Whorlie Well

The prisoner Worley lost was Tim Williamson, whom he was bringing from Castell to Mason to make bond on a cattle-theft charge. Twelve men with blackened faces stopped them and killed the unarmed Williamson. Scott Cooley, a former Ranger and Williamson's friend, gathered followers, among them John and Mose Beard, George Gladden and John Ringgold, and his retaliation killed at least a dozen men. Maj. John B. Jones came with Rangers but found some of his own men had served with Cooley. Cooley fled to Blanco County and died soon after, reportedly of brain fever.

What the plaque says

Whorlie Well Named for a victim in famous "Hoodoo War", provoked by cattle rustling in Mason County. John Whorlie (or Worley), a deputy sheriff, on May 13, 1875, lost a prisoner to a lynch mob on Aug. 10, 1875, Whorlie was killed and scalped while working on this well. His killer was identified as Scott Cooley, a friend of the lynched man. Masonic burial for Whorlie was conducted by the McCulloch Lodge No. 273, A. F. & A. M., of which he was a member. No one in Mason County was ever convicted for wrong doing in the "Hoodoo War", but after 1876 law, order, and peace were restored. (1971)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Fort Mason — 0.7 mi
  A reconstructed officers' quarters on Post Oak Hill above Mason, standing where the army's stone fort was taken apart by the town that grew up below it.
• Eckert James River Bat Cave Preserve — 14 mi
  A limestone cave on the James River where about four million Mexican free-tailed bats raise their young each summer, kept open to visitors by a family's gift.
• Enchanted Rock State Natural Area — 30 mi
  A dome of pink granite north of Fredericksburg that rises some 385 feet above Sandy Creek, creaks as it cools at night, and has drawn people for thousands of years.

More markers nearby

• St. Joseph's Catholic Church — 0.3 mi
• Two Sheriffs of Mason County — 0.4 mi
• First Comanche-German Meeting — 0.5 mi
• The Commercial Bank — 0.5 mi