Lonnie Williams

 By Steve A. Maze
     Arab, Alabama

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    Elonzo Huble Williams was born December 22, 1891, in Macedonia, Ala. “Lonnie,” as he was known, was the youngest of 11 children born to Irvin and Ann Autrey Williams.
  In 1916, Lonnie married Jessie Lilybelle “Lilly” Skipper from Butler County, Ala.  The following year he enlisted in the U.S. Army and served in France during World War I. According to Harry Rockwell’s book, “Beneath The Applause”, Lonnie got into a fight with another GI over a French girl. The soldier then struck Lonnie across the side of his face with a wine bottle after a short argument. The blow knocked Lonnie to the ground and his attacker kicked him before he could get to his feet. Lonnie was briefly rendered unconscious and spent about a week in the base hospital. With seemingly no ill effects from the attack, he was returned to duty and honorably discharged from military service in 1919.
  Unfortunately, the injury would come back to haunt him years later.
 

Starting a family

  Somewhere around 1920 or ’21, Lonnie and Lilly’s first son, Earnest Huble Williams, was born with a digestive problem. The couple could not find any type milk that would agree with their infant son, and he died.
  Their second child, Irene, was born on August 8, 1922.
  Thirteen months later, on September 17, 1923, the couple was blessed with the birth of their third child, a son that they named Hiram. Lonnie always referred to his son as Hiram or “that boy”, but country music fans across the world would come to know his as Hank.
 

Health problems and rumors of death

  Around 1930 the injury that Lonnie had suffered in France began to bother him, and he started to experience a lot of pain to his face and jaw. Paralysis eventually set in, and Lonnie became unable to speak. He could not blink his eyes, nor could he move the muscles in his expressionless face. Lonnie Williams remained in that condition for five or six years.
  Some people claimed that Lonnie’s health problems were as a result of being shell-shocked during WWI, but that obviously was not the case.
  Lonnie entered the VA Hospital in Alexandria, La., and would remain there for seven years. It was around that period of time that rumors began circulating that he had died.
  The “illness” from which he was suffering turned out to be a brain aneurysm, but Lonnie did not waste his time lying around in the hospital bed. Even though he had only one or two years of formal schooling, he spent much of his time reading and eventually became self-educated.
  Although Lonnie’s family was being supported by his monthly disability pensions, Lilly didn’t visit him very often, and Hank and Irene rarely saw their dad. During that period of time Lilly took the children, as well as the couple’s household belongings, and moved to Georgiana. They later relocated to Greenville, and then Montgomery.
  One day Lonnie was sitting in his hospital bed when something “exploded” in his head. He described it as “sounding like a gun went off.” Blood suddenly started pouring from his ears, nose and mouth. The aneurysm had ruptured, but instead of killing him, he made a remarkable recovery. The paralysis completely disappeared from his face, and he was once again able to speak.
  Naturally, Lonnie was ready to go home after his recovery. Doctors, however, thought the illness must have somehow affected his mind upon hearing that their patient wanted to be discharged. Unbeknownst to Lonnie, the only family members listed on his record when admitted to the hospital was Lilly and the couple’s two children.
  Letters he had written to his brothers and sisters were never mailed because hospital officials thought the siblings were only a figment of their patient’s imagination. Lonnie wondered why he had not heard from his siblings and confided his dilemma to another patient in the hospital. The patient got his family to mail a letter Lonnie had written to his sister, Bertha Garrett. She immediately recognized Lonnie’s handwriting on the envelope when pulling it from her mailbox.
  “I am able to get out, but for some reason I can’t,” Lonnie stated in the letter. Bertha was stunned when she read the news. She and her other siblings had been told that Lonnie had died seven years earlier, and was buried in Louisiana.
  Bertha got a neighbor to drive her to Greenville where she showed the letter to her brother, Mack. He immediately caught a train to Louisiana but the hospital required him to produce legal documents proving that the patient was his brother before Lonnie could be released.

 

A new family

  Lonnie was under the impression that he could resume life with Lilly and their two children in Montgomery upon his discharge from the hospital. Lilly had other thoughts when he showed up on her doorstep, however, and pitched his clothes out. The most indelible image left on Lonnie’s mind was not the thought of his marriage breaking up, but how much Hank and Irene had grown. He still pictured them as being six years younger and looking the same as he remembered them before entering the hospital.
  Lonnie then moved to McWilliams (30 miles west of Greenville) and “batched it” for a while. In September of 1942, he ended his bachelor days when he married Ola Till. Their only child, Leila, was born on June 19, 1943.
  From the time Lonnie moved back to McWilliams, Hank would hitchhike or catch a bus to spend weekends with his father, and saw him on a fairly regular basis. In fact, Hank and his band members would sometimes stop at Lonnie and Ola’s home when they were performing nearby. Hank and his first wife, Audrey, also went to see Lonnie after they were married.
 

Imitators and rumors

  Even at the height of Hank’s popularity, most people were under the impression that the famous singer’s father had died years earlier. That point was made clear to Lonnie one day when he stopped at a Montgomery café on his way to a doctor’s office to have his hand treated for blood poisoning.
  As Lonnie was eating he overheard a young man around 18 years old telling a waitress that he was Hank Williams’ brother. Lonnie moved closer and asked if he was Hiram’s half-brother or a full brother. The boy answered that he was his full brother.  “What ever became of your father?” Lonnie asked.
  The young imitator responded that his father died in a veteran’s hospital somewhere out west. He further explained that he was real young when his father entered the medical center and because his father never returned home, he could no longer remember him.
  “I’m glad to know you,” Lonnie replied while extending his hand. “You are a boy that I didn’t know I had, and it would be a good idea if you would spin your yarns somewhere other than in my presence, because I am Hank Williams’ father.”
  About that time one of Lonnie’s friends who happened to be a former band member of Hank’s, entered the café. The waitress knew the man had been associated with Hank at one time and asked if Lonnie really was who he claimed to be.
  “Well, I’ve eaten a good many meals in this man’s home while traveling with Hank’s band, and he always calls him Daddy,” the man answered.
  The young man who had been boasting to the waitress turned and walked out.
  When asked years later why he had been long reported as dead, Lonnie replied, “I don’t know for sure. The boy’s mother and I didn’t get along too well.”

 

Father and son

  Hank’s fame and earnings grew, but Lonnie always refused to take money from his son. He did not want to give the impression that he might be taking advantage of Hank, as so many others had. A good example of that was when Lonnie wanted to buy his neighbor’s property.
  The Hicks’ place joined Lonnie’s property and Lonnie told Hank that he would buy the place if he could afford it. Hank asked how much it would take and Lonnie replied, “Probably five or six hundred dollars.” Hank reached into his pocket for the money, but Lonnie refused to take it.
 

Two memorable Christmases

  Lonnie’s daughter, Irene, still lived with Lilly and didn’t have much contact with her father.
  “After Daddy remarried, Irene felt she would be interfering in his life if she visited,” says Leila Griffin, Hank Williams’ half-sister. “Later, Irene’s husband was in the Navy and she traveled around a lot. There were six or seven years that Daddy did not hear from her.
  “Around 1963, I decided to send Irene a Christmas card to her last known address. I didn’t even know if she would get the card, but I put a note inside. It said, ‘If you get this card please let Daddy hear from you. He doesn’t know if you are alive.’ On Christmas Eve, Irene called and had a long conversation with Daddy. He was glad to hear from her and they became much closer after that."
  Even though the Christmas season of 1963 would bring much joy to Lonnie, his most vivid Christmas memory may have come in 1952.
  “We were visiting with mother’s first cousin,” Griffin says. “When we were driving back home a neighbor stopped us and said that Hank had been by the house but had already left. We didn’t have a phone at the time and didn’t know he was coming to see us. Daddy looked for Hank at the homes of several relatives, but he had already left everywhere we went.
  “When we got home we found some Christmas gifts Hank and Billie Jean Jones (Hank’s second wife) had left us on the porch. There was a box of Hollingsworth candy for me and mother, and a cigarette lighter with daddy’s name engraved on it for him.”  Along with the gifts, the two visitors had left a note wishing the family ‘A Merry Christmas’ and ‘A Happy New Year.’ But it was to be a new year that Hank himself would never see.

 

New year brings heartbreak

  On January 1, 1953, a neighbor brought Lonnie’s family the devastating news that he had heard over his radio. Hank Williams had died in his car in route to a performance.
  “Daddy didn’t want to believe it at first,” Griffin recalls. “Later on when we found out that it was true, Daddy took it hard. It really hurt him that he didn’t get to see Hank that Christmas before he died.”
  Lilly went to claim Hank’s body in Oak Hill, West Virginia. While providing information for her son’s death certificate in Oak Hill, she listed Hank’s father as “deceased.” Lilly then brought Hank’s body back to her Montgomery home.
  A niece drove Lonnie to Montgomery the night before the funeral where he spent the night at his ex-wife’s house and kept vigil over his son’s body. That didn’t keep the family’s unfavorable relationship with Lonnie from being exhibited during the funeral services. Lonnie wasn’t given a very cordial greeting at the church or cemetery, nor was he asked to join the immediate family at either site.
  Even though the funeral was besieged with media from all over the country, it is doubtful that anyone besides close family members knew who Lonnie Williams was.

 

A letter to the editor

  Around the mid-1950’s, Lonnie wrote a letter to the editor of the Wilcox Progressive Era in an attempt to end the rumors of his premature death, as well as to prove that he was the father of Hank Williams.

 

Editor, Wilcox Progressive Era

 Dear Sir,
  Due to inquiries I have received from some parts of the country asking if I am the real father of Hank Williams, and telling me they have heard that his real father is dead, I am writing this letter.
  I am the real father of Hiram Williams, who was known for radio purposes as Hank Williams. When he was born, on September 17, 1923, in Butler County, Alabama, in what is known as the Mt. Olive West neighborhood, I chose his name from the Scripture, I Kings, 7^th Chapter, 13^th verse.
  The enclosed picture shows me standing at the boy’s grave in Montgomery, with my little daughter. Hank or Hiram as I have always called him, visited me at my home on Christmas Day, just a week before his death. I have visited him at Nashville, and went with him to Louisville, Ky. I was with him at the Coliseum in Montgomery when he was there, and he called me to come out before the crowd and introduced me as his father.
  I was born in Macedonia in Lowndes County. I was a railroad engineer for a number of years. During World War 1, I served with the 113^th Regiment of Engineers, Headquarters Detachment in France. I trained at Camp Shelby, Mississippi, and was discharged at Camp Gordon, Georgia. Wilcox County has been my home since 1903.
  At the time of my boy’s birth, I was farming strawberries in Butler County, and due to a late freeze, lost what I had, and went back to railroad work to support my family. After working with Ray Lumber Co. at Atmore, I went to work for W.T. Smith Lumber Co., at Chapman. I bought a home a mile and a half from Georgiana and we lived there for two years. Working in logging camps, I was transferred from Chapman to the Ruthven job and then bought a home at McWilliams here in 1927, moving my family here, and continuing with the Ruthven job until the summer of 1929.
  My health got worse due to service in the war. I was not able to handle the heavy engine that I had, so I went to Bolling and got a lighter job with the Ralph Lumber Co. My health failing, I had to go to the Veterans Hospital. I went to the naval hospital in Pensacola for a short time, then to the Veterans Hospital at Alexandria, La; where I stayed seven years, till January 1937. I was at Gulfport, Mississippi until August 1938, out until October, when I went back. I spent Christmas with the children, then went back and stayed until April 1939, when I was discharged from the hospital.
  During my hospital period it was reported in some parts that I had died. On seeing some of my old acquaintances afterward, they looked at me as if seeing a ghost since they had heard this report.
  Of course being gone so long I had no home to go to, so I came back here and batched three years, then married again. The little girl with me in the picture is my child by my second marriage.
  There is a true story that can be told of my life, and connected to my boy’s life from his birth to his death. If the world wants this story, it can be gotten.
 I am, sincerely yours, Elonzo H. Williams
Box 15
McWilliams, Ala.

 

Life after Hank

  Lonnie continued to live in McWilliams until the end of his life. He repaired roofs, dug wells, and did odd jobs for the widow women around the community. He and Ola even ran a country store for a while.  Lonnie Williams had outlived his famous son by nearly 18 years when he “officially” passed away on October 22, 1970. Sadly, many people never got to know the man that Hank Williams called Daddy.