On February 3, 1972, on a cold, snowy night in Boone, North Carolina, the Durham family, who owned a nearby automotive dealership named Modern Buick, was murdered. The cause surrounding their mysterious slayings would haunt Western North Carolina for nearly fifty years.
Weather conditions on that night were treacherous, with four inches of snow caked on the ground and wind gusts up to 40 mph. Certainly, not a night that people had to worry about someone knocking on a door, or better yet, even being on the roads.
The Durhams moved from Mount Airy in 1969. Bryce was the patriarch of the family; his wife, Virginia, and son, who was in his first year at Appalachian State, lived up a steep drive that led to their brick home on 187 Clyde Townsend Road, just off the 105 Bypass.
Sometime during the night, someone broke into the home and drowned the family in a nearby bathtub. The case would remain cold for the next fifty years, until a break in the case came from Georgia.
The Durhams were reportedly found deceased by family members who were escorted to the property by a neighbor who was a private detective, since their car wouldn’t start. The house had been ransacked, the telephone cord ripped from the wall, and the television was still on.
The sound of the television was muffled by the steady noise of water. In the bathroom, the bodies of the Durhams were discovered with their heads dangling in an overflowing bathtub.
“Investigators were told a green and white SUV was seen leaving the Durhams’ house just after 10:30 p.m., The Watauga Democrat reported. The N.C. Highway Patrol found it several hours later on the side of the road a few miles away with its “lights on, windshield wipers slapping, doors closed, motor still running,” according to the Winston-Salem Journal.”
The first significant break in the case came in 2019, when Shane Birt went to the White County Sheriff’s Office in Georgia to research a book about crimes in Georgia. The younger Birt had been close with his father, who was serving a prison sentence in Georgia. The elder Birt had reportedly told his son about killing a family of three in the North Carolina mountains during a snowstorm.
The White County Sheriff’s Office relayed the tip back to the Watauga County Sheriff’s Office. Interviews were soon conducted, and it was quickly discovered that four men committed the slayings. They were hired to perform a “hut” on the family.
The men responsible for the deaths were from the Georgia-based Dixie Mafia. Today, the only surviving member is Billy Wayne Davis, who is already serving a life sentence for murder at the Augusta State Medical Prison in Georgia. He has been incarcerated there since 1986.
Written By: John G. Clark Jr.