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Julian T. fierce, a iaiinbee Indian in racially troubled
Kobest>n County, was shot and killed in his home early
Saturday.
A relative found Pierce in the kitchen of his home about 7:30
a.m., Kobert B. Morgan, director of the State Bureau of
Investigation, said.
Pierre was an Indian activist running against District
Attorney Joe Freeman Britt tor judgeship. Pierce was a
symbol U? many Indian residents who are opposing corruption
in the county's criminal justice system.
Pierre's cousin,* Charles loeklear, 38, of Scotland County
said he arrived at Pierce's home around 7:30 a.m. Saturday to
have coffee with him before other political campaign workers
were scheduled to arrive after 8 a.m.
loeklear said that when he entered the rear garage he saw
glass panes broken in the door leading to the kitchen and
wondered if Pierre had forgotten his key when he arrived
home the night before and had to break into his house.
Pierce apparently arrived home after 12 a.m. Saturday
following a visit Friday night to the Oak Ridge Club in
Lumberlon where he visited people and discussed his
campaign, according to Bobby Thompson, a campaign worker
from the Prospect community.
A neighbor of Pierce's reported hearing a popping sound
between about 12:30 a.m. and 1 a.m. Satuday and gut out of
bed to check her house but found nothing, saw nothing and
returned to bed. Thompson said.
Pierce's campaign workers had received a warning from
someone in another county that a threat against Pierce
existed, particularly if he appeared to be leading in the race
against Brill for the judgeship, said Thompson. Neither Pierce
nor his aides took the threat seriously, hut rather as a nuisance
Thompson said.
Campaign supporters who stopped by the Pierce home on
NC 71, a rural mad near the Wakulla Community, said the
recent approval of a joint county school district was a sign that
Indian, Black and white people were coming together to
provide a belter education for their children and that Pierce
was also working for such a goal.
Friends and relatives described Pierce as caring, concerned,
intelligent, a workaholic.
On Sunday, Pierce's sister, Dale Chavis, stood with a small
group behind the bright yellow and orange tape marking off
the crime scene. Fighting to hold bark tears, she recalled the
last time she'd seen her brother alive.
"I talked with him last Sunday," she said. "He came by and
ate dinner and watched the ball game."
Mrs. Chavis said her parents, now deceased, were poor and
had little education. TTteir fmaily of 11 grew up on a farm in
Hoke County, where Pierre graduated as Valedictorian from
an all Indian Hawkeye High School.
Pierce was the first in his family to go to college. Dr. James
B. Chavis. a Pembroke State University administrator, said
he recruited Pierce to attend PSU.
Chavis said Pierce was genuinely concerned about
improving the quality of life, not just for Indians but for all
people.
Pierce graduated from ftiU with a degree in Chemistry in
1966 and for the next seven years worked as a chemist at
Shipyards in Newport News and Norfolk, Va. at the same time
getting in a year of graduate study at Old Dominion
University. In 1973, he enrolled in law school at N.C. Central
University and graduated at the top 5 percent of his class in
1976. For the next two years, while working as an attorney
with Securities and Exchange Commission in Washington, he
earned a master's degree in tax law from Georgetown
University.
In 1978, Pierce became executive director of Lsimbee River
Legal Sendees, a position he held until January, when he
resigned to campaign for the Superior Court Judgeship.
"He didn't care a whole lot for material things, and he
didn't belive in racism," Pierce's sister, Mrs. Chavis, said,
"He wanted Indians to be the best they could be."
Lew enforcement authorities from the State Bureau of '
Investigation, Federal Bureau of investigation and local
; agencies, aided by local informants on Itosday announced
that a Pembroke man had been charged with first-degree
murder in the shooting death of Pierce and another allegedly
the triggerman. was found Tuesday morning, an apparent
suicide rUa, according to Sheriff Hubert Stone
Stone said John Anderson "Johnny" Goina, 24. of Routt 1
Pembroke shot himself with a shotgun at the borne of his
father, Ernest Goins.
Arrested and charged with first degree murder was Sandy
Gordon Chavis, 21, of Route I. Pembroke. Chavis is being
held without bond in the county jail.
Stone said Goins had been dating Shannon Bullard, the
16-year old daughter of Pierce's girlfriend, Ruth Locklear.
"ITiey had been going together more than a year and broke up
about two months ago." Stone said.
Stone said Ms. locklear had taken out two trespassing
warrants against Goins and Goins thought Pierce had
something to do with it.
"According to our information, ("tins was a trigger-man,"
Stone said. "We have a signed confession from Chavis."
Pierce is survived by his three children: two sons, Avery
Wayne and Julian Thomas Pierre. Jr.; one daughter, Julia
Ann Pierce of Claremont, Va.- five brothers: Phil Pierce of
Aberdeen, Ezra Pierce of Iaimber Bridge, John Pierce of
Tucson, Arizona, Ray Pierce of Wichita. Kansas and Iannis
Pierce of Chicago. Dl; five sisters: Josephine Parks of Raeford,
Delia Pierce and Peggy Lowery of Aberdeen, Connie
Oxendine of Pembroke and Dale Chavis of Red Springs.
Pierce was eulogized at 1 p.m. Wednesday at the
Performing Arts Center on the PSU campus.
A 3:30 p.m. funeral service was held on Wednesday in
Sycamore Hill Holiness Church in Aberdeen. Burial followed
in the Church of God Cemetery, Aberdeen.
A T ribute To
JOHN LANKRORD.GODWIN
By Barbara Brayboy-Locklear
"I think of nil purple as being first class citizenI until they
prone otheruise. I don't like to think of people as being
members of the u-hite rare, or black race, or Indian race.
We're all members of the human race, and if we can't accept
that fact, then we're not progressing; we're regressing."
John lankford God urn
The sanctuary in First Baptist Church in Pembroke was
packed last Saturday afternoon as hundreds came to say
farewell to John lankford Godwin. The Lumbee Indian died on
Tuesday from injuries received in an automobile accident on
March 10.
In a eulogy, Rev. Mac legerton said Godwin was a leader
who obtained leadership not because of some job or
appointment or some worldly system identifying him a leader
of his people...That he was a leader who came up from the
grassroots; that over lime, became accepted and respected as
a leader of his people who were first unwilling to recognize
him.
In 1947, Godwin, struggling to support a growing family on
a small farm outside Pembroke, heard of a belter future for
him and his family in Virginia. He had become tired of
spending half his lime wishing for things he could have if he
didn't spend half his time wishing.
He moved his family to a farm outside Richmond and toiled
the soil for two years before he moved to Pennsylvania. The
1949 (arm season had not been a good one for the young man
who had grown up working in the fields of his native Rb to get Godwin
off his back.
The Lumbee Indian worked hard to become the best
tow-loader operator in the plant. His attitude became such
that if he worked hard enough, the people around him would
stand aside to let him pass because he knew where he was
going-up. And he did. He aimed for a top p??sition and was
awarded accordingly with the title of assistant chemical
engineer. He was later to become teacher in two of the
corporation plants. His job was to teach college graduates the
chemical process used by the plants.
Godwin never was named top chemical engineer in the plant
where he worked because he lacked a college degree. He had
graduated from the Indian Normal School in Pembroke, and
had gone on to study music for six months before meeting his
wife.
"He used to say he could have been another Frank Sinatra
or Ring Ciusby if he had not met Mama, fell in love and
married her." says his son. Tony.
In 1968, Godwin began to think of returning to his beloved
Robeson County to retire. He had. over the years, kept in
touch with family and friends through visits and telephone
calls. He longed to be home among his people. In 1970, he sold
the house he bought in 1955 and moved U> another in
the Whispering Pines area outside Pembroke.
Few expected the energetic Godwin to resL Many knew he
wouldn't. He didn'L He took a job in a failing hardware
section of a business in Pembroke and made it money. When
the senior business owner died, and a relative took over
management, a management meeting was called. When the
ftoov Ms -pini~f to ?KwUiiwsot bow the hanlncet mWI
best be operated, Godwin spoke up.
"And that was the first time my father's mouth got him in
trouble," Tony Godwin says.
Not one to sit still long, Godwin signed on as a quality
control employee at Croft Metal in Iajmher Bridge. He left the
job for another which lent itself to m??rp personal contact with
people.
"Dad always tried to meet people. He loved to discuss
politics, and he was most happy in a setting where he could
meet people coming in off the street to discuss ideas, views
and social issues which affected them," Godwin says. He says
his father's convictions and principles were as unbending as
an oak tree. He adds that his father was a perfectionist and
saw things in black and while right and wrong. He'd tell his
father that one had to sometimes bend like a weeping willow.
Hie comment was unheard. For Godwin was a mighty oak who
was merely yesterday's little nut that managed to hold its
ground. Godwin believed an aim in life was the only fortune
worth finding.
He listened to and observed the social injustices of Indians,
blacks and low income whites in Robeson County which
quietly fed his aim to help fight for change in a system
nurtured on corruption. ?? - I
And when in 1986, a Lumbee Indian was shot and killed by &
sheriffs deputy, who never received criminal charges,
Godwin founded Concerned Citizens for Better Government, a
tri facial coalition formed in December 1986. He served as
chairman of the group until December 1987. Godwin said the
organization was founded to dispel the belief that: "It's
always been like that. There's something you can do about an>
situation."
Godwin wanted people to understand that just because it's
well-beaten mad is no sign it is the right one, and that the n?i.
ot injustice had been traveled loo long by Indian, blacks an<
poor whites in Robeson County.
And just when Godwin thought he could get some rest, hi
phone would start ringing something else was happening anc
he knew it was lime to move on in listening to the cries .
Robeson's oppressed.
He suppressed his dispair well, for he fully understoo<.
there were two things on the side of the people: "Time" and
"Truth." And in the words of Rev. Legerton last Saturday,
" He knew every child in Robeson County would have an e^nal
education...In due time he knew every black. Indian and low
income white would have respect in the workplace, a decern
job 'and would have a decent house to live in."
/ Godwin also knew when one is being kicked from the rear, i
may mean that one is up front. He. too, knew that actio:
makes more fortunes than caution. His action was not withou
scorn even among his people. He became a successful mar
who laid a firm foundation with the bricks that others threw at
him.
A man at great wisdom, Godwin clearly saw the trouble with
being a loader is that one can't be sure whether the people are
following or chasing one.
Of Godwin, his pastor. Rev. Charles Locidear said, "He wt>
a man of strong convictions with the courage to stand op fo
what he believed in, even if rebuked or Seamed by people ir
his community."
"Godwin returned from the North to (See that we
not consistent with his own principles and codvk %a on what
waa right and wrong. A purpose was bar* in Ms hedrt And the
purpose was so fixed and so sound that to simply accept the
system and encourage It waa, to him. aa impossibility."
wSgyjsi:srrf a Rs.tft.ts
WHATEVER HAPPENED TO...
Lonnie Gaston Revels
Lormie Reikis u< become a full time homemaker
and mother. The family soon outgrew the house and moved a
half mile west There Revels, a widower, lives today.
After the move, the couple worked the earth hard to scratch
out a living for their five daughters and one son. After two
years of "third" fanning where the landowner received two
loads of corn and the tenant got one. Revels decided he
couldn't see it that way. And he bought his first mule and
wagon and started farming on "havles."
An opportunity arose for Revels to purchase his own farm. A
deal was struck with a local lender. "When I was trying to pay
for my farm, Td rise early and lake my mule and drag across
the swamp to the fields," he says. Arriving before daybreak,
he'd wait until he could see to begin plowing his mule. Later
on in the morning he could see his wife with a child by one
hand and a food sack in another, walking the mile to bring a
breakfast to the young farm husband. He says he would sit
himself on the pbw and eat with dirty hands. "And it didn't
kill me to do it."
He says he was a good farmer. "If I hadn't been, I couldn't
have paid for the farm and educated my children." He says he
worked hard to send his children to school, often selling
livestock to afford hooks and tuition. "I didn't want them to
have to do like their daddy in not getting a formal education."
Retirement for Revels came about ten years ago after a
horse-riding accident He has since fully recovered from
injuries received in a fall fn>m a horse he has since sold. A
six-weeks stay in hospitals convinced him to hang up the
stirrups for good.
Today he rents out the 80-acres of the 2 farms he owns. His
wife of 52 years died in 1980. A daughter, too, is deceased.
He still rises around 6 a.m. with a good appetite which he
usually appeases with his own homecooked breakfast
Other meals are usually taken at nearby restaurants or in
private homes.
He spends hours just pitting around his home on Union
Chapel Road outside Pembroke. Much time and care are given
to a vineyard he established years ago in an area on the
property where his house is situated.
He can still use a shovel and rake. He can swing a bushaxe in
a fashion that puts younger men to shame.
He loves people and enjoys visits from his children and
grandchildren. His only son is the family politician. "One
politician in the family is enough, especially if he can talk as
much as my boy," Revels laughs. "I never was a politician. I
just sit back and listen to him talk."
The great-grandfather is a loyal and longtime member of
First Baptist Church in FVmbroke. There he has served as a
? -trustee for more than 40 ybars and has served as treasurer of
the building fund.
He attributes his good health and long life to a long practice
of serving God. He's been a Christian for more than four
decades. Revels says treating his fellowinan right and paying
i his "Just and honest" debts have allowed him a peaceful life, ff
He has plowed well, the rows of his life. He has produced a
yield, if measured, would equal bushels and bushels-hill of
deserved praike.
JOHN L. GODWIN
MEMORIAL FUND
ESTABLISHED
juSkKfy I*.- i . ? Jl*! Vfci.L-.' lu. I l, u* ? i ? .. .x L;
JS^WtgK
Church of Pembroke has
established a John L Godwin
Memorial FVindle bt used for
the purchase of a piano as a
tribute to hia many yuan of
- ^ - - --- ?
music ministry tftroOnhd.i
'* wsewewv*/ M" "?????
the community and ?ut?.
Contributions may be mailed
to P.O. Bo* 780. Rm broke,
NC 88871 Mom iafontiation
may bo obtained by eaBint
881-4881