The Carradines: from Yazoo to Vicksburg, ‘Revenge of the Nerds’ and ‘Kill Bill’

Rev. Beverly Carradine, who is buried in Vicksburg’s Cedar Hill Cemetery, was born on April 4, 1848, at Altamont Plantation in Yazoo County. (Beverly was an uncommon man’s name even in the 19th century.)

At age 8, from a hilltop in Yazoo County and mounted on a horse named Lightfoot,  he saw a riverboat named Banjo and heard the calliope playing. It was not unlike magic to him—never had a poor farm boy seen such a thing. He chose then to live a life of adventure.

Four years later, in 1860, he determined the “war will not end without me being in one battle.”

In 1863, the 15-year-old Carradine was captured by Union soldiers as he was delivering a letter to family in another county. His horse, Joe, was taken as a prisoner of war. Carradine was not held long by the Union, and in 1864, on the shores of Bee Lake near McGee plantation, Carradine killed a tiger that had escaped from its owners. Later that year, the 16-year-old was asked to guard Brinley Plantation and the plantation owner’s daughter, Anna Hamilton. He rescued her from a servant and received an emerald ring as a reward.

Soon thereafter he joined the Confederate Cavalry and fought in the Battle of Sipple’s Farm, by his account.

Beverly Carradine.

After the war, he enrolled at Ole Miss in Oxford. Graduating after two years, he joined his cousin in pursuing a career in medicine and pharmacy. He soon married the beautiful, black-haired Laura Green Reid, and with her fathered William Reed Carradine among four other children. (He fathered another four children by his second wife.)

“Laura, I’m not going to go to Hell after all,” Beverly Carradine told his wife on July 12, 1874, after he had “prayed through” and saved his soul.

By October of that year, he was licensed to preach, and began saving his flocks in Mississippi and New Orleans. On June 1, 1889, Carradine received the “blessing of sanctification” in his study in the parsonage at 35 Polyminca St., New Orleans.

Son Reed grew up to become a writer for the Associated Press, and he fathered John Carradine.

John Carradine became a well-known actor, hitting the big screen in 1930. He played  Preacher Jim Casy in “The Grapes of Wrath” in 1940 with Henry Fonda, and starred in other big hits such as “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance” and “Stagecoach” with John Wayne.

John Carradine, actor and grandson of Beverly Carradine of Vicksburg.

John Carradine fathered three well known actors: David Carradine, who was Bill in the “Kill Bill” films; Keith Carradine, who played Wild Bill Hickok in the HBO series “Deadwood”; and Robert Carradine, who is best known for playing the lead in the “Revenge of the Nerds” series of movies.

Martha Plimpton, best known for her role as Stef in “The Goonies” is the daughter of Keith Carradine, and great-great granddaughter of Beverly Carradine.

Keith Carradine, as Wild Bill Hickok above, is a great grandson of Beverly Carradine.

Robert Carradine, as Lewis Skolnick in “Revenge of the Nerds” above, is a great grandson of Beverly Carradine of Vicksburg.

The family patriarch, Rev. Beverly Carradine, went on to become a leading evangelist and a prolific writer with at least 26 books to his credit including “Sanctification” and “Pastoral Sketches.”

He died in 1931 and is buried at Cedar Hill Cemetery here in Vicksburg next to his wife, Laura Reid, and his son, Reed Carradine, the father of actor John Carradine.

The marker for Rev. Beverly Carradine at Cedar Hill Cemetery, patriarch of one of the most famous acting families in America.