Community mourns loss of young girl

Grief spread through Waynesboro on Sunday as a young girl's family, friends and teachers learned of the discovery of her body in the slowly receding waters of Rockfish Run.

Lacy Elizabeth Taylor, 8, had been missing since slipping into the rushing creek at about 5:30 p.m. Saturday. The girl fell alongside friend Tina Marie Allen, 41, whose life was also claimed by the torrent. The woman's son Adrian, 9, was pulled to safety.

“I think everyone is shocked and saddened,” said Rebecca Jarvis, principal of Wenonah Elementary School, where Lacy was in second grade. “Anytime a community loses a child, it affects a lot of people. It’s hard to pick back up and move on from it.”

Since enrolling at Wenonah in the fall, Lacy traveled into the school’s office each morning to offer a hug to one of the assistants, Jarvis recalled.

“She was always very happy to be in school,” Jarvis said. “She was a sweet little girl with a real energy about her. She had a beautiful smile and great little freckles.”

Angel Gonzalez, a friend of the girl’s guardian, Penny Taylor, recalled the girl’s inquisitive nature.

“She was very intelligent, always wanting to know everything about everything,” he said.

Waynesboro police found the girl about three-fifths of a mile from where she entered the swiftly flowing brown water of Rockfish Run while the trio attempted to cross a low-water culvert bridge at Kirby Avenue.

Children and adults had been playing in a flooded area nearby for at least an hour. Police said the group went around a barricade that had been placed there earlier to keep traffic from passing through the water.

A man who was in the area at the time pulled Allen's son Adrian to safety, police said.

“Adrian is a great little fourth grader,” Jarvis said. “He has just a spunky personality and very sweet disposition.”

Lacy and Adrian were close friends, Gonzalez said.

“They were so tight,” he said. “The boy not only lost his mother, but also lost one of his best friends.”

Gonzalez said he would remember Allen as a loving mother and hard worker.

“She was a handywoman to a tee and a very happy woman,” he said. “Anything she could have done to keep that boy happy, she did.”

Jarvis said she planned to remain in touch with Wenonah’s teachers and counselor today and to compose a letter to the school's second-grade families, who will return from spring break on April 25.

The incident, considered an accidental drowning by police, remains under investigation, said Sgt. Kelly Walker.

He said darkness forced a halt to Saturday’s search for Lacy before 9 p.m.

Two teams of officers resumed searching the creek on foot at about 6:30 a.m. and found the girl's body at about 7 a.m., while more than 40 law enforcement officials and rescue workers were preparing a larger search that would have included the South River.

Rockfish Run, also known as the Tenth Street Creek, is a tributary to the river that flows down from Afton Mountain and through a neighborhood on Waynesboro's east side.

The South River was still swollen to a depth of more than 6 feet at 9:30 a.m., after peaking above flood stage, at a depth of more than 11 feet, Saturday night.

Rockfish Run had deepened from its usual foot of water to about five feet, police said. Brown waters continued to spill over the bridge on Kirby Avenue in the late afternoon Sunday.

Gonzalez said shared faith brought comfort to family and friends after the girl’s body was recovered.

“We know Jesus went down into the water and took her with him,” he said. “[Penny Taylor] is still crying, but it’s not the same cry she had last night. We know that baby is safe and she’s with God.”