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Hey weirdos, I'm Elena. I'm Ash. And this is Morbid. [Music] Morbid morbid morbid morbid
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Morbid and the world is falling apart around It's got everywhere. Everywhere. Yeah.
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All of it. Um and I I assume when this comes out that the world will still be falling apart around us, so this is
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pretty relevant. Um yeah, everything sucks, but you know what? We're going to be just fine cuz
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we're all going to pull together. community as a community. Yeah. You know? And um Support local businesses.
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Support local businesses and remember you do not have to open your door to ice unless they serve you a warrant. Hey.
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So just know that. Uh anything else fun that's happening at the top of the show. No, nothing fun
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is happening. Anything fun I should say anything else fun anything fun at all. Something fun is happening. We got
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invited to go to the premiere of Heart Eyes. Yeah, we did. really excited to see that movie. It
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looks really [ __ ] good. Guys, sometimes I'm all for a cerebral horror movie or cerebral thriller. I
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love like Donnie Darko a deep one like you know that like a moody one, but sometimes you
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just want a [ __ ] gimmicky serial killer um that only kills people on certain holidays. Hell yeah.
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You know, sometimes you just want that and it looks like Heart Eyes it looks chef's kiss. Like I need it. It's from
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the producers that did Scream, so you know it's going to be good and the same people that did um Happy Death Day.
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Oh, yeah. We love that. And Mason Gooding is in it and he is a snack. And I'm excited to see him back on our
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screens. go. I said It just looks like a lot of fun. I'm really excited about it. This is not an
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ad, by the way. Oh, it's literally not an ad at all. They They just invited us to go see it and we're [ __ ] stoked.
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We're just excited about it. want to invite us to go see a movie Invite us to go see a movie. Let's go.
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You know, I feel like a producer or something. No, you guys. If you want That'd be fun just a big movie with
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everyone. I mean Hell yeah, let's go. Let's figure it out. Let's figure it out, man. We'll
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work on it. Yeah, so that's a fun thing. You know, we can look for the we can look for the bright spots.
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Yeah, in fact, I started a notes app on my phone and I think you should too and listener, hello, I think you should Dear
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listener Dear listener, Dear Abby, I made a note note a note in my phone. Oh, Ash broke.
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Hold on, I'm just rebooting Ash real quick. I made a note on my phone and it says
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good things are always happening to me and each day I'm going to write one good thing that happened to me. I love that.
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Yeah, it's manifesting more good things. we talked about it on a recent episode that we were just saying like you know
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like one of our uh resolutions I almost said revolution, funny. Um one of our resolutions is to be kinder to ourselves
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and we wanted you guys to make sure you are also practicing that cuz it's important. And I think that's another
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good one to add to the list is like try and I think honestly with the bombardment of [ __ ] and news that is
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happening right now and how overwhelmed everyone feels cuz I feel very overwhelmed. insanely
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Um in fact, I think both of us have kind of like pulled back from social media a lot
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just because it's like I'm and I'm pulling off really cuz I'm just like it's too much all at once.
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Like I can't keep I can't keep intaking it all. Uh And you know what? We're not [ __ ] meant to.
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No, we're not. There's a there's a there's a very good balance that everybody needs to strike between being
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informed and being inundated. Mhm. And it's a hard balance to get, so like you're doing fine.
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If you're listening, you're doing fine. Killing it. But I think it's like thinking like changing your mindset to
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be like okay, what is one good thing that happened to me today or one good one thing that I'm grateful or can
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celebrate today will at least give you a little bright spot in all the the darkness that it feels like it's
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everywhere. Yeah, even on like a bad day. Like I had a day last week where I was just in a
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[ __ ] mode. You know, you were here. Poor Mikey was here. I was in No, I was in [ __ ] mode. Like it was
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bad. entitled to those days. But you get so wrapped up in a day like that and it's like at the end of that
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day hadn't started my note yet. But at the end of that if another [ __ ] mode day
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comes, I can look back and be like all right, but what's one good thing that happened that day instead of like
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focusing on all the shitty things that happened or the negativity wrapped up in all of it. Sometimes you just got to and
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you know what? Like I don't know why this is turning into this, but I think whatever. Are we a self-help podcast?
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Suddenly we've turned Guess what, guys? Uh sometimes it's just like go if you can like take a walk, walk
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your dog, walk your kids Oh, yeah. Just get air. and just kind of like take a little
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walk, look around, look at the trees. Sometimes it sounds silly. passion project
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those things Exactly. Sometimes those are the things that all of a sudden make you go like, you know what?
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I'm lucky to be here. Yeah. Let me think of all the things that I have that I can make myself feel
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better about, you know, everything. Yeah, it's a grounding exercise. It is and we're here with you. We're here.
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So, you know? Oh, and one more thing since we're a self-help podcast, I learned about love
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and kindness meditation the other day. I'm taking this really cool Wiccan class cuz I'm going to become a [ __ ] Wiccan
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and Wiccan woman and hex the patriarchy. I'm going to become a Wiccan woman. I am. I'm going to become a I love that.
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Hell yeah. Um but I I learned about love and kindness meditation. So if you're interested
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in meditation at all, look into that. It's very cool and I I liked the experience. Yeah, you know, we all need
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more of that. I I'm really I'm going to I'm a hippie. Best time to do it Yeah. now. Get into the love, get into the
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kindness. Yeah. Everybody be cool, man. Just don't be all like uncool. Just be cool. Just
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be cool. Don't be all like uncool. And you know, um this story that I have for you today
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Is it uncool? pretty uncool But at the end of it it does have um No, it's still a little it's there's a lot
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of like unknowns in this. Yeah. Some of them become more known, but then there's
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still a mystery at the end. So I am I am sorry to say that I'm going to leave you
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slightly slightly open to some things, but there's going to be a couple of things
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that you're like, well, This is an interesting story. I remember hearing this when I like first got on my like
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interest into crime and MFM covered it way back in the day. Yeah, they did. You're right.
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Shout out to Karen and Georgia. Shout out to Karen and Georgia. Uh this is the disappearance of Bobby Dunbar.
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Ooh. Now again, normally I don't love to do children's cases because it bumps me out
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a lot. This one's bumped me out for sure, but there was so much like shenanigans in this case that it felt
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like an important story to tell for sure. Um so this goes all the way back to 1912.
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Whoa. Yeah, we're really we're really back there. Whoa. On August 23rd, 1912, Percy and Lessie Dunbar traveled with
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their two sons, Alonzo and Bobby. Uh they had lived in um Opelousas. I looked it up how to say it. I hope I said it
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correctly. Opelousas, Louisiana. Um they were traveling to a near to nearby Swayze Lake.
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Ooh, that's gorgeous. Right, there you go. They had planned to spend the day there, do some fishing, some camping,
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just a nice little family outing. Cute. That night, the family was sleeping in their tent and their 4-year-old Bobby
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apparently woke up and left the tent. Okay. for some unknown reason. Uh apparently he wandered away from the
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campsite, but nobody saw him do this. Uh this is just assuming because he wasn't
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there. Yeah. Um the next morning when Lessie and Percy woke up, they found Bobby missing, which I literally can't
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imagine what they felt in that moment, but Waking up to find your kid missing must
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be the wilderness? Yeah, [ __ ] that. So they of course they panicked and started
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frantically searching the area around the tent for him. Now at the time, Swayze Lake was really more of an
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undeveloped swamp than an actual recreation area. Oh, okay. Uh it was according to author
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Tal McThenia. I hope I'm saying that name right. It was apparently quote teeming with
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alligators and surrounded by dark thick woods. So not great. Whoa. Uh so their search was going to be very
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dangerous and very slow and very difficult. All of the above. And when they weren't
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able to find Bobby very quickly, Percy went into town to get help and with that within hours, there were dozens of men
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that had arrived at the lake to help search for Bobby. By that night, about 150 men had joined
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the search party Damn. including a group of divers who searched the lake. Wow, which again was more of a swamp.
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more of a swamp. With [ __ ] alligators, oh my god. Yeah. And this these are divers that
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they got in here in 1912. That's crazy. Now unfortunately because the terrain was so hard to maneuver and it was so
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dense, so thickly settled, it was super super slow this process of looking for him. According to one account, quote,
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"The cane brakes and undergrowth at Swayze Lake are so thick that it's impossible to see 10 feet from the
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trail." Wow. And many of the searchers really quickly began speculating like, "We're not going to find this kid."
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They were like out loud being like, "I don't think we're going to find him." Yeah. Which must have been horrifying to
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hear. Um nearby, a smaller group of men actually dynamited the stream for more than a mile in order to bring
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anything to the surface that was under the water. I like dynamited as a verb. Yeah, right. It really is. But nothing
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worked. Nothing found There was no sign of Bobby. His poor parents. They had searched the area for 18 hours
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and they found no sign of him. And Percy and Lessie reluctantly returned to Opelousas while the what remained of the
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search party continued to comb the area. But they had to bring their other son home. Can you imagine you just like go
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out for a cute family outing? With two children and you come back with one. Like that is beyond
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unthinkable. Yeah. Unthinkable. That's so [ __ ] Now, in the days after this a smaller
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group continued to search the area. So the people weren't giving up on this. Uh several divers did their best to search
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through the murky waters but they never found even the slightest bit of evidence
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that Bobby had even been there. By the third day many of them had given him up for dead. Basically reasoning
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there was very little chance that a four-year-old could survive the elements alone
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for that long. Yeah. Much less in an area where there were gators, there were all so much wildlife
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there. That was not going to be good. The main theory at the time was that Bobby had wandered away from the camp in
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the night and fallen into the lake and drowned. Oh. And but some were holding out hope that he
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was still alive saying that maybe you know, maybe he's still alive because if he had drowned then we probably would
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have found some evidence like a scrap of clothing, something which like I don't know with gators.
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Yeah, exactly. Now within a week news of Bobby's disappearance had reached the wider
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public and it quickly became a big fascination with the press. One reporter wrote, "Never in the history of this
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parish has an incident created such profound interest and such profound sorrow." I mean yeah, I can imagine.
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is a really great way of saying it. Yeah. Um the idea that a child could simply disappear without a trace.
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Into thin air. That was enough of a mystery and enough of like a horrifying situation to think about that was enough
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to grab the attention of the public very quickly. Um but there was also this really like
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macabre angle that the press couldn't ignore. Mhm. Um one reporter asked, "Is little Robert at the bottom of Sweazy
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Lake?" And then this is like the way that he wrote this I'm like, "Okay." With Jesus. Immediately like
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that's already jarring. worse. "Is little Robert at the bottom of the Sweazy Lake? Is his little body
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the victim of the rapacious appetite of alligators, loggerhead turtles, garfish,
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or has the little fellow been gnawed to death by mosquitoes, gnats in the jungles of the Atchafalaya swamp?"
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So I feel like that writer probably should have gotten into like horror. Yeah, novels, fiction, you know?
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Nothing nothing true. Use that prose elsewhere. We don't need to we don't need you using that flowery prose for
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someone's four-year-old that they are holding out hope that they're alive. Jesus.
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like reading that I hope his family never read that. No. Cuz what the [ __ ] Oh god.
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Yeah. Now this was the moment that it became clear that the press was going to be a massive
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figure in this case. Okay. And they are. Yeah. figure in that probably the biggest to
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be quite honest. so so helpful and so so hurtful. in this case. Yeah. Bobby's disappearance coincided with a
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strange period in American journalism actually. It was guided way more by like how much
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you could sell and how much readership you could gain than any kind of like journalistic ethics code or anything
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like that. Any kind of integrity. Any kind of like seeking out the truth kind of
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situation. It was That's big business. That is big business. Numbers numbers numbers.
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Exactly. It's never like can I actually give you the truth or dig something up. It's like this is the most salacious
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version of the story. Who gives a [ __ ] if it's real? Let's make money. get people to pick it up.
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Yep. So as a result newspapers frequently contradicted one another, embellished stories, and in some cases
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just flat out lied in articles they published cuz it sold. That's insane. They were tabloids
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essentially. Yeah. That never that never ceases to amaze me that they could just straight
00:14:04
up lie. Mhm. Be like, "Yeah, this is what I think happened." And you're seeing all these newspapers
00:14:08
contradicting themselves because this one's saying it's just who which story the different newspaper grabbed onto and
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said, "I think that our readers will grab this one more." Yeah, exactly. like should we check the sources? Nah.
00:14:20
Like let's just go let's just go with this one. That's good. Now for example in early reports Bobby had disappeared
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from the camp in the middle of the night while Percy and Lessie were asleep which
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is what happened. Days later though a new story appeared in several of the papers and in this story Bobby had
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attempted to follow his father down to the lake but Percy had turned around and told him to return to camp which was a
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mile away. And he was last seen wandering alone back to the campsite. It's like why make that up? Well, this
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distinction like to some people at first might seem like kind of trivial and just
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like, "Okay, that's stupid." But the latter account of this story it opens the door to many more scary
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possibilities first of all but it also kind of attempted to place some of the blame on the dad.
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Even vaguely on Percy for sending his four-year-old a mile back to the campsite by himself.
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And it's like that's [ __ ] up. It is [ __ ] up. Cuz it's like these people are going
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through a hell that you can't even comprehend. Right. Like what the [ __ ] Now while
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many among the search party and in the press had given up Bobby for dead at this point, there were still those that
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hung onto hope that he could still be alive somewhere. In Opelousas a small group of residents actually fundraised a
00:15:36
thousand dollars as a reward to anyone who returned Bobby alive and unharmed to his family. And think that's 1912.
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That's a lot of money. And that's like the community doing that. That's not just the family. Aw.
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And in response to the community support Percy and Lessie published a letter of thanks in the local papers. They said,
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"We are well aware that all has been done which human effort can accomplish and it is a comfort to know that our
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country is with one of the kindest hearted peoples on Earth." Which like wow. Hits different.
00:16:06
Hearing that you're just like [ __ ] Yeah. Now within a few weeks of Bobby's disappearance a new theory had started
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circulating and it was alleging that the boy hadn't simply just wandered off but
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was kidnapped from the campsite. According to some press accounts um quote the local police hold to the
00:16:24
belief that the child was brought to New Orleans during the early part of the week by the woman who was seen to alight
00:16:30
from the train station at Port Allen with a child answering the little fellow's description. That was in the
00:16:36
Times-Democrat in 1912. Um according to this account a passenger on a train from Baton Rouge, Louisiana
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had spotted a boy he believed to be Bobby Dunbar traveling in the company of a young black woman. Okay. The woman was
00:16:50
reportedly very well dressed but the police in New Orleans still just with no basis associated this woman with a group
00:16:59
of men living on the outskirts of a nearby logging camp. And they quickly developed a theory that the group had
00:17:05
kidnapped Bobby Dunbar to hold him for ransom. Very confused how they put one and one together there. Very confused
00:17:11
about that. Hello? It's like wow, okay. Uh so it's like I I hope they stretched before they
00:17:17
made that leap. Yeah. Now soon after the reports of Bobby being seen in the company of this
00:17:22
young woman investigators began receiving other reports of sightings which is this happens a lot.
00:17:28
Yep. And they were as far away as California. Uh the St. Landry Clarion alleged, "It
00:17:33
is now believed by many that little Robert Dunbar who disappeared from the fishing camp at Sweazy Lake has been
00:17:39
kidnapped." Mhm. There was no basis for this. They just said, "You know what? We
00:17:43
decided." "You know what? He's kidnapped now." Just a week after Bobby was supposedly
00:17:48
spotted in the company of that young woman another report came in of his being seen with an Italian woman who was
00:17:55
clearly not his mother. Mhm. The kidnapping narrative just kept on going into the fall just different
00:18:01
people kidnapping this kid for different reasons. Which is giving his family hope.
00:18:06
Yeah and making them probably terrified. Yeah. You know? So so many emotions mixed up in that.
00:18:12
Yeah and by November the reward amount had increased to six thousand dollars. And again this is 1912.
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Um the reward notice which had been circulated to every state in the country said quote "Bobby is presumed to have
00:18:25
been taken away by a woman about 30 years old and the boy might have been carried away for the purposes of
00:18:30
securing a ransom for his return although no demands have been received from any source." So why would you think
00:18:37
that? So you have literally no reason to think that. You know like we have not received any ransom demands.
00:18:42
like a month. But is it we are of the mind that they are asking for ransom. Like don't you think they would have
00:18:48
asked for ransom if they wanted ransom? Like what is it how is it helping them to not ask?
00:18:54
how ransom works is you request it. So despite not having any evidence to support the belief and citing only a
00:19:00
handful of possible random sightings several months earlier the press managed to keep the kidnap story alive and
00:19:06
continued to promote the idea that Bobby had been kidnapped for ransom. But interest in the story had started to
00:19:13
actually kind of wane as the months went on. Um you know, they weren't getting any new information so there was not a
00:19:19
lot of new stuff to print. Yeah, different things start to happen just the way it is.
00:19:23
And the story though got a burst of energy the next month when a new story started circulating that Bobby had been
00:19:29
killed by his captors. Oh. And now the press is printing this like it happened. Okay. According to one of the detectives
00:19:37
on the case Joseph and Robert Marshall two men who had been arrested for the kidnapping now they're saying told
00:19:44
investigators quote "The boy had been put out of the way because it was difficult to conceal him any longer."
00:19:50
But they never asked for a ransom. No idea why this happened. It is unclear why this story was given any it's kind
00:20:00
of unclear why it was given any credence by journalists. It was to sell newspapers.
00:20:04
Yeah. There was no physical evidence that the Marshall brothers or anyone else for that matter had Bobby in their
00:20:10
possession, let alone had killed him. Like what? No evidence whatsoever. Yeah. But for the press who had started to
00:20:18
honestly keep you know, run out of ways to keep the story alive, the murder narrative was a convenient way to kind
00:20:25
of wind it up again and captivate the nation for another few months. Yeah. Unfortunately for journalists or
00:20:31
fortunately depending how you look at it, I guess, reports of Bobby's death were about to be seriously undermined
00:20:37
reviving the story in a way that I don't think anybody was ready to hear it revived.
00:20:42
say so. Now, after it was reported that Bobby was killed, the story kind of silently
00:20:48
pulled back out of the public's view again for a little while cuz that was kind of the end. Right, and it got
00:20:53
wrapped up. We have a wrap-up, but a few months later in early April 1913, the last of the men arrested for the
00:21:01
supposed kidnapping were set free by a court order after the district attorney's quote informed the court that
00:21:08
there was absolutely no evidence for prosecution. Huh. Their release again seemed to single signal kind of
00:21:16
the end of the Dunbar story because now I guess he's been murdered, but they have no evidence to prove anything that
00:21:24
he's been murdered. So now it's like these little things keep happening that they're really just end points. They're
00:21:29
like periods on the story. Yeah. But then a twist came because a few weeks later Bobby Dunbar or at least
00:21:35
someone resembling Bobby Dunbar was found in the company of a man named William Walters who was a peddler in
00:21:42
Columbia, Mississippi. Mhm. Now Walters was arrested on a charge of kidnapping and the boy with him was
00:21:48
taken into custody. But from the moment of Walter's arrest, the story was anything but simple. This was not just a
00:21:54
simple like here he is. Walter's According to Walters, this boy was not Bobby Dunbar. This was Bruce Anderson
00:22:01
and he had been given to Walters by his mother, Julia Anderson. Okay. At the time Anderson was working as a field
00:22:09
hand and caretaker to Walter's elderly parents. Hopefully you guys can follow that.
00:22:14
Yeah. Um but she lacked the resources to care for her son and left him in the Walter's
00:22:20
care. Yeah. And he said, so um he wrote in a statement after he was arrested, "I got
00:22:26
this child at the residence of J.P. Walters, Burnsville, North Carolina between November and Christmas 1911.
00:22:33
That's such a wild statement. I got this child. Yeah. I got this kid. this kid. Around this time. Julia Anderson claimed
00:22:40
to be the mother of the child. "I don't know the father. The child was about 3 years old when I got him." Mhm. Now
00:22:46
according to Walters, there were at least 100 people who had seen him and this boy, Bruce, together before and
00:22:53
after Bobby Dunbar went missing. Okay. Which he said that's proof that this is not Bobby Dunbar. I mean, yeah. The
00:22:59
following day, April 21st, Percy and Lessie Dunbar traveled 175 miles to Columbia eager thinking that this is
00:23:07
their son. Of course. But when they arrived, they were kind of surprised. Um apparently it was dark when they got
00:23:14
there and the child was asleep. Yeah. Lessie said he quote looks more like her son than any child she has ever
00:23:21
seen, but she couldn't be certain that it was him. Mhm. With only oil lamp for light cuz
00:23:26
remember we're in 1912. 1912. She examined him and after looking him over, one journalist reported that
00:23:34
she gasped and said, "I do not know. I'm not quite sure." Okay. Another report published the next day said that the
00:23:41
what that Lessie recognized him instantly and it said quote, "Mrs. Dunbar made a careful examination of the
00:23:48
lad without awakening him." And was standing over the bed a few hours later when the child opened his eyes. The boy
00:23:54
recognized his mother instantly and stretched out his arms to her. Now, is that what actually happened?
00:24:00
And that's the thing like so you see that and this is why it's so dangerous when people lie do that. But
00:24:09
it's like cuz you're you're going to see that story be like, "Oh my that's so great. They're reunited." Like and oh,
00:24:14
he knew her. So that's that's it. Proof. Right. But it's like they're just writing
00:24:19
whatever the [ __ ] they want. To sell the papers. So the first of those two reports is probably the truer of the
00:24:25
two. Yeah, she wasn't sure. According to Tal McThenia, quote, "Percy and Lessie both
00:24:31
told the papers the boy didn't look like their son." Mhm. Among other things, his eyes were
00:24:37
apparently much smaller than Bobby's and he was missing a scar on his foot that Bobby was known to have had. Yeah, and
00:24:43
you don't really get rid of scars. Exactly. Making things even more complicated was
00:24:48
the fact that the boy seemed confused and didn't really seem to have any knowledge and familiarity that one would
00:24:55
expect Bobby Dunbar to have with his family, with what was going on. what How much uh time had passed? About
00:25:02
a year. About a year. So he would still remember stuff. like it's like 10 years down the road or
00:25:06
something. Um despite that, Percy and Lessie returned the following day and Lessie
00:25:10
gave the boy a bath examining him more closely now that it was daylight. Yeah. Uh it was So she was bathing him
00:25:18
to kind of look and see if there was marks, moles that she knows her son to have.
00:25:21
Sure. And when she did this, she enthusiastically announced that this was her son. But she might have just tricked
00:25:27
herself into thinking. Exactly. Like I can't look. I feel like this was just I want this to
00:25:33
be my son. Yeah. So And not even in a way of like I want this to be my son so I'm going to pretend it's my son.
00:25:39
her mind tricked her. Might have literally been like this is your son. We're going to go with this. But then
00:25:43
again, maybe it was. Who's to say? I will at the end of this. Um in early accounts of this reunion,
00:25:50
many among the press noted that Lessie had a lot of anxiety over her uncertainty and the boy's unfamiliarity
00:25:57
I mean, yeah. with them. One journalist wrote quote, "Bobby at first meeting turns upon
00:26:03
Alonzo with a scowl of anger." That's his brother. Mhm. They there appeared to be no
00:26:07
recognition of his little brother. But after Lessie and Percy formally claimed this boy,
00:26:14
uh most journalists reversed course and celebrated the reunion with you know, as
00:26:18
like this heartwarming thing. According to one paper, uh quote, "The instant they met, Robert said, 'There's my
00:26:25
bubba, Alonzo' and reached over and kissed him." Aw. Some papers went even further
00:26:30
reporting that Bobby had quote asked frequently about his brother while he was in New Orleans and was very eager to
00:26:35
see him. Okay. This is really [ __ ] up of these papers. Of course it is. is really [ __ ] up because none of this
00:26:43
is confirmed. writing fantasy. And Bobby returned home to Opelousas with Percy and Lessie in
00:26:48
late April to much fanfare and excitement. Uh the town who again had fundraised to find this boy, had rallied
00:26:57
around this family, they threw a huge parade with a big band to celebrate his return. Um William Walters was in
00:27:05
custody now so everyone was like, "Wow, this terrible story has a happy ending. This kidnapper being brought to justice
00:27:12
and we have Bobby back." they thought it was over, it wasn't, but now it was. it was except it wasn't because one
00:27:18
woman is going to come into the picture and put a little bit of a doubt in everyone's mind.
00:27:24
All right. Now in her statement to the authorities, Julia Andrews who's supposedly Bruce's
00:27:31
mom confirmed some of the details of Walter's story. Okay. While strongly refuting several of his claims. So it's
00:27:39
getting weirder and weirder because now we have someone coming in and saying, "Oh he's telling the truth a little
00:27:43
bit." But there's also parts of this that he's lying out of his [ __ ] face. Okay. So now it's like Jesus Christ
00:27:48
everybody. telling the truth? Yeah. So she said to the and this is in the Times-Democrat,
00:27:54
1913, "William Walters left Burnsville, North Carolina with my son, Charles Bruce, in February 1912
00:28:02
saying that he only wanted to take the child with him for a few days on a visit to the home of his sister.
00:28:09
I have not seen the child from that day to this. I did not give him the child. I
00:28:14
merely consented for him to take my son for a few days." Okay. Now according to Julia, she had known
00:28:20
him. Like this isn't some random guy that came and was just like, "Hey, can I take your son for a few days?" And she
00:28:25
was like, "Absolutely can." she worked for his parents, right? knew him. Yeah. And according to Julia,
00:28:31
Bruce had taken a very strong liking to Walters. Her son had liked this man. Yeah, she's comfortable.
00:28:37
Followed him everywhere. So she didn't see any harm with a short trip. Yeah, like just was like this is going to be
00:28:43
fine. So when the when Walters failed to return with Bruce, Julia became very concerned, but she didn't really know
00:28:52
where he had gone or how to get in touch with him because it's 1912 and she can't
00:28:55
just like location track him or something. Like she's like, "I don't know." She requests his location.
00:29:00
like, "I can't. What do I do?" She's like, "Hey, send me a ping." Yeah, so she just waited hoping that he was
00:29:05
going to come back. Yeah. She said, "I'm willing to go anywhere to identify him on condition that my expenses be paid
00:29:12
and that I be allowed to take my child away from Walters. I do not want him to have my child." Aw, that's really sad.
00:29:18
Now the problem, at least for Julia, was that this child in question had just been claimed as Bobby Dunbar by the
00:29:25
Dunbars. But Walters is still saying this is Bruce Anderson. It's not. Now sensing a big story, the
00:29:33
press in Louisiana just jumped on this opportunity and they paid to have Julia brought to the city to examine this boy.
00:29:41
Okay. So she went on an overnight train ride to get there and was brought to the
00:29:46
Dunbar home. Oh my god. Also, can we just Oh, whoever the [ __ ] this kid is? This poor
00:29:51
This poor child. Like this is truly traumatic. And this poor family, like the the Dunbar family.
00:29:58
snip snap next level. And poor Julia, like nobody knows whose kid it is. The Dunbars. And it's like everybody's
00:30:03
affected here. Nobody wins in this situation. But especially the kid. He's like 5 years old.
00:30:09
awful for this kid. like, "Who am I? Who am I and who are any of you Like what is going on?" Now,
00:30:15
five different boys were presented to her for inspection. Okay. Including to do it that way.
00:30:20
Exactly. Including the boy the Dunbars had claimed was Bobby. Yeah. Julia didn't recognize most of the boys,
00:30:26
but when Bobby Dunbar, who they claimed was Bobby Dunbar, was presented to her, he had tears in his eyes and seemed
00:30:33
upset. Aw. He refused to say whether he recognized Julia. Huh. Which is strange. And Julia, who was
00:30:42
exhausted and very stressed out from travel, couldn't say whether that was Bruce.
00:30:49
Okay. I've never been in this situation. I can't imagine not recognizing my child, but again,
00:30:56
who knows? Who knows? Maybe it was dark. Once again, I have never been under this kind
00:31:01
of stress. the thing. I have never been under this kind of situation. I am not in 1912. I don't
00:31:07
know what the lighting is even like there. I don't know what any of this is. she's probably sitting there thinking,
00:31:11
"I don't want to [ __ ] this kid up if it's not my kid. Like I got to be totally sure."
00:31:15
I can't imagine, but I also can't imagine the circumstances that all this is happening under. So, I'm going to
00:31:21
keep my own opinion out of this because there's nothing for me to say. I don't I've never been in this position, so my
00:31:29
my opinion on this would be kind of moot at this point. Speaking from 2025 over here with great lighting and all the
00:31:37
running water I could hope for. No. So, there's that. But she did ask whether this was the boy found traveling
00:31:46
with Walters, but the lawyers in the room wouldn't answer her questions. Now, because she wasn't unable to identify
00:31:53
this boy confidently or any of the children, really, everyone concluded that the entire test had been a failure
00:31:59
and that was it. Yeah. According to Tal McThenia, quote, "Julia begged for a second chance and
00:32:04
the next day she was allowed to see the boy again and to look him over." Like actually, which again, like these this
00:32:10
boy just keeps getting examined. Like that's really [ __ ] up. This time she felt more certain that it
00:32:14
was her son. But her failure the night before was already national news and none none of
00:32:20
the press wanted to correct any of the countless articles that had already been published celebrating Bobby's return to
00:32:27
the Dunbars. Yeah. They wanted to stay with that story because that was a fun, heartwarming story. This is like a big
00:32:33
old bummer. Yeah. Now, just as they did as they had since Bobby disappeared 9 months
00:32:38
earlier, the press controlled the narrative around the Dunbar story and they had decided the outcome for
00:32:44
themselves. They didn't want to hear anything else. They set about dismissing Julia's claims and they decided they
00:32:50
were just going to portray her as an unfit mother. Aw. Uh in one article titled "Julia Has Forgotten", Oh god.
00:32:56
journalist Jerome G. Batey described Julia's examination of of the boy they were saying was Bobby Dunbar. Um and it
00:33:04
Wow. It's a I'm going to give you a little I'm going to give you a little uh snippet from it.
00:33:11
It's harsh. It's harsh as [ __ ] It says, "Her long journey had been in vain. She had not seen her son since
00:33:17
February of 1912 and she had forgotten him. Animals don't forget, but this big, coarse country woman, several times a
00:33:24
mother, she forgot. She cared little for her young. Children were only regrettable incidents in her life. She
00:33:30
hopes her son isn't dead just as she hopes that the cotton crop will be good this year. Of true mother love, she has
00:33:36
none." Um How do you know that? well, first of all, shut the [ __ ] up cuz you're not a mom.
00:33:43
mean. And secondly, obviously she gives somewhat of a [ __ ] She made the journey
00:33:47
out here to determine if this is her kid or not. So, that doesn't even really make any sense.
00:33:52
It's just You know what it is? Like regardless of what you think about, you know, Julia or whatever the hell like in
00:33:57
the story of the situation, that's just like a really nasty judgment to throw on
00:34:02
someone that you don't know. Yeah, it's just And it's adding insult to injury. That's the thing. There's a lot of
00:34:08
emotions and emotional turmoil happening in every [ __ ] part of this story. The
00:34:13
Dunbars, Julia's, like I don't know what's going on with Walter but like or William Walters, but like some shit's
00:34:20
going on over there, too. And it's like saying is true? Her child was [ __ ] kidnapped.
00:34:25
Yeah, that's the thing. And it's like And then the Dunbars have lost their child and have no idea what happened to
00:34:31
him and are thinking this is There's so much emotion here and the press was just
00:34:36
not willing to look at it from a human level and say there's a lot of emotions and a lot of stress, anxiety,
00:34:42
trauma here. grief, trauma, just hope, hope dashed, hope brought back. You know what I mean?
00:34:48
Like these all these people have been snip snapped around like Thank you. Hope, hope dashed, hope brought back.
00:34:55
you guys had seen her deliver that. The arms were flailing. Yeah. It just it's such It's such a
00:35:00
situation that like none of us can conceive of. fathom that. And in such a time where like [ __ ] was
00:35:06
real dark, so it's like literally livelier livelier and it's like I couldn't even say that word. So, it's
00:35:12
like a flu. For the press to be such dicks. It's like they were literally like trolls. Like the press were trolls
00:35:19
just like trying to make people upset. It's like damn. That's really mean. So, the truth was
00:35:26
Julia Anderson was very distressed and very heartbroken about not knowing where her son was and whether this was her
00:35:34
son. And that same year, what they were failing to say in any of these articles saying she's been a mother several times
00:35:39
over and she doesn't give a [ __ ] That same year she had given up one baby for adoption.
00:35:45
And another child of hers had died. And nobody knows the circumstances under which like that adoption happened. You
00:35:52
don't know if she There was a death of a child and she just couldn't couldn't do
00:35:57
it. was trying to do the right thing for too much child. And it's like you just don't
00:36:01
know. Like in the there's no backstory here. was so stigmatized back then and I mean
00:36:06
still is today, but And the press strongly implied that that the death of one of her children was her
00:36:11
fault. Of course. That's awful. Yeah. In a single year, she had lost all her children.
00:36:17
And lacking the resources or social status of people, you know, like the Dunbars because they were of a higher
00:36:23
status, like social status, it was unlikely she was going to be able to regain custody of Bruce or convince
00:36:28
anyone that this was her child. That's so sad. She told reporters in May 1913, "I
00:36:33
believe this is my son Bruce, but I can't swear to it and I won't try to take him away from the Dunbars. I have
00:36:39
suffered so much myself that I don't want to make anyone else suffer, but I just can't help it. I believe that is my
00:36:45
boy." Aw. And it's like that's Rip your heart out. heartbreaking. Yeah, truly. And it's
00:36:51
just like whoa. I just my brain won't wrap around this. No, and you have to sit there and think
00:36:57
one, like if this if this is Bruce Anderson and he is getting claimed by the Dunbars as Bobby Dunbar, obviously
00:37:05
he's living a different life now. So, that might have been why he was a little hesitant to say like, "Yeah, that's my
00:37:10
mom." You Cuz maybe he's just like and it's like I don't know it's like I don't know. He's been away from her
00:37:18
possibly since he was three. Yeah, so he might not even know. than that. So, it's like he might have
00:37:25
very fuzzy memories. That might be why he was upset cuz he was like, "I'm trying to place why I know this lady,
00:37:32
but I don't have the like full cognizance to say this is my mom." And a baby 5-year-old should not be put
00:37:39
in that position. gone since three and now he's five. That's like and he's been through Who
00:37:44
knows what he's been through. I know. And it's like I don't know. It just it it's a lot. It's a lot.
00:37:50
It is. Percy and Lessie Dunbar had decided that this was Bobby Dunbar and that's how
00:37:55
they were living. They they were not going to question their decision. Uh Percy told reporters after the second
00:38:02
examination that Julia had of the boys, he said, "This is the last time my child
00:38:06
is going to be examined. I'm tired of this foolishness. The woman could not identify the boy yesterday. Besides, the
00:38:12
child does not know her and never did. He has identified himself in a thousand ways and he is my child. I'll never give
00:38:19
him up, court order or not." Totally. I don't blame anybody here. get it. Cuz also child to begin with and
00:38:25
then I I don't remember, honestly, if it's if it ends up being Bobby Dunbar, but it's like gaining him back, you
00:38:30
would never let go again. No, that's the thing. Never. That's why when he says, "I will never give him up,
00:38:36
court order or not", you can you feel the desperation there. Like you're never taking him from me again.
00:38:46
Yeah, oh, but like it's traumatizing. You can't blame anybody for this and you also can't blame Julia for being like,
00:38:52
"I'm pretty sure that's my son, but I don't know what to do here." Aw. It's There's so much like
00:38:58
Is this tragic? It's very tragic. And as it turned out, they would never have to. The Dunbars
00:39:04
were never going to have to give up Bobby. Okay. Um Julia was unable to fight the Dunbars
00:39:11
for custody. Uh she returned to North Carolina without her who she believed was her son and from that point on, he
00:39:18
was Bobby Dunbar. What a tragic loss for her. Like a series of tragic losses for
00:39:23
her. So, right after this, attention turned to William Walters and his upcoming kidnapping trial.
00:39:29
Now, what's his deal? Yeah. It's worth keeping in mind that from the moment he was arrested, his
00:39:34
story hadn't changed. He insisted the boy in his company was Bruce Anderson, who had been given to him by Julia
00:39:40
Anderson, who was the boy's mother. And Julia more or less confirmed that story, but with some slightly different
00:39:47
details, obviously. And there were several other witnesses in North Carolina, Mississippi, and Louisiana who
00:39:53
had seen Walters and Bruce Anderson together before the day Bobby Dunbar went missing, and they came forward to
00:39:59
corroborate Walter's story. Oh, [ __ ] But the story had grown so large and so complicated since Bobby disappeared,
00:40:08
mostly entirely because of the press that someone they needed someone to be held accountable for this.
00:40:13
Yeah. They would the public was not going to allow this just to be blown blown into the wind. Regardless of
00:40:19
whether crime had actually been committed or not. Oh, yay, yay. Because now Wil- William
00:40:24
Walters is saying, "I didn't kidnap him. She told me to take him." Yeah. Like he's
00:40:30
which I'm like, "What?" Like I'm just so confused. he said that she told him he was just
00:40:34
going for a little bit. exactly. And it's like This is a a rigmarole of he said,
00:40:40
she said. It's wild. So, as they'd done all along, the press latched onto the kidnapping
00:40:44
narrative and spun it into an even larger story involving a larger conspiracy to harm Percy Dunbar.
00:40:53
Apparently, Percy Dunbar held a large amount of power in and around Opelousas. Percy's brother Wallace told a reporter,
00:41:01
"I make no accusations, but I feel confident that Walters was merely a tool in the hands of enemies of Percy
00:41:07
Dunbar." Okay. According to the press, Percy was in charge of distributing government
00:41:13
rations in and around Opelousas following the Great Flood of 1912. Okay. He was apparently known,
00:41:19
allegedly, to have cut rations for men refusing to work. Wallace Dunbar, his brother, said, "I
00:41:25
know on several occasions that men left the distributing offices saying they would get even." Ooh. The popular theory
00:41:32
was that a group of these men conspired to kidnap Bobby and hold him for ransom,
00:41:37
but after several weeks when the interest of the press and local law enforcement became, you know,
00:41:43
kind of like faded out, they gave up on their plan and they passed the boy off to William Walters. So, they're saying
00:41:49
he's a tool but from these guys. I don't think so. This is a very intense theory.
00:41:53
never asked for ransom. That's the biggest plot of that plot That's the problem here.
00:41:58
is that you never asked for ransom. ever ransom demand. Like I'm like, "You guys
00:42:02
are talking a lot about ransom for never having received a ransom letter." Yep. So,
00:42:08
there's no evidence that this theory was any more realistic or even plausible Yeah. than the other theories
00:42:14
surrounding Bobby's kidnapping. It supported the kidnapping narrative that had been built up around the case
00:42:20
and justified everyone's actions following Walter's arrest like basically. And it seemed that several
00:42:25
people were willing to play along with investigators in order to support that belief. In late May, investigators
00:42:31
started collecting affidavits from locals who were willing to testify against Walters, Oh, [ __ ]
00:42:37
including Harvey Burke, who was a man from Picayune, who claimed, quote, "Walters told him that the Dunbar boy
00:42:43
was not stolen for money, but for revenge as Dunbar had given evidence against an old crippled man and caused
00:42:50
him to be compelled to work on the streets as a convict." Okay. It really didn't matter that statements like this
00:42:56
one contradicted the prevailing theory of a conspiracy. It really only mattered that it supported the belief that the
00:43:03
boy was Bobby Dunbar and had been taken by William Walters. Yeah. Didn't really matter the details
00:43:09
surrounding it. They were just like, "Oop, see? Yep. He did it. And it's like, "But none of these stories are
00:43:13
adding up. People are telling 14 different stories of what how he got with William Walters."
00:43:18
Y'all are going everywhere. In response to the growing number of just bonkers affidavits collected by the prosecution,
00:43:25
Walter's lawyers, Dale and Rawls, started collecting their own affidavits that established a timeline of events
00:43:32
and traced Walter's movements at the time of Bobby's disappearance. Okay. Um They wrote in a statement to
00:43:38
the press, "We have sat silently by and seen so many false statements published in the columns of the public press that
00:43:44
we feel that the public is entitled to know the real facts on these dates." Among those statements was sworn
00:43:50
testimony from J.S. Thigpen of Pearl River County, Mississippi. He swore under oath that William Walters had been
00:43:58
at his home on August 23rd and 24th, the day Bobby went missing, and spent the entire day working on the man's sewing
00:44:06
machine. Okay. Whole day that Bobby was missing. So, boom, alibi. This statement confirms
00:44:11
Walter's own story in which he told police on the day of the boy's disappearance, quote, "I worked on a
00:44:17
machine for young man Thigpen and went from there by old man Thigpen's, by Holdens, worked on a machine for Holden
00:44:25
and doubled back and spent that night at old man Thigpen's." What sounds like a country song. I want
00:44:32
to be known as old woman Ashkel. Old man Thigpen. Well, yeah. I honestly forgot that. Just call me old man Thigpen.
00:44:39
Obsessed. I'm going to be that for the next listener tales. Old man Thigpen. Old man Thigpen.
00:44:45
That's so iconic. So, this guy, like they are all like he's saying, "Yes, he was at my home working
00:44:53
on my sewing machine." he was. on those two days. Like stayed at my home that night.
00:44:59
And then Walters is saying, "I was at his home and I stayed there those two days working on that machine."
00:45:06
It's all adding up. By the time Walters was extradited to Louisiana to stand trial, he was at a
00:45:13
huge disadvantage. Like Julia Anderson, William Walters was poor. He was uneducated. He lacked the resources or
00:45:20
knowledge to mount any kind of proper defense against his accusers, who were honestly like part of a wealthier,
00:45:27
higher social status than he is. More importantly, the majority of Walters' witnesses lived in Mississippi,
00:45:35
and while it wasn't a too crazy of a distance to travel, the majority of them lacked the funds to travel to Louisiana
00:45:41
and testify on his behalf. Yeah. So, a lot of people could see that this was a disadvantage that a lot of
00:45:46
the people that could come and testify on his behalf couldn't get there. Yeah. Um so, the residents of St. Landry
00:45:53
Parish, particularly the ones who weren't convinced of Walter's guilt, many of them offered to pay to have
00:46:00
Walter's witnesses put up in Opelousas during the trial. They were that convinced. Yeah.
00:46:06
William Walter's trial for the kidnapping of Bobby Dunbar started in mid-April 1914 in Opelousas and was
00:46:12
heavily attended by spectators from all over who had been following this case since Bobby disappeared.
00:46:18
Mhm. For Walters, the trial could mean life in prison or the death penalty Damn. if he was found guilty, but for
00:46:24
the Dunbars and Julia Anderson, it meant the opportunity to to definitively prove
00:46:29
the boy's identity and put any custody claims to rest. Now, the first witness called in the
00:46:35
case was Percy Dunbar. Mhm. He detailed the 8-month search for his son and testified that, quote, "He
00:46:41
recognized the child when he found him at Columbia." But he did acknowledge that, quote, "He recognized some of the
00:46:46
mark on the boy, but not all." Now, following his testimony were a number of witnesses for the prosecution
00:46:53
including Wallace Dunbar, his brother. Uh they all testified that the boy discovered in the company of William
00:46:59
Walters was indeed Bobby Dunbar, but none appeared to have offered any proof beyond just like, "I recognize him. He's
00:47:06
Bobby Dunbar." Right. Which I I understand that like It's really all you have. As predicted, Walter's case
00:47:13
was hampered by a lack of witnesses and a jury that was almost certainly biased against him
00:47:18
Yeah. from all the press that was covering the story. Um in an open letter to the people of
00:47:23
Louisiana, one Walter supporter wrote, "You have promised to give W.C. Walters a fair trial. The man is now on trial in
00:47:30
a hostile community without money and without friends. While it is late, it is not too late to render the justice
00:47:37
promised for this man, whether he be guilty or innocent." So, they're just saying he deserves a fair trial, whether
00:47:42
he's guilty or innocent. Yeah. For his part, William Walters remained very hopeful that the jury was going to
00:47:48
see the truth. Um he couldn't rely on many of his witnesses to travel to Opelousas to
00:47:52
testify on his behalf, but his lawyers had found several of the town's, quote, unquote, prominent citizens who were
00:47:59
willing to testify that the boy in question was not Bobby Dunbar. Oh, man. Among those who did travel to Louisiana
00:48:06
for the trial were W.H. Murray, a mail carrier from Barnsville, North Carolina, who testified that the boy found with
00:48:13
Walters was Bruce Anderson. Mhm. Likewise, E.M. Stevens, who was a merchant from Barnsville, also testified
00:48:20
and told the jury he was confident the boy was Bruce Anderson. Oh, wow. Both proved strong witnesses for the defense,
00:48:26
but in their cross-examination, the prosecution treated both men as hostile and according to one reporter,
00:48:32
quote, "Succeeded in rattling Murray to some extent." Basically undermining his credibility.
00:48:38
Which is shitty cuz you're essentially just like frauding your witness. Yeah, it's like just let the facts come
00:48:42
out, man. Right. Let the facts fall where they may and figure it out that way. On April 22nd,
00:48:47
Julia Anderson, who had been ill for most of the trial, testified from a cot set up in the the courthouse.
00:48:56
She gave a thorough history of her difficult life and again said how her child had come to be in the company of
00:49:03
William Walters. She also continued to insist that the boy was her son Bruce Anderson. And she said, "If that ain't
00:49:09
my child, he's never been born on this earth." Aw. Despite the intense scrutiny and
00:49:15
negative press Julia had received in the years leading up to the trial, um even the very obviously biased press
00:49:21
couldn't ignore the fact that unlike the prosecution's flimsy case, Julia's story
00:49:26
seemed to support everything Walters had said since his arrest. It did. It did. It did. It did. I'm
00:49:32
saying it did and it does. It did. Honestly, it did. They both they're the same story.
00:49:38
Yeah. Just with like little minor things that like I think they both are going to
00:49:41
squabble over. It's It's always like What do they say? Like yours, mine, and the truth.
00:49:45
Exactly. Um one reporter wrote in the Times-Picayune, "The strong point of the defense is that every bit of its
00:49:51
testimony grooves perfectly." You love saying Picayune, don't you? saying Picayune.
00:49:56
It's a certain twinkle in your eye when Yeah, the Times-Picayune. I love it. You've said it a couple times and every
00:50:03
time it's like the way you say it and the little twinkle in your It makes me so happy.
00:50:08
I love it. We got I got to say it a lot in the Axeman of New Orleans. Um and it just it stuck. It felt It felt right.
00:50:17
Times-Picayune. But the trial came to an end after 2 weeks and on April 25th, the jury
00:50:23
retired for deliberation. That must have been tough. Yeah. So through this whole trial, the jury had
00:50:29
heard from a lot of witnesses who supported Walter's claims and offered details that offered more than a little
00:50:35
reasonable doubt as to his guilt. Yeah. And by extension they had to think about the identity of
00:50:41
the boy who had been found in his company. They had made it reasonably sound to think that this might not be
00:50:48
Bobby Dunbar. Yep. Regardless of that strong support that was very clear, on April 27th, the jury found William
00:50:54
Walters guilty without capital punishment. Damn, I wasn't expecting that. He was sentenced to life in prison
00:51:00
for kidnapping. Wow. Now his lawyers quickly filed an appeal arguing among other things that the
00:51:06
statute under which he'd been convicted, which is Louisiana Act number 271, was unconstitutional
00:51:12
and that the prosecution had far exceeded the limitations of the right to cross-examine defense witnesses.
00:51:18
Mhm. The Louisiana Supreme Court agreed Okay. and ordered that the verdict and sentence against Walters be set aside
00:51:25
and that he be released from prison and quote discharged from further prosecution under that statute.
00:51:32
So following this decision, the prosecution had the opportunity to try Walters again under an amended statute.
00:51:39
But they said it would be too expensive to do a second trial and it would be a poor use of resources, so they dropped
00:51:46
the charges and William Walters was free to go. That's suspicious. That should tell you
00:51:53
a little bit. That's weird. That should tell you a little bit. That's giving like West Memphis 3 that
00:51:57
they were like, "Yeah, we'll release three." You know. Yeah. Quote unquote child
00:52:01
yeah. Like that's totally fine. Why not? No. We'll just We'll take I'm paper that
00:52:05
you did. Okay, get out of here. okay. That makes sense. That poor man, all he went through. And then they're just
00:52:11
like, "Yeah." Yeah, get out of here. Now and who know That's the thing, too. It's
00:52:16
like what was up with William Walters? Why did he have this child? Is Julia telling the truth that like she
00:52:23
never told him he could have this child? Did he kidnap this child? This Who is this child? Like what is going on? Like
00:52:30
what That's the thing like I don't know what the real story is cuz he's saying No, I didn't kidnap kidnap this child.
00:52:36
She said I could have this child. Yeah. But why though? One. And then two For why though? Why though? And then but
00:52:45
Julia's like, "No, I didn't tell him he could have my child and I don't want him
00:52:48
to have my child." So that gives me pause. I mean, yeah. And then the Dunbars are
00:52:52
like, "This is Bobby Dunbar." And we're like, "What?" Oh man, this is a This is a wreck. Now
00:52:57
with the trial having come to the to an end and Walters freed by technicality one question still remained. Who is this
00:53:04
child? to Bruce Anderson now? Oh yeah. Cuz now okay, sure this is Bobby Dunbar. Who the [ __ ] is Bruce Anderson? What
00:53:11
happened? Yeah. What do you Like the press and the Dunbars maintained that the boy discovered with
00:53:17
Walters was Bobby Dunbar. So the majority they were just kind of like, "Okay, uh
00:53:23
but Julia lost a child, everybody." Like is every Like are we really just forgetting that? Like she Where's her
00:53:30
child? Yeah. Where's Bruce? Unfortunately, the fate of anybody would really be kind of left up in the air for
00:53:38
decades after this. What? It just ended that way where the Dunbars were like, "This is Bobby."
00:53:45
And then they were like, "I don't know what happened to Bruce." What about Julia? So following the
00:53:49
trial, Julia Anderson decided to relocate to Polarville, Mississippi. And she spent time there She had spent time
00:53:55
there before the trial and she found a lot of supporters there. There were a lot of people who had her back among
00:54:00
those residents. That's good. She needed that. Years later, she married James Rawls. Um I could not figure out if
00:54:06
there was um a connection between the lawyer, Rawls. And the couple had They had seven children
00:54:12
They had seven children together. Julia never got over the loss of her son, Bruce, and talked about him often
00:54:18
until her death in 1940 at the age of 55. She was young. I mean, she had a lot of trauma in her life.
00:54:25
Yeah, well this is where it would have ended. Like this is where that would have been the end. Like wow, what a
00:54:30
story, what a tale. That's crazy. But in 1999 I'm sorry. Margaret Dunbar Cartwright
00:54:38
one of Bobby's granddaughters Bobby Dunbar's granddaughters Uh-huh. received a large scrapbook that had
00:54:45
hundreds of articles about the case. And so she started digging into the family history.
00:54:51
Margaret knew the story. She had had years of hearing it told by her parents and grandparents. She knew the story
00:54:56
well. Yeah. Um or she thought she did. Uh but she said when she started digging deeper into the case, it became clear to
00:55:02
her that the version of the story she'd heard her whole life might not have been
00:55:06
as accurate as she'd been led to believe. So Margaret said of Julia So Julia Anderson, "This woman was
00:55:14
telling truth. She did have a son. And my heart hurts for Julia at this point believing that this boy is her son. You
00:55:21
know, it's really awkward because Lessie and Julia are in the same position." Yeah. They're both missing children.
00:55:26
Mhm. Which is like This is his granddaughter? Like for her to come out and be like, "Yeah, like we should have
00:55:32
a space in our heart here for this woman as well." Margaret's research eventually
00:55:37
led her to Mississippi where she sat down with Julia's two remaining children, Hollis and Jewel.
00:55:44
This was in 2000. It turned out that Julia's family had also heard about the case their whole
00:55:49
lives, but a very different version of events. Um Jewel's daughter, uh Linda, told
00:55:55
Margaret, "We knew that we had an uncle that had been taken by the Dunbar family
00:55:59
in Opelousas, Louisiana. We always said kidnapped. We said they kidnapped him." Oh [ __ ]
00:56:05
Now from Jewel and Hollis, Margaret learned a lot about Julia and it painted a very different picture from the woman
00:56:12
she was known really She'd only known from like legend and like really bad disparaging newspaper articles.
00:56:19
Julia, according to her children and grandchildren, were was a wonderful mother and an incredibly resilient woman
00:56:26
who attended church every Sunday and contributed to her community whenever she could. Um It was clear to her
00:56:32
children that no matter how strong she appeared to be to everyone around her, which she appeared to be very strong,
00:56:37
Julia lived her entire life with a piece missing. Yeah, I know. said Jewel said she always talked about Bruce, but she
00:56:44
called him Bobby. She was always looking for him. Oh wow. Now everyone in the Rawls family knew
00:56:50
about Bruce and the Dunbars and they knew they lived only about 200 miles from one another. Which is not very far
00:56:56
at all. But they also knew the Dunbars were a prominent, somewhat wealthy family with
00:57:01
good social status. They didn't want to cause any trouble. Mhm. So Bruce would always just be a
00:57:06
memory to them. At least until Margaret Dunbar Cartwright began conducting her research. Margaret Cartwright spent more
00:57:16
than 4 years working on her genealogical project, sometimes working at basically
00:57:21
full-time on it. And she came away with a very intimate history not only of her own family, but of the Rawls and Walters
00:57:29
families as well. She went hard. The research gave her a brand new perspective on the old family legend
00:57:36
about her grandfather's disappearance and reappearance until one day it dawned on her that the story her family had
00:57:42
been telling her for decades could very likely be a lie. Mhm. So Margaret summarized her findings and brought the
00:57:50
findings to the rest of the Dunbar family, her family Okay. and suggested that they have a DNA test
00:57:55
done to put an end to this controversy once and for all. Yeah. And to her surprise, several members of the family
00:58:01
said no. Oh girl. Despite their objections, Margaret arranged with her cousin, Alonzo
00:58:08
Dunbar's son, so Okay. Bobby Dunbar's brother, Alonzo, his son. Yep. They arranged together to have a
00:58:15
comparative DNA test done out of res you know to see if there was genealogical DNA. To
00:58:21
be If it came up that there was genealogical DNA, then we got Bobby. Okay. Cuz we're testing his brother. So we're
00:58:28
seeing that. Now out of respect for the rest of the family, they agreed that they would only
00:58:33
open They were not going to open the results of this until everyone in the family was comfortable doing so. So they
00:58:39
were going to receive these They were going to do it but receive the results and then wait it out until everyone felt
00:58:44
like they wanted to know and then they would do it together. Okay. Unfortunately they never reached
00:58:50
that point. weeks later it was already done for them. So Margaret said, "I called to check
00:58:57
with the laboratory and the laboratory assistant ended up blurting to me the results over the phone." Girl. The DNA
00:59:04
did not match. So that was not That was not Bobby Dunbar. What was Bruce Anderson. What the [ __ ]
00:59:15
Likely Bruce Anderson. That's the story that you know, we don't have the DNA, but Holy [ __ ] Yeah.
00:59:22
I didn't remember the ending of this. lab technician had no idea the impact of what she was saying to me. It was a
00:59:28
shock to me, not really the conclusion, but to hear it." So she knew. She was like, "I have a
00:59:33
feeling this is not Bobby." But to hear it confirmed, wow. And several members of the family were
00:59:40
furious that Margaret had defied their wishes, but she felt she had a duty to inform everyone. Yeah, well, and she
00:59:47
didn't necessarily defy their wishes. No. She wanted to know. Yeah. She had every right to know.
00:59:51
Also, fate has a funny way of working things out. Yeah. Cuz the DNA results weren't just
00:59:56
confirmation of their grandfather's identity. Cuz now they're like, "Oh my god, I'm pretty sure that that's Bruce
01:00:02
Anderson." Right. Which would also mean like, "We're now related to Julia Anderson and
01:00:08
her family." Oh my god, yeah, you're like a whole different your cousins. Those are now like your kin,
01:00:15
essentially. Like you know, like that's yeah, yeah. Holy [ __ ] Oh my god. And it's like thinking of Bobby Dunbar,
01:00:21
like this kid who went through all this, like quote unquote Bobby Dunbar, Yeah. Going through all these
01:00:25
examinations, going through the back and forth, all that [ __ ] seeing his mother,
01:00:29
not knowing if it's her. Potentially living with the Dunbars, potentially being kidnapped, not having any idea
01:00:34
what he went through with Walters. And then to think of him, what really shocked me was to think of him as an
01:00:39
adult who got married, who had kids, who had grandkids. And they must have heard
01:00:45
Imagine hearing this story. You'd be like, "Grandpa, what?" And also like he must have known somewhere in his heart
01:00:52
You wonder if somewhere he was or wasn't. He knew. It's like he had to have somewhere, whether like whether
01:00:58
subconsciously or consciously, the body knows. But wow, you just feel for them because
01:01:04
it's like, wow, this is just so deeply traumatizing. But so this wasn't just, you know,
01:01:11
confirming their grandfather's identity, they were also, you know, vindicating Julia Anderson and William Walters, both
01:01:19
were called liars and accused of much worse for saying this is Bruce Anderson and not Bobby Dunbar.
01:01:24
And they were both dead by this point. And to think of like Julia seeing her child Yeah.
01:01:31
being able to have him. Oh. And then and then thinking of the Dunbars because I like Lessie and Percy
01:01:39
just wanting this to be their child Yeah. that they were missing. It's like, "Oh my god."
01:01:46
There's no win. And when you look up pictures, you can see why there was like a doubt. I'm not saying why like in in a
01:01:54
family it would be confusing, but I'm saying from like an outside perspective I can see the resemblance.
01:01:59
And Hollis Rawls, Julia Anderson's child, Yep. said, "We have no hard feelings against nobody of what has
01:02:07
happened because back in those days, I'm sure they thought they were doing the right thing. And if I had been back in
01:02:12
those days, I might have felt the same way in a way about things like that." Oh wow, they do look a lot alike.
01:02:17
Yeah. But if Bobby Dunbar was really Bruce Anderson, then what happened to Bobby Dunbar?
01:02:24
Yeah. We go all the way back to the beginning. Yep. And Margaret speculated, "I think
01:02:29
he fell off the Swayze Lake Bridge and was eaten by an alligator and died." That's the most likely scenario. And
01:02:35
honestly, the truth is, we will probably not ever know. And for I never like to say that, but we might never know. I
01:02:42
mean, how would we? What happened to Bobby Dunbar on August 23rd, 1912? That is a haunting tale. The end of that
01:02:52
story shook me to my [ __ ] core. just I'm looking at the two of them side by side and knowing that one of these
01:02:59
boys like lived his whole life thinking he was someone else. Yep. And the other was possibly eaten by
01:03:05
alligators. Yes. And they're just like That just sent a chill down my [ __ ] spine.
01:03:10
little boys. Like both of them are just such little cuties. They are. Oh god, and just to think that
01:03:17
Julia died not ever having that piece of her put back together. Like not hearing like, "This is You were right."
01:03:27
Yeah. I mean, you hope wherever wherever she's hanging out that she got to see it. Wow. What a tale. Or maybe whatever
01:03:35
you believe in, maybe they're reunited somewhere. Yeah, maybe. I love that. I don't know.
01:03:39
I like that. Yeah. In another life. In another life, in another timeline, in other realms That's what I believe. I
01:03:45
feel like there's so many other lives another realm going on. I don't know what it's all about, but I'm sure it's
01:03:50
there somewhere. I hope I don't have IBS in that realm. Woah. I hope so, too. I'm just saying. I'm just feeling I'm
01:03:55
just putting out my wishes now. Just saying. Just letting you know what I hope's
01:03:59
going to happen in the other realm. What do you hope? I mean, I hope I don't have
01:04:03
migraines in the other realm. I'd really love to get rid of I'd really love to get rid of those.
01:04:06
We'd like to get rid of our ailments in the other realm. That'd be pretty sick. All right. Yeah. So, that's that's a
01:04:12
wild tale. A thinker. It's an oldie, but it's a wild one. It is. I love an oldie. Yeah. All right.
01:04:19
Well, we hope you keep listening. And we hope you keep it wee. But not so weird as any of this.
01:04:26
And not so weird that you don't practice some self-love and point out the good things that happened to you this week,
01:04:30
man. We're a self-help podcast. Don't be all uncool. Don't. [Music] [Music] [Music]