The Digs of the Deal
When it comes to law and order, the legend of Judge Isaac Charles Parker — “The Hanging Judge” — put Fort Smith on the map. Parker’s quest for justice was greatly aided by Prosecutor William Henry Harrison Clayton, who was just as determined to end the lawlessness that pervaded the western Arkansas frontier in the late 1800s.
Clayton’s home, located downtown on North Sixth Street and known today as the Clayton House, served as a Union hospital during the Civil War, then as a boarding house, and today, it’s a museum. But many of the historians at the Clayton House are adamant that some of the home’s residents never left.
* * *
The Clayton House was built by a Mr. Sutton, whose first name has been lost to history, in 1852. Sutton abandoned the home during the Civil War and fled to Texas, while the house was seized by Union troops. For the duration of the war, the house served as a Union hospital and was witness to many amputations, gruesome injuries and violent deaths.
By the late 1970s, the Clayton House had fallen into disrepair.
After the Civil War, lawlessness and corruption ran rampant across western Arkansas, as outlaw bands and crooks laid claim to anything that they could touch. President Ulysses S. Grant was determined to clean up the city and started by appointing William Henry Harrison Clayton to the district attorney position for the Western District of Arkansas in 1874. Grant then nominated Parker as Arkansas’ Western District Judge in 1875.
Clayton, born in Pennsylvania, was a Union soldier who settled in Arkansas after the war before receiving his prestigious appointment. His focus was enriching education in the region, and he opened several public schools before becoming a lawyer.
After the appointment, Clayton purchased what is now known as the Clayton House, and renovated it. This renovation consisted of doubling the size of the house and converting it into the Victorian Gothic Italianate style. Clayton, his wife and seven children lived in the home from 1882 to 1897, and hosted many prominent guests in the district.
Clayton and Parker, meanwhile, shared the same goals for the district and set to work. Mila Masur, executive director of the Clayton House, said both men (and their wives) were very active in the community, and their impact on the region’s crime rate was great.
“Clayton and Judge Parker set about cleaning up corruption and lawlessness and tried around 10,000 cases,” she said. “Clayton’s record for murder convictions is a record that still stands today.”
Out of those 10,000 cases, 160 people were hanged at the gallows in Fort Smith.
Clayton served two terms as a prosecutor and worked alongside Parker for 14 years. His family was very influential in Arkansas politics and as a result, the Clayton House hosted many important political and social events. Clayton’s brother, Powell Clayton, served as the ninth governor of Arkansas, while his twin brother, John K. Clayton, was a U.S. senator from the state. John K. Clayton would go on to be mysteriously assassinated after losing an election.
Masur said once the Clayton family moved out of the home in 1897, the building served as a boarding house until the 1960s.
“Plenty of people would have been born here and died here, between all of the functions that this house has had,” Masur said.
An 1897 photo of the Clayton family in the front yard of the house.
In the late 1970s, Fort Smith scheduled the house for demolition. But a group of concerned citizens “literally blocked the wrecking ball,” according to Masur, and saved the property. The Clayton House was soon restored to its former glory and has been operating as a museum since 1977.
But with such a tumultuous history, the Clayton House has provided visitors with its share of eerie experiences.
Some see a ghostly figure in this photo of a side window on the first floor of the house.
“We have at least three resident ghosts here in the house: a cat, a tall man in boots and a woman in a brown dress,” Masur said. “William’s older brother, Powell, played a strategic role in getting the Crescent Hotel [in Eureka Springs] opened, and that hotel is also haunted. One of the ghosts that haunt the Crescent Hotel is also a cat.
“The woman in the brown dress is believed to be Florence, Clayton’s wife. We had a paranormal investigation crew come through, and they concluded that the tall man was Powell Clayton, but that seems unlikely.”
Masur explained that the tall man is often described as being angry, but Masur believes that’s a misconception.
“If it is Powell, we know that he was a big man and had a heavy footfall. People call him the angry man, but I don’t think he is.”
Masur said she and others have tried to debunk some of the other paranormal phenomena alleged to have taken place inside the Clayton House.
“We had a movie crew here one evening filming a local movie. I was helping the sound guy look for ways to film upstairs. The large door upstairs slammed shut 180 degrees. When it’s open, it rests against the wall behind it due to gravity. We tried to recreate [the slam] and couldn’t do it. After 4 p.m., there’s rarely anybody in the house. Whoever was lurking there was unhappy that we had visitors after hours,” Masur guessed. “We also have porcelain dolls in locked display cases that tend to move and turn towards each other. Another lady who works here has heard the cat and felt it rub against her legs. The cat plays with the curtains and moves them around, as there are no air vents there.”
* * *
Portraits hang in the parlor of William Henry Harrison Clayton and his wife, Florence.
It’s apparent that several legendary figures in history were responsible for Fort Smith’s conversion from a town of lawlessness into the city that it is today. Even more apparent is the importance of the role that the Clayton House has played in the shaping of Fort Smith for residents in this life, and possibly even the next.
