LA LA - Belle Chasse, WhtMale 16-17, UP88342, hanged, suicide note, Feb'75

[Tony1902]

@cenazoic

If I could I’d look at arpent maps from the 60s-80s to get a better idea. I wish the couple who found him had been interviewed.

 

[Sweetluv]

Wait, the couple was never interviewed!?

 

[Tony1902]

If they were it never made it to he local papers. Just the discussion of the TOD but no other indication of who they were. Apparently they contacted LE and gave their information. If it was an actual interview it would be in the Plaquemines Parish sheriff office

 

[Teche]

I read that Wikipedia article and something is amiss. There is no dictionary of the Atakapa language, either in the Smithsonian or the Library of Congress.
They never ranged that far south. The Pacana inhabited the lower potion of the East Bank, while outlying scouting bands of the Choctaw and the Tchoupitoulas (spelling varies there.) ranged mostly on the West Bank and some bands upriver from NOLA in the East Bank. Wildly inaccurate information.

The Atakapa were in St. Martin parish.

 

[cenazoic]

According to Wiki () the Atakapa lived on the Gulf but where largely extinct by the late 1700s, due to contact with the French/Old World diseases.

And interesting, @Teche - there was an early ‘Attakapas Parish’, with an early settlement which is now St Martinville.

Love Louisiana history, but know very little about Plaquemines. I’ve been tracking down (a very few) books about it, published after 1975.

Just in case one of them happens to mention BCJD, even in passing.

 

[Tony1902]

Unfortunately wiki is wrong. While the Atakapa died out as a major tribe, they merged with Cajuns, other tribes like their cousins the Karankawa, and African American communities. While there is no extant work regarding their language, the last surviving member intermarried with Cajuns and was a evangelical pastor. The field notes by the ethnographer who interviewed him are in the Smithsonian and the Library of Congress. MrT is part Atakapa and Chitimacha.

 

[cenazoic]

While there is no extant work regarding their language,

Not sure what you mean: A Dictionary of the Atakapa Language, by Ganschet, et al, published in 1932, and is downloadable via the link above (Smithsonian) or archive.org.

 

[Tony1902]

Not sure what you mean: A Dictionary of the Atakapa Language, by Ganschet, et al, published in 1932, and is downloadable via the link above (Smithsonian) or archive.org.

It’s not considered to be accurate by modern researchers.

 

[carbuff]

I'm sorry, I'm confused here. I'm not sure what the history of the Atakapa and their language has to do with our unfortunate young guy or the geography of the area?

 

[cenazoic]

Haha! It doesn’t, just a sidetrack.

 

[carbuff]

Haha! It doesn’t, just a sidetrack.

Oh okay, I can deal with that.

 

[Tony1902]

Sorry it did go OT. It might have been my fault when looking at the wiki for Plaquemines Parish & the writer erroneously stated Plaquemines came from the Atakapa language and it did not.

Apologies for the derail.

 

[carbuff]

Sorry it did go OT. It might have been my fault when looking at the wiki for Plaquemines Parish & the writer erroneously stated Plaquemines came from the Atakapa language and it did not.

Apologies for the derail.

No problem. It was good information I'm glad to know.

 

[Shampooedrug]

After some yearbook digging, I found CW's photo as the president of the Lexington chapter of the Future Farmers of America in 1973. He was class of 1973, so he would be 19 in 1974/75 as reported in the article. He isn't present in any of the yearbooks' individual class photos (1970-73), only this group picture (which I've cropped for privacy of his classmates).
View attachment 358960

He does bear a resemblance to the JD. However, he has blond hair.

 

[hanpap]

I do not believe Charles H. Wallace was ever reported missing. I found his parents obituaries and he was stated to proceed them in death. of course I could not find one for Charles himself. He may have been declared dead at some point between then and now..

 

[hanpap]

does anyone have any information about the boys home he ran away from?

 

[Curious_in_NC]

does anyone have any information about the boys home he ran away from?

The only mention of that I know of is from the article in the New Orleans States-Item Apr 2, 1975. It describes it alternately as a home for teenagers and later in the article as a halfway house. My hunch is that it was more of a halfway house, given his age. He had graduated from HS, had been presumably living in Memphis on his own, and was working at a drug company before then.

"Their son Charles, 19, had recently vanished without a trace from a Memphis home for teenagers with drug problems"

"On that February night when he disappeared, the Wallaces had a long phone call from him at the Memphis halfway house... He called to say he wanted to come home now. My husband said he thought it was too early and that Charlie wouldn't be able to make it at home this soon. I guess that made Charlie angry. That night he disappeared from the Memphis home."

 

[Teche]

According to Wiki () the Atakapa lived on the Gulf but where largely extinct by the late 1700s, due to contact with the French/Old World diseases.

And interesting, @Teche - there was an early ‘Attakapas Parish’, with an early settlement which is now St Martinville.

Love Louisiana history, but know very little about Plaquemines. I’ve been tracking down (a very few) books about it, published after 1975.

Just in case one of them happens to mention BCJD, even in passing.

St. Martin De Tours Catholic Church in St. Martinville is one of the oldest churches in Louisiana. There’s a statue of an Attakapas Native American in the front. St. Martinville was known as Le Petit Paris.

 

[Shampooedrug]

I do not believe Charles H. Wallace was ever reported missing. I found his parents obituaries and he was stated to proceed them in death. of course I could not find one for Charles himself. He may have been declared dead at some point between then and now..

Waaaaait….so is he …still alive or dead?

 

[carbuff]

Waaaaait….so is he …still alive or dead?

Probably one or the other, yeah.

...sorry to be flippant. Stress relief I guess. The polite answer is, we don't know.