot Springs, they became travelling companions.  Even though they moved about as man and wife, Abe insisted that Bessie continue to turn tricks to help with expenses and finance his gambling habit.  She seemed to be in love with him and did as he asked.  Both of them began to drink heavily, and, to keep Bessie in line, Abe sometimes found it necessary to physically discipline her.  He was arrested once in Cincinnati for slapping her around in public, but Bessie refused to press charges.

     They may have married during the next two years.  They certainly acted as if they were married, but there is no record of a wedding.  In any case, they travelled to Marshall, Texas, in January of 1877 and registered at the Capitol Hotel as Mr. and Mrs. Abraham Rothschild of Cincinnati.  After two days, the couple boarded the train and travelled eighteen miles to Jefferson, where they registered on January 19^th at the Brooks House Hotel as A. Munroe and wife.  

     Jefferson was a busy center of commerce at the time, and Abe may have intended to sell jewelry to prosperous businessmen in the city, or he may have had something else in mind.  Why he registered in Jefferson under a false name is a matter of conjecture, and there are those who believe Abe’s sole reason for the trip to Jefferson was to rid himself of Bessie.

     Abe had several possible motives.  Bessie may have been pushing him toward marriage, a step he was not willing to take.  She may have claimed to be pregnant which would have created a family scandal at the time.  (She would not have been the first young lady to lie about such a thing.)  On the other hand, Abe could have been bored with Bessie and their relationship, or he may have simply wanted her diamonds, which he could use to finance his gambling.  Whether it was robbery or a more complicated reason, Abe wanted Bessie out of his life.

     Bessie joined Abe at the Rosebud Saloon the next two evenings, drinking, dancing, flashing her collection of diamond jewelry, and displaying her shapely figure in fine satin dresses.  The handsome young couple made quite an impression on the conservative population of Jefferson.  Someone heard Abe refer to his wife as Bessie, and she was immediately dubbed “Diamond Bessie.”

     Shortly before eleven o’clock on Sunday morning, January 21, 1877, Abraham and Bessie had breakfast at Henrique’s restaurant and arranged for a picnic lunch, even though the weather was cold and threatening.  As the couple ate breakfast and waited for their lunch to be packed, Frank Malloy admired Bessie’s large diamond rings and other assets.  He was the last local citizen to see Bessie alive.  Frank watched as Abe carried the picnic basket across the foot bridge over Big Cypress Bayou and the couple disappeared into the fog on the Marshall Road.

     Before three that afternoon, A. Munroe, as he was known, returned to Jefferson and explained that his wife was visiting friends across the bayou, but would return before their scheduled departure on Tuesday morning.  Someone noticed that Abe was wearing two diamonds that had been on Bessie’s fingers.   A cold front moved through town on Monday, and snow, a rarity in Jefferson, covered the ground by Tuesday morning when Abe, with all the couple’s luggage, sneaked aboard the train and left for Cincinnati, alone.

     Snow continued for a week.  The weather cleared, and on February 5^th, a woman gathering firewood in the forest off the Marshall Road discovered the body of a finely dressed, attractive young lady.  The body was seated,  leaning against a tree, partially covered with snow.   Cause of death appeared to be a bullet hole in her right temple.  Authorities in Jefferson knew immediately the corpse must be Diamond Bessie. Because there was no gun at the scene and no jewelry on the body, suicide was ruled out and foul play was suspected.  When it was discovered that A. Munroe did not exist, but Abe Rothschild of Cincinnati and his wife, Bessie had been in Marshall, a warrant was issued for Rothschild’s arrest.

     Abraham Rothschild, after his return to Cincinnati, acted strangely.  He increased his drinking and became paranoid, insisting that “someone” was out to get him.  Early one morning, after a particularly grueling, all-night session at a bar down the street from the Mansion of Joy, Abe stepped out into the deserted street and attempted to blow out his brains.  He managed to blow out one eye, but survived.   Sheriff John Vines, of Jefferson, arrived and arrested him as he recuperated in the hospital after the incident.

     The Rothschild family, disgusted with Abraham but anxious to protect the family name, put up a vigorous defense against extradition, but eventually lost the battle.  To the family’s shame, Abraham was taken back to Texas to stand trial for the murder of a common harlot.  The trial would become one of the most sensational of the century, with every prominent attorney and politician in Texas clamoring to get involved on one side or the other.

      Abraham’s wealthy father spared no expense in the defense of his family name.  He hired ten pricey lawyers and paid them lavishly to defend his son.  The team succeeded in getting many delays and a change of venue because sentiments were so strongly against Abe in Jefferson, and the trial was moved.  The case was finally tried in Marshall in early December of 1878.

     After three weeks of testimony, Abraham was found guilty and sentenced to hang.  The defense team earned its money by getting the verdict thrown out and winning a new trial.  The press was incensed and claimed that anyone with a few good friends and a lot of money could get away with murder in Texas. 




This Cypress Siding was nailed in place in 1875, when this building was a synagogue.  There is no record that Abe and Bessie worshipped here, although it was available for them.

     After months of delay, posturing, and motions by both sides, the retrial started in Jefferson on December 14, 1880.  The defense presented a new witness, Miss Isabelle Gouldy, who testified that she had seen Diamond Bessie in the presence of an unidentified man on January 20^th, and again on January 25^th, two days after Abe Rothschild left town.  The coroner testified that the body was not sufficiently decomposed to have been in the woods for fifteen days.   He also noted that Bessie was not pregnant. 

     The prosecution viciously attacked Miss Gouldy’s veracity, implying that she was a prostitute and not to be trusted, and suggesting that her testimony had been bought and paid for with Meyer Rothschild’s money.  They also pointed out that the body had effectively been in a deep freeze for almost two weeks because of the snowstorm.  The jury listened carefully to these arguments and, because the defense had created more than a shadow of doubt to cloud the issues, found the defendant innocent of all charges.

     Abe and his family left town on the first available train and went back to Cincinnati.  After a long and checkered career as a con man, Abe died in 1937, and is buried in a family plot in San Mateo County, California.  Bessie Moore is buried in the Oakwood Cemetery in Jefferson, her gravesite neatly fenced and tended by the industrious ladies of the Jessie Allen Wise Garden Club.  Sheriff John Vines, Frank Malloy, Isabelle Gouldy and several others involved in the trial are buried nearby.

The final resting place of Diamond Bessie, in the Oakwood Cemetery at Jefferson.

     Each year, during Jefferson’s annual “Pilgrimage” celebration, the Jessie Allen Wise Garden Club sponsors several performances of the play, The Murder of Diamond Bessie in the building that, in 1877,  housed the Jewish Synagogue in Jefferson.  

     To this day, the murder of Bessie Moore is listed in the files of the Texas Attorney General’s Office as "unsolved.”

Bob Wills' Day in Turkey and The Pilgrimage in Jefferson

The water tower for the city is in the background.  This farmer plowed up his cotton, for a reason unknown to me, but I bet the government paid him to do oit.

     Last week, I travelled 369 miles due north to meet some old friends and attend the annual Bob Wills Day celebration in Turkey, Texas.  The Bob Wills Committee bought the vacant high school building in Turkey and converted it into a museum, dance hall, gift shop, and dining establishment for use once a year during the celebration.

     The Church of Western Swing, a former church down the street from the high school, celebrates nightly with Western Swing dances where couples two-step into the wee hours.  Breakfast tacos are available at the re-furbished high school cafeteria, along with coffee, pancakes, and sausage.

     The city of Turkey is located about thirty miles north of Matador, Texas, the headquarters of the legendary Matador Ranch, in the so-called Cross-Timbers section of Texas.  The timber part must be elsewhere, because most of the land around Turkey is treeless, with sweet potato or cotton fields covered much of the year by sand dunes.  It is hot, arid, dry, and gritty land.  Outsiders might complain about the twenty-mile-per-hour winds, with gusts to thirty, but the natives don’t notice.

Saturday morning parade with the aforementioned water tower in the background.

     Hugh and I met our friends, Buck Campbell and Ken Black at the festival.  Buck came over from Muleshoe, and Ken drove down from Dallas.  Buck’s son, Scott, lives in a place called Trophy Club, north of the DFW Airport, and his son, Conner, just turned 21, is a student at Texas Tech in Lubbock.  This was Conner’s first Bob Wills, Day celebration.  I imagine there were other families with three generations present, but I doubt if there were many.

     Scott, and the other fifteen members of the delegation from Trophy Club, had restored an ancient riding lawn mower to ride in the Saturday parade and to race in the lawn mower race that afternoon.  Many hours of careful, late-night drinking, planning, and meticulous craftsmanship went into the design and renovation of that machine.  It created quite a stir when unveiled for the first time, its shiny black paint job emblazoned with decals from a variety of sponsors.

The Trophy Club beast bears down on the competition at turn five.

     Jody Nix, a virtuoso on the fiddle and practitioner of Western Swing Music from ‘way back headlined the Saturday night dance, as he has for many years.  I have watched Jody grow old at these sessions.  His perfectly groomed hair and moustache are now gray.  His form-fitting western shirt, hand-tooled Ranger belt, and starched Wrangler jeans are all larger and much tighter than in years past.

     I first saw Jody Nix when I was in college.  Buck Campbell and I took dates to the “Brownfield Stomp,” a monthly dance at the VFW Hall in Brownfield.  Hoyle Nix and his band would come up from San Angelo to play, and Buck and I would drive over from Lubbock with our dates.  Jody Nix was about twelve, and, back then, played a sit-down steel guitar for his dad’s band.  He only played on Saturday nights because Hoyle insisted he stay in school.

                                                         *    *    *    *    *

     This last Thursday, Charlotte and I drove to a different world, but stayed in Texas.  A bit over 412 miles northeast of Kerrville, deep in the Piney Woods of East Texas, the city of Jefferson transports us back to the Antebellum South.  We were there for the annual “Pilgrimage,” a festival that celebrates the history of this unique little city.

Bobbie Hardy's plantation house, finished in 2002, but no longer a B & B.  We watched the muster of the Confederate soldiers from this porch.  The 1860 Episcopal Church is directly across the street.

     Jefferson, once the second largest and most prosperous city in Texas, grew as an inland port, shipping bales of cotton down Big Cypress Bayou to the Red River, then on to the Mississippi and Natchez, St. Louis, or New Orleans.  Entire plantations from the Carolinas, Georgia and Alabama, having “farmed out” their soil, relocated here during the 1840s and ‘50s, bringing their possessions, their slaves, their attitudes, and their way of life.  The army Corps of Engineers, in a successful effort to drain the swamp, left Jefferson high and dry before the turn of the century.  With the loss of the port on Big Cypress Bayou, prosperity literally dried up.

     Many plantation homes in the little city were lost to decay, but in the late sixties, when the Bed and Breakfast industry developed in Texas, these homes became popular and desirable places to visit.  Tourism revived the economy of the quaint little town.

     In 1872, during the heyday of Jefferson, a Cincinnati playboy and his lady companion visited Jefferson for about two weeks.  They stayed at the Excelsior Hotel, and Abraham Rothschild, a young diamond merchant, called upon local businessmen, peddling his wares.  At night, he and his “lady” frequented the Rosebud Saloon, where she cut a fine figure, dripping with Abe’s diamonds.  She became known around town as “Diamond Bessie.”

Part of the cast from Diamond Bessie during the parade.  I can pick out the Sheriff, the Defense Attorney, the Judge, and a local "Social Worker" in the red dress.  The old man, seated and waving an American flag, was a Belly-Gunner on a B-17 in World War II.  He was only 5-2, and fit nicely into the pod beneath the plane.

     On a Sunday, Abe and Bessie left for a picnic in the nearby woods.  That afternoon, Abraham returned alone and caught the Monday morning train back to Cincinnati.  Bessie was found, two weeks later, deep in the woods with a bullet in her head.  Abe was arrested in Cincinnati and brought back to Jefferson for trial.

     In the fifties, a play was written about the incident, and has been performed annually during the Pilgrimage for sixty consecutive years.  I was asked to play one of the jury members in this year’s presentation, and jumped at the opportunity.

The arthor, as one of the finest jury members money can buy.

     On Sunday morning, I sat on the front porch of a plantation house similar to “Tara” from “Gone with the Wind,” and watched as three hundred costumed Confederate soldiers re-enacted the original muster in the park across the street. These Jefferson volunteers were marching off to join General Lee’s army.  A letter used in the original ceremony was read from the front steps of the Episcopal Church, the same place it had been read at the start of the Civil War.  The brick church was built in 1860 and is still in use today. 

       I cannot help but compare the two experiences, one week apart, in Texas.  On Saturday, at 10 AM in Jefferson, it was warm and humid.  Pecan, oak, and pine trees towered over the little city, and we wished for the hint of a breeze.  I thought of last Saturday in Turkey and four hundred people sitting in lawn chairs on a former football field, trying to hold their umbrellas in a thirty-mile-a-hour wind, seeking protection from the blowing sand and hot sun.  They braved the elements to sit there and hear Bob Wills’ music, played by old men, the remnants of Bob’s Texas Playboys. 

     Western swing music by Bob Wills and his Texas Playboys brought joy, hope, and laughter to the dirt farmers on the scorched, open prairies of West Texas during the depths of the depression.  At the same time, in run-down homes deep in the East Texas woods, genteel southern ladies served herb tea in China cups and prayed their husbands would find work.  Poor people in little towns built this state.  Rich men helped, but poor people did the work.  With pride, energy, and hard work, they created Texas.  So long as I am able, I will attend their celebrations—I will honor their customs and their memories.