#famoustrees

Walking through Mobile, Alabama visitors can shop in some of the many specialty boutiques, visit historic homes and museums, or perhaps take part in some of the many festivals held in the city such as the Gulf Coast Chinese Lantern Festival or Mobile’s own Mardi Gras celebration being celebrated where it originated in 1703. Mobile has a lot of history, but on Bayou Street many visitors walk past a bizarre story hidden in plain sight.

In November 1833 Charles R. S. Boyington was adjusting to his new home. A printer by trade and poet by heart, the nineteen-year-old moved to Mobile from the northeast and was living in a boarding house while waiting to find his fortune in the cotton boom that brought him down south. Sharing a room with Boyington was Nathaniel Frost, and the two friends tried to fit into the high society of Mobile despite each of them fighting their own battles. Boyington was an uprooted gambler, and Frost was riddled with tuberculosis that he expected would eventually take his life.

Map of Mobile, Alabama circa 1838. Image is public domain via University of Alabama Department of Geography.

It was not unusual to see Boyington and Frost walking together so when the pair were seen near the Church Street Graveyard on the afternoon of May 10th 1834 there was no cause for suspicion. That changed when Boyington returned home alone. When asked where Frost was he allegedly became agitated saying he didn’t know and he couldn’t wait for him. He was in a hurry to get to the river and board a steamboat headed for Montgomery, Alabama but not before stopping at a store to buy a knife and two guns.

The scene found the next morning stunned the residents of Mobile. Nathaniel Frost was found brutally beaten, bloodied, and stabbed, his body found just outside the Church Street Graveyard with some reports stating his body was hanging from a tree. Amid all the questions swirling through the minds of Mobile there was one certainty, the last person to be seen with Nathaniel Frost was Charles Boyington and he was on a boat taking him far from the crime.

Horses raced out to stop the steamship and when officials found Boyington on board he had his hands full of playing cards. He was taken back to Mobile and imprisoned at the Conde Charlotte Jail to await his fate. The evidence against him was thin and Boyington was adamant that he was innocent, what proof was there other than they were seen together? He may have been sure a pardon was coming but one never came, and when it was revealed that Frost owed Boyington money it convinced the court that the gambler took his payment in the form of his terminally ill friend’s life.

When Boyington left the Conde Charlotte Jail on February 20th 1835 people lined the streets to watch his last walk to the gallows. He maintained his innocence and made a promise to the people of Mobile, that they would know the truth because after his burial an oak tree would grow above his grave as a sign of his innocence. He was buried in the potter’s field section of the same graveyard where he and Frost were last seen together.

Today along portions of Government Street lay the many dead of the Church Street Graveyard. Closed since 1898, at some point the walls of the graveyard were moved inward leaving some of the departed to now lay just outside the graveyard walls. According to records, one of them now at rest outside the walls is Charles R.S. Boyington, his grave only marked by the sixty-foot-tall oak tree that grew over his body as he promised. Arborists have determined the tree to be over 150 years old.

The Boyington Oak. Image via Wikimedia Commons Altairisfar, CC BY-SA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0

When Charles R.S. Boyington faced death he promised that an oak tree would grow from his grave to prove he was innocent. A tree did grow, and what the tree could not speak others did when years later two men revealed on their deathbeds that they were Nicholas Frost’s killers.

Today the oak tree, now referred to as The Boyington Oak, stands over the body of Charles Boyington and a nearby red sign tells his tale with an inscription reading:

“THE BOYINGTON OAK

IN 1835, CHARLES BOYINGTON

UNJUSTLY HANGED FOR FRIEND’S

MURDER. PREDICTED AN OAK

WOULD GROW FROM HIS HEART

TO PROVE HIS INNOCENCE.

ALABAMA FOLKLIFE ASSOCIATION

WILLIAM G. POMEROY FOUNDATION 2020”

The Boyington Oak historic marker. Image via William G. Pomeroy Foundation https://www.wgpfoundation.org/historic-markers/the-boyington-oak/

As is the case with many tragic tales, stories have grown and taken root just as firmly as the tree they focus on. According to some of the many visitor accounts involving The Boyington Oak people standing in the shade of its branches are hit with sudden cold spots, whispers and sobs can be heard, and a general feeling of sadness permeates the air under the 100-foot-long branches.

Whether affected by the sadness of the story or by the unresolved sadness of Charles Boyington, the tree stands today as a natural memorial to an innocent man accused of murder who promised that nature would speak his truth for him well after his voice was silenced.

Piece about the Boyington Oak printed in The Anniston Star, Anniston Alabama on February 20th 1935.

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Sources:

Andrews, Chris. “Haunted History of Mobile - the Boyington Oak.” Bienville Bites Food Tour, 2024, bienvillebitesfoodtour.com/blog/haunted-history-of-mobile-the-boyington-oak/.

Collins, Kimber. “The Science and the Story of the Boyington Oak.” WKRG News 5, 29 Oct. 2019, www.wkrg.com/haunted-history/the-science-and-the-story-of-the-boyington-oak/.

Kleen, Michael. “Church Street Graveyard’s Boyington Oak.” M.A. Kleen, 5 Apr. 2017, michaelkleen.com/2017/04/05/church-street-graveyards-boyington-oak/.