Reynolda House exhibit explores infamous 1932 shooting death

Sep. 16—WINSTON-SALEM — It's no secret that Reynolda House Museum of American Art houses one of the finest collections of American art anywhere, and museum officials are proud to show it off.

The museum's latest exhibition, however, draws back the curtain on another, considerably darker facet of Reynolda House's rich history — a nearly century-old, scandalous murder mystery that the museum has never actively publicized.

Until now.

"Smith & Libby: Two Rings, Seven Months, One Bullet," which explores the tragic, but sensational, 1932 shooting death of tobacco heir Z. Smith Reynolds, opened last weekend at Reynolda House. The exhibit will remain on display through the end of the year.

"We've not shielded it, but we definitely haven't wanted to exploit it," said Phil Archer, deputy director of Reynolda House, who curated the exhibit. "It's titillating and fascinating — it has been for 90-plus years — but out of respect for the dead, we haven't made anything of it the way we are this fall."

Now, though, Reynolda House officials feel it's time to address the mystery more thoroughly.

"The story doesn't ever go away," Archer said. "People continue to ask about it, and we want to reward their curiosity with facts and accurate stories, and not just blank stares."

Smith Reynolds, the 20-year-old son of tobacco magnate R.J. Reynolds, was an acclaimed amateur aviator who became enamored with — and relentlessly wooed — sultry torch singer and Broadway star Libby Holman, who was eight years his senior. He eventually won her over, and the couple married in November 1931.

They were married only seven months, though — and their relationship was often tempestuous — before a single gunshot wound to the head ended the young husband's life.

It happened on the night of July 5, 1932, at the spacious Reynolds estate that is now Reynolda House. Following a birthday party for a friend of Reynolds, at which guests boated on the lake, ate barbecue and drank homebrew, the newlyweds retired to their suite upstairs.

Around 12:45 a.m., a single gunshot rang out, and Reynolds was found in a pool of blood on a sleeping porch adjacent to the couple's bedroom. Holman and two guests at the house — Reynolds' boyhood friend Ab Walker and Holman's acting coach, Blanche Yurka — rushed him to the hospital, where he died about four hours later.

Had Reynolds killed himself, as his wife claimed? Was it an accidental shooting? Or had Holman murdered her husband?

The death was initially ruled a suicide, but certain facts didn't add up. For example, based on the trajectory of the bullet that killed Reynolds, he would've had to have held the gun and pulled the trigger from an almost impossible angle.

Also, in the hours after the shooting, three searches of the sleeping porch failed to turn up a gun. The next morning, though, the gun mysteriously showed up on the porch, in plain sight.

"A coroner's inquest was held, and there were over 300 pages of testimony recorded," Archer recounts. "They realized that whether there had been a crime or not, there was a coverup, and they ruled that Smith had been killed by a person or persons unknown."

A grand jury took that a step further, charging Holman with first-degree murder and naming Ab Walker as an accomplice. The story, of course, made national headlines. What newspaper could possibly resist the salacious tale of a voluptuous Broadway singer murdering her young husband, who just happened to be the son of a millionaire?

"The American public just had a huge appetite for the story," Archer said.

Then came an even greater shock — the charges were dropped, at the insistence of the Reynolds family. A family spokesman said that while they didn't believe Smith was in a state of mind to take his own life, they also didn't think there was compelling evidence of a murder.

Incredibly, the state agreed to drop the charges. To this day, it's unknown what actually happened to Reynolds.

Among the items on display in the "Smith & Libby" exhibit are the voluminous transcript from the coroner's inquest; the bullets that remained in the gun that killed Reynolds, as well as fragments of the metal jacket that split off from the fatal bullet; and a bathroom door that had a bloody handprint on it, evidence of someone going into the bathroom to wash the blood off of his or her hands.

Also on display are a newsreel about the case that played in movie theaters across the country during the summer of 1932; the Forsyth County sheriff's drawing of the crime scene; other papers from the sheriff's records, including letters from psychics weighing in on what they believed had happened; and other photographs, letters and memorabilia from the Reynolda House archives, including some artifacts pertaining to Holman's career.

"We've gotten some really good feedback from the exhibit," Archer said. "There's been so much conjecture and disagreement about what really happened that it's still a mystery, but now visitors can draw their own conclusions."

jtomlin@hpenews.com — 336-888-3579