Charlie Lawson had a lot of things to be grateful for during the holiday season of 1929.

Despite America just entering the throes of the Great Depression, the Lawsons had a good life.

Two years earlier, Charlie had bought a tobacco farm near Germanton, North Carolina.

He was a simple man with simple needs.

He was a husband, father, and tobacco farmer.

He worked hard, kept his family fed, made sure his debts were paid, and then kept a roof

over their head.

For Charlie Lawson, everything seemed right in the world, but as they say, looks can

often be deceiving.

Charlie knew that people in town were talking about him.

They envied his business, his farms, his fields.

They spoke about his family, his children, and his pretty wife.

He knew they were talking about him, because the voices told him so.

The voices.

At first they were just whispers, but soon the voices became so loud they couldn't be

ignored.

Charlie answered the voices quietly under his breath.

At first, his wife, Fanny, thought he was praying to himself for perhaps reciting

Bible verses while he worked the fields each day.

But then he started talking to himself at home too.

Something she thought was not right with her husband.

He'd had some nervous troubles for the past year, but things were stranger now.

...