Judge Lynch, his first hundred years

11

FRANK SHAY

From the collection of the

nm

PreTinger

v JJibrary
p

San Francisco, California
2006

JUDGE LYNCH

By the Same Author

IRON MEN AND WOODEN SHIPS

MY PIOUS FRIENDS AND DRUNKEN
COMPANIONS

HERE'S AUDACITY!
INCREDIBLE PIZARRO
PIRATE WENCH
etc., etc.

JUDGE LYNCH

HIS FIRST HUNDRED YEARS

BY FRANK SHAY

IVES WASHBDRN, INC. • NEW YORK

By the Same Author

IRON MEN AND WOODEN SHIPS

MY PIOUS FRIENDS AND DRUNKEN
COMPANIONS

HERE'S AUDACITY!
INCREDIBLE PIZARRO
PIRATE WENCH
etc., etc.

JUDGE LYNCH

HIS FIRST HUNDRED YEARS

BY FRANK SHAY

IVES WASHBURN, INC. • NEW YORK

COPYRIGHT, 1938, BY FRANK SHAY

All rights reserved

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
BY THE VAIL-BALLOU PRESS, INC., BINGHAMTON, N. Y.

Contents

Preface:

"To HELL WITH THE LAW" 7

Chapter One:

THERE WAS A JUDGE NAMED LYNCH ... 15

Chapter TIVO:

THE EARLY LIFE AND TIMES OF JUDGE LYNCH 27

Chapter Three:

JUDGE LYNCH'S CODE . . . . . . . . 77

Chapter Four:

JUDGE LYNCH'S JURORS . . . * . v . . 84

Chapter Five:

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH .... 99

Chapter Six:

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH'S CASES:

(A) Judge Lynch's Cause Celebre-Leo

Frank . . > *53

(B) The Mob Was Orderly-New Or-

leans Mafia l61

(C) The Burning of Henry Lowry . .168

5

CONTENTS

(D) The Law Never Had a Chance-

Claude Neal 178

(E) The Five Thousandth— Raymond

Gunn 187

(F) Twice Lynched in Texas— George

Hughes 197

(G) Three Governors Go Into Action—

1933 2°7

(H) Those Who Defied the Bosses . . 220

(I) 1937 245

Chapter Seven:

THE REVERSALS OF JUDGE LYNCH . . . .251

Lynch-Executions in the United States, 1882-1937 . 273

Bibliography 276

Index 283

Preface

"TO HELL WITH THE LAW"

LYNCHING has many legal definitions: It means one
thing in Kentucky and North Carolina and another in
Virginia or Minnesota. For the purpose of this work
it is defined as the execution without process of the
law, by a mob, of any individual suspected or con-
victed of a crime or accused of an offense against the
prevailing social customs. The state of Minnesota
clearly defines it as the killing of a human being by the
act or procurement of a mob. In Kentucky and North
Carolina the lynch-victim must have been in the hands
of the law or there was no lynching. Virginia defines
it simply as murder and ordains that every person
composing the mob, upon conviction, shall be pun-
ished by death.

There is more than the simple dictionary definition
of lynching. Behind every lynching, beyond the de-
struction of the unfortunate victim, is the debasement
of citizenship, the crucifixion of justice and democra-
tic government, the prostitution of public officials,

7

PREFACE

and the depraved behavior of the mob-members. The
effects of a lynching on the mind of an observer, es-
pecially a child, cannot be estimated. The conse-
quences of sadistic practices put human relations on a
considerably lower plane. Dr. A. A. Brill states: "Any-
one taking part in or witnessing a lynching cannot re-
main a civilized person."

It is seldom that a mob gives voice to its creed as
did the one outside Covington, Tennessee, in August,
1937: when urged by the sheriff to let the law take its
course, it cried, "To hell with the law!" It is not only
the cry of the lyncher but of every other type of
criminal.

Since 1882, when lynchings were first recorded,
through 1937, the toll of the mob has been 5,1 12 vic-
tims. More than four fifths of these were Negroes, of
whom less than one sixth were accused of rape.
Lynchings have declined from a high of 235 in 1892
to a low of eight for 1937. The decrease was not con-
stant: in 1932 the number fell to ten only to rise to
twenty-eight in the following year. It is an inevitable
fact that during the coming years certain Americans
will meet their deaths at the hands of mobs.

Lynchers are criminals in the same sense that mur-
derers and kidnapers are criminals: lynching is a crimi-
nal activity, and to be put down it must be considered
as such. Obviously law enactment is not enough; rigid

8

PREFACE

enforcement is necessary and it must be backed up by
a public sentiment against the crime. Even the most
serious protagonists for a Federal law against lynching
do not believe that it will stop the practice. They point
out that proposed Federal legislation leaves the appre-
hension and punishment of lynchers to the state, that it
only makes recalcitrant states abandon their do-noth-
ing policy, and that it forces peace officers to resist
the mob beforehand and to prosecute it afterwards.
It seeks to guarantee the humblest citizen the due pro-
cess of the law and the equal protection assured him by
the national Constitution. It provides that cowardly
and unfaithful public officials may be fined and impris-
oned, and that the people of the county who permitted
the murder be made liable for monetary damages.

Such a law will not eradicate the crime of lynching,
but it will convince peace officers that they must not
release their prisoners to a mob and that the lynch-
minded must suppress their sadistic desires: it will
serve as an effective curb on a crime that many Ameri-
cans condone.

It is almost impossible to verify statistics relating to
lynchings. For this work the author has gone to several
sources: from 1882 to 1888 the accepted totals are
those compiled by Cutler from the files of the Chicago

PREFACE

Tribune, and from 1889 to 1937 the records are those
of the National Association for the Advancement of
Colored People. Some independent research has not
materially changed these figures. For prevented lynch-
ings, the estimates of Monroe N. Work, of the Depart-
ment of Records and Research at Tuskegee, have been
accepted. In many communities there are forces strong
enough to suppress news of lynch-executions; in
others the bodies of the victims are destroyed or
secretly buried, and the members of the small mobs
sworn to silence.

For my research I have used the published material
of many individuals and organizations. That I have
been materially aided by the work of James Elbert
Cutler, Walter White, Arthur F. Raper, and James
Harmon Chadbourn is apparent and herewith ac-
knowledged. Organizations such as the National As-
sociation for the Advancement of Colored People, the
Southern Commission on the Study of Lynching, the
American Civil Liberties Union, the Industrial Work-
ers of the World, the International Labor Defense,
and the Workers' Defense League have been helpful
in letters and documents loaned. To the Federal Writ-
ers' Project thanks are due for a leave of absence to
complete this work.

10

PREFACE

To Alfred Hartog I am indebted for considerable
aid and valuable time devoted to research, to Miss
Richetta G. Randolph and Julian B. Thomas for the
loan of valuable material and helpful suggestions. To
my wife, Edith Shay, my thanks for counsel and help
in the arrangement of material and for the compila-
tion of the bibliography and index.

F. S.

ii

JUDGE LYNCH

Chapter One

THERE WAS A JUDGE NAMED LYNCH

IT was not until forty years after his death that the
name of a Virginia soldier in the War for Independ-
ence was given to the practice of summary punishment
he had introduced as a war-time measure. It is a long
way from the mild, repressive measures of Colonel
Charles Lynch, who was known to some as Judge
Lynch, to the legendary figure bearing his name
whose known victims now number 5,112,* many of
whom went to their deaths by methods almost incon-
ceivable. Judge Lynch, the real, was an honorable
patriot, a Quaker whose religious scruples forbade the
taking of human life even in war; Judge Lynch, the
legend, whose code contains only the sentence of
death, is a savage American whose practices bring
shame to all other Americans.

A century of lynching, with more than 5,000 re-
corded victims in a little more than half that time, has
placed America in an unenviable position before the

1 January i, 1938.

JUDGE LYNCH

entire world. It has done incalculable harm not only to
our reputation as a civilized country but to ourselves,
our manner of thinking, and the welfare of future gen-
erations.

No nation, ancient or modern, has been entirely free
from mobs and "mobocracy." But mob-law is not
necessarily lynch-law, whereas lynch-law is always
executed by mobs. The mob is always the result of a
temporary or permanent breakdown or failure of a
social system; it is invariably accompanied by violent
death, be it the death of an individual or of a class.
That there are justifiable mobs is beside the point; cer-
tain diseases are cured by inoculating the patient with
a virus that, if administered to one in good health,
would in itself produce death.

Aberrations of justice are not distinctively Ameri-
can. Summary justice has been meted to individuals
throughout history. There are isolated instances in
modern Europe, but these bear the stamp of genuinely
spontaneous action on the part of the people who,
outraged by his criminality, fell upon the offender and
put him to death. The imperfect evidence at hand
would indicate that it was invariably the guilty person
who was lynched and not, as is so often the case in this
country, one who was merely suspected or accused of
criminality.

Other commentators and historians have sought to

16

THERE WAS A JUDGE NAMED LYNCH

connect American lynching practices with those that
existed in Europe before and shortly after America
was settled. They have discovered a likeness in such in-
stitutions as the feudal Vehmgerichte of Westphalia,
but the Fehmic courts were secret tribunals established
for the preservation of the true faith, the promotion
of peace, and the suppression of crime. All their opera-
tions were veiled in mystery: their secret spies pene-
trated to the remotest corners of Germany, their judges
were unknown, their judgments were swift and their
execution certain. The Vehmgerichte bear a closer
resemblance to our Ku Klux Klan and other repressive
groups than to our general and more democratic prac-
tice of lynch-executions.

The Lydford laws, gibbet or Halifax law, Cowper
and Jeddart justice, and the Scotch burlaw bear a
strong resemblance to our Frontier Justice, to the Vig-
ilantes in their original conduct. All these practices
originated in a genuine and popular need and through
the lack of regularly constituted law courts. That they
were later prostituted to ulterior and selfish purposes is
within this thesis. Venice's Council of Ten, Castile and
Aragon's Holy Brotherhood were regularly consti-
tuted and legal, even if repressive, bodies, and their
edicts were accepted laws. Only in Czarist Russia did
the practice of lynch-executions somewhat similar to
ours prevail. It was the custom to take horse-thieves

JUDGE LYNCH

and club them to death, to tie them to the tails of young
horses, which were ridden off at a gallop; or the lynch-
ers would fasten the victim to a log while the women
punctured his skin with sharp instruments until death
ensued.

What is now known as lynch-law, the court of
Judge Lynch, and Judge Lynch himself were un-
known to the earliest colonists. Summary justice was
meted to misbehavers of almost every type and to those
guilty of offenses not covered in the common law. It
was an accepted practice, not because there was no
formal law, but because formal law was undergoing a
severe change. Today the stool-pigeon is the accepted
accomplice of all police regulation; in those early days
an informer was invariably in the service of the crown
and therefore anathema to all patriots who, when he
was unmasked, undertook to flog him and to hold him
up to popular exposure and contempt. But the man
who laid on the lash, who applied the tar and feathers,
or who ordained that the victim be carried on a rail
was known as Squire Birch.

Many New England communities had officials
known as "warners-off," whose duty comprised the
investigation of all newcomers as to character, religion,
goods, and other local requirements. If in their wisdom
they felt the newcomer was not one who would add

18

THERE WAS A JUDGE NAMED LYNCH

luster and wealth to the community, or if his family-
were liable to become public charges, the warners-off
went into action, giving a five-day warning to clear
out. Beyond that their powers of office did not carry
them. If the ostracized did not leave within the pre-
scribed time, the people figuratively took the matter
into their own hands and brought the head of the fam-
ily before Squire Birch, who ordained the method of
chastisement. After the administration of justice, the
offender was taken to the town's limits and ordered
never to return, under penalty of "worser" treatment.
Summary punishment was also exercised against
Indians who overstepped treaty bounds, against
chronic drunkards and wife-beaters, and, in certain
communities, against non-churchgoers and, in others,
tobacco smokers. Later, when matters became tense
between the colonists and their British oppressors,
violent treatment was used against loyalists— informers
who accepted the crown awards for pointing out
patriots or revealing the persons and lairs of smugglers.

The origin of the legendary Judge Lynch has been
obscured by the legend-makers. Ploughing through
histories and memoirs, the last words of oldest inhabit-
ants and first settlers, folklore, and the works of con-

19

JUDGE LYNCH

temporary writers brings out the fact that there was a
Judge Lynch and that an act of the Virginia legisla-
ture was known as Lynch's Law.

Charles Lynch, who was to give his name to a juris-
prudence he never practised nor would have tolerated,
was born in 1736, at Chestnut Hill, his father's estate
in Bedford County, upon which a part of the city of
Lynchburg now stands. Lynchburg was not named for
Charles Lynch but for his elder brother, James. The fa-
ther, an Irish redemptioner, had been sold to a planter,
and the young immigrant, when his redemption period
was completed, married Sarah, the daughter of the
house, a professed Quaker. After the planter's death,
the mother joined the Society of Friends; James, the
oldest son, became possessor of the estate; and the two
younger sons, John and Charles, took parcels of the
family land that lay near the border. Charles followed
his mother into the Cedar Creek Quaker meeting, and
the records of the congregation show that on Decem-
ber 14, 1754, the young man and Anne Terrill first
published their intentions of marriage. Later the young
couple established their home on the Staunton River,
in what is now Campbell County.2

For some years Charles was an active member of the

2 "The Real Judge Lynch," by Thomas Walker Page, Atlantic
Monthly, December, 1901.

20

THERE WAS A JUDGE NAMED LYNCH

Society of Friends and, for a time, clerk of the monthly
meetings. Later the exigencies of the times, 1767,
caused him to accept public office, and he became un-
satisfactory to the peace-loving Quakers, who dis-
owned him for taking solemn oaths, contrary to the
order and discipline of the Friends. It was in that year
that Charles Lynch was elected to the House of Bur-
gesses, where he held his seat until the colony became
independent. In 1776 he was a member of the conven-
tion that sent the instructions to the delegates from
Virginia to the Continental Congress, which exercised
a decisive influence on the movement for independ-
ence.

At the beginning of the War for Independence his
Quaker principles still influenced his actions to the ex-
tent of keeping him out of active military service. Mr.
Page says: "He did not enlist in the army, partly be-
cause of his Quaker principles, but chiefly because his
presence was imperatively necessary at home. He had
to rouse the spirit of his constituents to support the ac-
tion he had advocated in the convention. He had to
raise and equip troops for the army. He had, as it were,
to mobilize the forces of his country, and attend to all
the duties of a commissary department. In addition,
he had to make some provision in the event of an attack
from hostile Indians."

21

JUDGE LYNCH

In 1778 he had sufficiently stifled his Quaker scru-
ples to accept a commission as Colonel of Militia and
to organize a regiment.

It was as officer commanding this home-guard or-
ganization that his name was given to a species of sum-
mary justice. The theater of war had shifted to the
South, and both armies were in desperate need of
horses. The prices paid were so high that gangs of
rustlers made horse stealing a lucrative practice. The
local courts were only examining courts and the single
court for final trial of felonies sat at Williamsburg,
more than two hundred miles away.3 To take the pris-
oners thither, and the witnesses necessary to convict
them, was next to impossible. Frequently the officers
in charge of prisoners would be attacked by outlaws
and forced to release their men, or be captured by
British troops and themselves made prisoners.

As practically all of the horses were stolen from
American farmers to be sold to the British forces, the
thieves were, for the greater part, Tories. Colonel
Lynch placed the matter before his friends and neigh-
bors, and it was decided to take things into their own
hands, to punish lawlessness of all kinds, and, so far as
possible, to restore order and security to their com-
munity. It was not the "Vehmgericht" in any sense,
but a war-time measure. Colonel Lynch was appointed

3 Cutler: Lynch-Law.

22

THERE WAS A JUDGE NAMED LYNCH

presiding justice, and three neighbors, Captain Robert
Adams, Jr., Colonel James Callaway, and William
Preston, associate justices. Colonel Lynch's home was
to be their courthouse.

It was the custom of this court to have the accused
brought face to face with his accuser, permit him to
hear testimony against himself, and allow him to sum-
mon witnesses in his own defense. If acquitted, he
was allowed to go, with apologies, his inalienable
right to sue for false arrest intact. If he was con-
victed, he was sentenced to receive the Law of Moses,
which is forty lashes less one, on the bared back; if
he did not then shout "Liberty forever!" he was
strung up by the thumbs until he did so. The most
convinced Tory shouted for liberty without further
ado.

The chorus of a once popular patriotic song cur-
rent in Virginia after the war runs as follows:

"Hurrah for Colonel Lynch,
Captain Bob and Callaway!
They never turned a Tory loose,
Until he cried out 'Liberty.' "

Later the Tories were greatly encouraged by the
news of the British invasion of Virginia, and they
proposed to seize and hold for Lord Cornwallis the
stores collected by Lynch for General Greene's army

23

JUDGE LYNCH

in North Carolina. Colonel Lynch, with his regiment,
was on the point of setting out to oppose a British
army under Benedict Arnold when news of the con-
spiracy was brought to him. Manifestly it would not
do to whip the conspirators, make them shout "Lib-
erty forever!" and turn them loose, nor could he
order them put in irons and taken along with the
regiment. The Colonel sought the advice of his fel-
low-justices, and it was decided to sentence them to
terms of imprisonment of from one to five years, and
the leader, Robert Cowan, was additionally fined
;£ 2 0,000, due to war-time inflation less than $1,000.

That was the real Judge Lynch.

After the war, the Tories who had suffered at the
hands of Colonel Lynch and his associates, threatened
to prosecute them. To avoid lawsuits and to settle a
war-time affair for the future, Colonel Lynch laid
the whole matter before the Virginia legislature. After
a long debate, for there were many unreconstructed
Tories yet in the legislature, the following act was
passed in October, 1782:

AN ACT TO INDEMNIFY CERTAIN PER-
SONS IN SUPPRESSING A CONSPIRACY
AGAINST THIS STATE:

I. WHEREAS divers evil-disposed persons in the year
one thousand seven hundred and eighty, formed a
conspiracy and did actually attempt to levy war against

24

THERE WAS A JUDGE NAMED LYNCH

this commonwealth; and it is represented to the present
general assembly, that William Preston, Robert Adams,
junior, James Callaway, and Charles Lynch, and other
faithful citizens, aided by detachments of volunteers from
different parts of the state, did, by timely and effectual
measures, suppress such conspiracy: And whereas the
measures taken for that purpose may not be strictly war-
ranted by law, although justifiable from the imminence of
the danger;

II. BE IT THEREFORE ENACTED, That the said William
Preston, Robert Adams, junior, James Callaway, and
Charles Lynch, and all other persons whatsoever, con-
cerned in suppressing said conspiracy, or in advising,
issuing or executing any orders, or measures taken for
that purpose, stand indemnified and exonerated of and
from all pains, penalties, prosecutions, actions, suits, and
damages on account thereof. And that if any indictment,
prosecution, action, or suit shall be laid or brought against
them or any of them, for any act or thing done therein,
the defendant, or defendants may plead in bar, or in
general issue, and give this act in evidence.

And, according to Mr. Page, the proceedings were
imitated widely throughout the former colonies and
came to be known by the name of Lynch's Law.

To the reader this historical precedent for the vilest
of modern practices may seem a bit far-fetched. The
legendry of lynching has many more interesting and
plausible accounts of its origin, but all of them appear,
upon investigation, to be spun of shoddy and other

25

JUDGE LYNCH

synthetic fabrics unable to bear up under any sort of
scrutiny. The story of the patriotic Colonel's activi-
ties bears the stamp of authenticity, which the folk
tales of the old men and women who "knew him
when" do not.

It is a far cry from Lynch's patriotic activities,
which gave a new verb to the American language and
another personality to our list of legendary characters,
to present-day lynch-executions, with their barbarous
forms of torture and cruel death and carnivals of
sadism. It is a still further cry from the efforts of the
original Lynch to maintain order and security in the
face of armed invasion to the Judge Lynch of today,
who, in a peaceful nation, is a constant menace to
the order of our society and the security of more
than fifteen millions of our citizens.

26

Chapter Two

THE EARLY LIFE AND TIMES OF
JUDGE LYNCH

THE career of the legendary Judge Lynch is an
American saga. Early in life he took over the office
so competently filled by Squire Birch, and performed
the duties of the lower court with a promptness and
energy that won for him the admiration of his more
impatient and energetic fellow-citizens. No untried
cases clogged the Judge's docket, there were no post-
ponements or other delays, his decisions were quick
and their execution never delayed. There were few
appeals from his decisions, and practically no rever-
sals. So effective was his handling of the cases brought
before him that when the opportunity presented it-
self he was elevated to the bench of the Court of
Uncommon Pleas, the court from which there is no
appeal.

During the early years of the nineteenth century
the practice of lynching followed along the traditional
lines of flogging and tarring and feathering. In cer-
tain cases the sentence was death by flogging or hang-

27

JUDGE LYNCH

ing, occasionally by burning. In the succeeding years,
the Judge narrowed his decisions to death and sought
variety only in a refinement and intensification of
the methods of executing the sentence. Before long
in his new berth he became known far and wide as
"the hanging judge," and his jurisdiction spread across
the American continent, confined only by the two
oceans and the two borders. Within these confines
he rides his circuit, and neither distance nor weather
halts his grisly progress.

The earlier work of Judge Lynch was confined to
those calls made upon him by the better people of
the community to try offenders of public morals,
offenders against prevailing social customs, and, on
occasion, persons who had committed acts of out-
rageous criminality. His code was flexible to a degree;
invariably the accused was permitted a defense and at
times convinced the court of his innocence or was
able to show extenuating influences or justification.

There was a period between the surrender of the
British at Yorktown and the breakdown of the Crown
judicial system and the subsequent development of
an American code, based on the various courts. The
transition was not accomplished overnight: in the
more developed sections it was achieved with a de-

28

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

gree of dispatch that made the change almost imper-
ceptible; in the sparsely settled and the newly settled
sections it required many years. Courts in some of
these places were of limited authority, others did not
know how far under a democracy their authority
carried and were often arbitrary beyond their powers.
In the unsettled communities close to the frontiers,
the people were too busy defending themselves from
the Indians to worry much about law, and often
founded sizable communities that had to depend for
their court on some distant county seat.

As the towns prospered and became populated, the
lack of a law court, civil and criminal, became evident,
and sometimes they awaited long the appointment of
a judge or the visits of the circuit justices. In the mean-
time the people took the law into their own hands
and tried the guilty themselves. Lacking jails and the
time to transport the accused to distant courthouses
for further trial, they resorted to the extra-legal meth-
ods of Judge Lynch. Punishment for criminality of
all types became corporal; a man was beaten or he was
hanged. This type of justice followed the frontier
from east to west and continued in existence until the
frontier was closed, approximately in the eighteen
nineties; yet, as late as 1915 and 1916 we find records
of hangings on charges of desperadism in western
states.

29

JUDGE LYNCH

It is safe to estimate that by the beginning of the
nineteenth century, law enforcement and observa-
tion were prevalent in all but frontier localities. This
period has been termed an era of good feeling, pros-
perity, and the expansion of industry and markets;
we see in it the gradual demand and awarding of more
and more democratic processes. No property restric-
tions to suffrage and the caucus system of selecting
candidates for the presidency and vice-presidency
were finding adherents throughout the country.
Democracy was in full swing, and Andrew Jackson
was its high priest and holy prophet.

Democracy's lay-preachers were going up and
down the land assuring the people that every man was
a king. Everyman was believing it and, looking about
him with his royal eye, found much that displeased
him. He assumed that it was his kingly prerogative to
change the things he didn't like, but his authority, he
sadly learned, was confined to his own person and to
small local groups who thought as he did. He had
never thoroughly learned the theory of democracy
and, therefore, was never able to practise it. Where
he could not get his way by diplomacy, he brought
in force and violence; he had won everything that
way, and it seemed the correct way.

The things that displeased every man were social
and economic. He disliked the aliens who were flock-

30

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

ing in, particularly the Irish and their church, whom
he tried to rout. In the North he joined his southern
brothers in disliking the Negro; but he disliked him
especially because he was a slave, and slave labor was
having an unfavorable effect on the entire country.
From the North he loosed upon the South a flood of
anti-slavery advocates, most of them self-appointed
and self -financed.

The South at first paid little attention to these
propagandists, for their efforts were confined almost
entirely to the whites, masters of slaves, and to the
ministry. It was not until 1829 that David Walker, a
free Negro living in Boston, published his pamphlet,
Walker's Appeal. The author had been born in South
Carolina, the son of a free Negress and a slave. He had
acquired enough education to read and write, and had
come to Boston, where he opened a second-hand cloth-
ing store.

The appeal comprised four articles and a preamble
addressed to "the Colored Citizens of the World,"
but, in particular and very expressly, to those of
the United States of America. The pamphlet was
circulated through the mails at the expense of the
author. Copies found their way into the hands of city
officials in Atlanta and Richmond and were referred
to the Governors of Georgia and Virginia, who in
turn submitted them to their respective legislatures.

3*

JUDGE LYNCH

Official protests were sent to Mayor Otis of Boston,
demanding immediate suppression of the subversive
booklet. Otis replied that the pamphlet had been
written by a free black man, whose true name it bore;
that it had not been circulated in Boston; that he did
not personally or officially subscribe to its sentiments
nor could he prohibit its circulation through the mails.
He would, and did, publish a general warning to ship
captains and others not to expose themselves to the
consequences of carrying the incendiary booklet or
other similar writings into the southern states.

The Georgia legislature, not satisfied with the
Mayor of Boston's answer, framed and passed a
measure providing for forty days' quarantine of all
vessels having free Negroes on board, prohibiting in-
tercourse with such vessels by free Negroes or slaves,
and making the teaching of free Negroes to read
and write a penal offense. In Virginia, at a secret ses-
sion of the House of Deputies, a bill was passed mak-
ing it a misdemeanor to teach or permit free Negroes,
slaves, or mulattoes to be taught to read or write; it
also prescribed fine, imprisonment, flogging, or death
for any white person, free Negro, slave, or mulatto
who should write, print, or circulate among slaves,
free Negroes, or mulattoes any paper, book, or pam-
phlet tending to incite insurrection or rebellion. The
bill did not pass the Senate.

32

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

In Louisiana, where copies of Walker's Appeal had
been discovered, the legislature enacted a law forbid-
ding free Negroes to enter the State of Louisiana and
commanding all who had entered since 1825 to leave
within sixty days.

However, the passing of laws and the death of
Walker a year after his pamphlet was published did
not stop the flow of anti-slavery literature into the
southern states. In 183 1, on New Year's day, William
Lloyd Garrison issued the first number of what was
later to become the most powerful and influential
abolitionist weapon, The Liberator. Free Negroes
gave it their hearty support from the beginning, and
by the whites it was attacked and denounced as in-
cendiary and, with Walker's Appeal, credited as one
of the chief causes of the frightful Southampton mas-
sacre.

The southern states were not strangers to Negro
or slave revolts. Previous to the Southampton out-
break, Virginia had had seven slave rebellions, South
Carolina seven, North Carolina three, Georgia two,
and Maryland and Louisiana one each. All of them
were suppressed or nipped in the bud, but they served
the purpose of keeping the South on its guard. In 1 800,
Gabriel, a slave belonging to Thomas Prosser, resid-
ing near the city of Richmond, made his plans quietly
and in secrecy and his revolt was already in motion

33

JUDGE LYNCH

before it was discovered. Negroes, to the number of
eleven hundred, had gathered in the night at a brook
some six miles from the city. Under the general
leadership of Gabriel they were divided into several
divisions, each with an objective: one was to seize
the penitentiary, containing several thousand stand
of arms; a second was to take the powder house;
while the main body was to press on and take the
Capitol building, which was to be used as a rallying
point and a stronghold. From there on the rebels
were to commence the work of slaughter: not a white,
save the French inhabitants, was to be spared.

All conditions at first conspired to make the insur-
rection a success. Richmond was not even in a good
defensive position; it would be easy to capture, and,
if the objectives were taken, easier to hold. Secrecy
stood in Gabriel's favor until the last hour, when,
already on the march, the rebels were forced by a
swollen stream to stop. The pause gave sufficient time
for two slaves to divulge the plot to the white masters
and the revolt was put down. Patrols were estab-
lished in Richmond and surrounding towns; on plan-
tations strict surveillance of Negro quarters was main-
tained. Arrests, brief hearings, and executions quickly
followed, from five to fifteen slaves being hanged at
a time. Gabriel eluded arrest, and three hundred dol-

34

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

lars was offered for his apprehension. He was later
captured in Norfolk, after having lain in a vessel's
hold for eleven days, and was hanged on October 7,
1800.

Each executed slave meant a property loss to his
owner that was not entirely repaid by the state. As
Virginia lands grew less productive and the planters
faced a future with limited incomes, breeding slaves
for the market gradually assumed the proportions of
a leading industry, a matter of some four million dol-
lars annually in the late eighteen fifties. Publicity of
the slave revolts would have practically destroyed the
market value of Negroes bred in Virginia, and, though
there are frequent references to incipient revolts in
letters, all public information was suppressed. In 1816
the slaves of Fredericksburg planned a revolt, but
the leaders were betrayed and later hanged.

In June, 1822, Charleston, South Carolina, heard
rumors of a slave uprising. Denmark Vesey, a free
Negro, aided by a Peter Poyas, had enlisted Negroes
of from forty to fifty miles about the city in a con-
spiracy to slaughter the whites and free the blacks.
Poyas alone had enlisted no less than six hundred
slaves, and it was one of these, a household servant,
who revealed the plot to his master. After a month's
investigation, only fifty of the thousand supposed to

35

JUDGE LYNCH

have been concerned were apprehended. Denmark
Vesey, Peter Poyas, and thirty-three others were put
to death without revealing their secrets.

In 1830 the South wanted the Negro, free and
slave, under control, and the flood of abolitionist
literature, addressed as it was, for the greater part, to
the Negro, was regarded as a menace. Few slaves
could read, but many free Negroes and some slaves
whose masters, through kindness, had given them the
rudiments of education, could and did carry the mes-
sage of the anti-slavery advocates. The entire South
was frightened; the slaves lived a different life, spoke
almost a different language from their masters; and,
as long as the subversive literature was being circu-
lated, there was no security for the whites. The only
hope of the southern states was to choke it off at the
source.

Each revolt was unsuccessful, yet each one served
to put the Negro farther back in his struggle for
education and independence. The laws enacted by
South Carolina as a result of Denmark Vesey 's con-
spiracy were unusually severe. All persons of color
were debarred from education in its simplest forms;
all free Negroes coming into the state were to be im-
prisoned. Numbers of colored men, some of them
citizens from the free states, were seized from vessels
in South Carolina ports, imprisoned, and finally sold

36

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

into slavery to pay the costs of trial and imprisonment.

The free states, egged on by the abolitionists, pro-
tested, and Massachusetts sent the Hon. Samuel Hoar,
an eminent attorney, to Charleston to effect and pro-
cure the release of several colored men, citizens of
the Bay State, imprisoned under this ordinance. Mr.
Hoar, accompanied by his daughter, proceeded upon
his mission, but was compelled to retire in haste from
Charleston under threats of personal violence. No one,
black or white man, from a northern state was per-
mitted to enter South Carolina's jurisdiction if he
proposed to question the validity of her acts.

Southern ground was being prepared for the ad-
vent of Judge Lynch.

The insurrection in Southampton County, Virginia,
in August, 183 1, was unlike any of the previous slave
uprisings in that it was not the result of a carefully
elaborated plan. It was the result of one man's inspira-
tion, of a single night's conference in the woods by
seven black men who proceeded to the work of
slaughter almost as soon it was determined upon and
the first steps arranged. Nat Turner, the leader, was,
like his predecessors, Gabriel and Vesey, a "good
nigger."

On Sunday, August 2 1, six slaves met in the woods

37

JUDGE LYNCH

on the plantation of Joseph Travis, ostensibly for a
barbecue. The Travis plantation was located in the
neighborhood known as Cross Keys, about fifteen
miles from Jerusalem Court House and about the
same distance from Petersburg. When the roasted
pig was ready, the six who had prepared it were
joined by a seventh, a dark mulatto in the prime of
life, powerfully built, with strongly marked African
features and a face indicative of intelligence and res-
olution. This was Nat Turner.

After the pig was eaten, Turner harangued his
fellows in earnest, moving rhetoric depicting the
wretchedness of the Negroes' lot and proving by
Scripture that he had been called to free his brothers.
All conceded the truth of his assumption and declared
themselves ready to follow him. The conference con-
tinued for several hours.

"It was agreed," said Turner later in his confession,
"that we should commence at home that night and,
until we had armed and equipped ourselves and gained
sufficient force, neither age nor sex was to be spared,
which was invariably adhered to." The general design
was to conquer Southampton County first and then
the rest of the state. In case of defeat they could re-
treat to the Dismal Swamp, which was about twenty-
five miles distant, in whose fastnesses they felt they
could find security.

38

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

The Negroes left their retreat after midnight, and
before dawn were well started on their short career
of death and destruction. The house of a widow was
first visited, and the family of five whites murdered.
A neighbor hearing their screams hurried to the scene
to find all five dead; on his return to his own home,
he was informed by his Negro houseboy that his own
wife and child had been murdered. The family of
Turner's master were the next victims, and the leader,
with new recruits by dawn, continued his work of
slaughter.

In one thing the Negroes were more humane than
Indians or white men fighting against Indians: there
was no gratuitous outrage beyond the death blow
itself, no insult, no mutilation. But in every house they
entered the blow fell on men, women, and children;
no one with a white skin escaped. From every house
they took arms and ammunition, and from a few,
money. On every farm and plantation they secured
recruits. The mob increased from house to house,
first to fifteen, then to forty, finally to sixty-odd.
Some were armed with muskets, others with axes and
even scythes; some commandeered their dead masters'
horses. Before the day closed, fifty-five whites— men,
women, and children— had been killed.

The other whites, driven from their homes, aban-
doned everything in the desire to get away from

39

JUDGE LYNCH

danger and to shut from their eyes the sight of the
vengeful Negroes. Annoyed by the slow progress of
his men and realizing that delay would bring armed
whites from other districts, Turner decided to strike
out for Jerusalem Court House to intercept fugitives
and cut off communication with Norfolk and Fortress
Monroe. His men, still three miles from the Court
House, decided to stop and enlist the many slaves of
a Mr. Parker. The halt proved disastrous. Eighteen
white men, mounted and armed, rode up and con-
fronted the whole body of blacks. In the pitched bat-
tle that followed, the Negroes drove off the whites,
pursuing them and killing and wounding several. A
fresh band of whites coming up at that moment stayed
the pursuit, gave fresh battle, and compelled the
blacks to break and run. Those on foot scattered,
leaving their leader and about twenty others to fight
it out. Turner saw that his cause was lost, that more
and more white men were arriving, and gave the
order to scatter and seek shelter. A few were told
where they were to meet him. The mob dispersed as
though into air, many members returning to their
homes as though nothing of import had occurred.

Roving bands of armed white men sought out the
Negroes; many of the rebellious slaves were shot on
sight, and some innocent Negroes suffered. Some

40

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

prisoners, taken near Cross Keys by troops from
Fortress Monroe, were shot and their heads left for
weeks stuck on poles as a warning to others who might
undertake a similar course. It is alleged that the cap-
tain of the marines, on his way back to the barracks,
bore the head of a Negro on his sword; it was a good
trick, no matter how he managed it. Another re-
vealing story is that of a Negress who attempted to
kill her mistress: she was dragged out after she had
been taken prisoner, tied to a tree, and her body rid-
dled with bullets. It is said that some slaves suffered
fearfxd tortures, being burnt with red-hot irons and
their bodies being horribly mutilated before death
came to their relief.1

The patrols continued for days, destroying every
black man they met with. "It was," said a member of
the House of Delegates, "with the utmost difficulty
and at the hazard of personal popularity and esteem,
that the coolest and most judicious among us could
exert an influence sufficient to restrain the indis-
criminate slaughter of the blacks who were sus-
pected." A letter from a clergyman on the spot said:
"There are thousands of troops searching in every
direction, and many Negroes are killed every day:
the exact number will never be ascertained. Men

1 Cutler: Lynch-Law.

41

JUDGE LYNCH

were tortured to death, burned, maimed and subjected
to nameless atrocities." 2

Slave owners, those who had not been destroyed
by Turner and his mob, began riling claims for com-
pensation for slaves killed to the number of over one
hundred— this, in face of the fact that the widest
estimate of Turner's forces gave the number at sixty-
odd. Nor was the slaughter of blacks stayed until
slave owners threatened to shoot down any "patrol"
found on their premises. Not a few of these self-
constituted guardians of the peace later boasted that
they had killed their "share of the niggers."

Fifty-five slaves were arrested for trial, of whom
seventeen were convicted and hanged, twelve trans-
ported to the deep south, twenty acquitted, and others
held for further examination. Turner evaded capture
for six weeks; his retreat was a hole in the ground
under a pile of fence rails. When he was taken he was
persecuted in various ways, whipped, and sentenced
to be hanged. His confession implicated no others,
assumed all the blame, and asked the mercy of his
God. His body, after death, was turned over to sur-
geons for dissection. For the benefit of other slaves
who might seek freedom through insurrection, the
news was broadcast that his skin had been tanned
for leather and his body rendered to grease.

2 Victor: History of American Conspiracies.

42

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

Despite Turner's confession, there was no doubt
in the minds of the Southerners as to who was re-
sponsible for Nat Turner's insurrection. As though
by universal accord, the accusing fingers of the entire
South were pointed in the direction of William Lloyd
Garrison, Arthur Tappan, and George Thompson.
Copies of their papers were burned and their agents
were mobbed and beaten whenever discovered. The
insurrection only served to fasten the chains of ig-
norance more firmly upon the Negro; too, it deprived
him of the confidence of his masters, it restricted his
little liberties, and substituted violence and cruelty.
After that day, for a colored man to be caught con-
ning a spelling book was to bare his back to the lash.

There was a more grievous indictment of the
whites than of their rebelling slaves. Where Turner
had killed cleanly, the whites in retaliation tortured,
mutilated, and burned, conducting themselves like
barbarians. In offenses committed by Negroes and
Abolitionists, the orderly processes of the law no
longer sufficed; the law was too slow.

The education of Judge Lynch was progressing.

The governors of the slave states did nothing to
ameliorate conditions. Despite Turner's confession,
the Governor of Virginia told the legislature that
there was much reason to believe that the insurrec-
tion in Southampton and the plots discovered else-

43

JUDGE LYNCH

where had been "designed, planned and matured by
unrestrained fanatics in some of the neighboring
States, who find facilities in distributing their views
and plans amongst our populaton, either through the
postoffice, or by agents sent for that purpose through-
out our territory."

Other governors of southern states wrote to the
executives of the free states from which the incen-
diary publications had been issued, asking that they
be suppressed, or that they at least not be sent into
the slave states. Refusal to make use of every possible
means to achieve these demands would be evidence
of a spirit "hostile to that friendship and good under-
standing which should characterize sister States."
Almost to a man the governors of the offending states
pointed out that the writers and publishers were free
citizens, that their respective state constitutions up-
held the right of free speech and a free press, and that
they, regrettably, could do nothing. The people of
the South realized, too, that under the law they could
do little to prevent the invasion and circulation of
abolitionist literature, and they turned to violence and
asked the young Judge Lynch to hear some of their
cases.

According to Garrison's The Liberator of October,
1831, a dispatch dated Wilmington, North Carolina,
September 28, said: "Three ringleaders of the late

44

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

diabolical conspiracy were executed at Onslow Court
House on Friday evening last, 23rd instant, by the
people." The news was followed by the editor's bit-
ter comment that "executed by the people doubtless
means executed by a mob on suspicion of guilt, with-
out investigation or trial."

In what were known as the free states of the North,
the abolitionists were no happier than in the slave
states. In 1833 a meeting in Clinton Hall, New York
City, was called to demand the immediate emancipa-
tion of the slaves and the formation of an Anti-Slavery
Society. The call had gone out to those sympathetic
to the cause, but before it was opened, the hall was
taken over by those opposed to the movement. The
owners ordered it closed, and the meeting adjourned
to Tammany Hall, where resolutions were adopted
declaring it improper and inexpedient to agitate the
question of slavery and assuring the South of a fixed
and unalterable determination to resist every attempt
to interfere with the relation of master and slave.

It was during the immediate excitement of this
episode that William Lloyd Garrison returned from
England, determined to open his great anti-slavery
campaign in New York City. He abandoned his in-
tention at once and hurried on to Boston, but word

45

JUDGE LYNCH

of the Tammany Hall meeting had preceded him,
and his arrival was met with an attempt to mob him.
A handbill was distributed urging all true Americans
to attend the greeting armed with plenty of tar and
feathers.

That year Garrison succeeded in forming the
American Anti-Slavery Society, with the avowed
purpose of organizing subsidiary societies in every
city, town, and village in the land, to send forth agents,
circulate tracts and pamphlets, enlist the pulpit and
press in the cause of the slave, give preference to the
products of free labor over those of slaves, and bring
the nation to a speedy repentance.

In the southern states the agents were met by mobs
and beaten, tarred and feathered, and taken to the
city or county line and warned that further offense
would be treated more violently. In the North the
reaction was against the Negroes, and a mania for
Negro-mobbing broke out: there were riots at Co-
lumbia and Lancaster, Pennsylvania, Trenton and
Bloomfield, New Jersey, and Rochester, New York.
In Philadelphia, several persons were killed and others
wounded, and thirty houses were destroyed. Investi-
gation showed that the riots were due to the fact that
many employers preferred the cheaper black labor
and so made it difficult for white working men to sup-
port their families. Among other causes were the

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

demonstrations by Negroes whenever a fugitive
slave was tried in the courts.

While in England, Garrison had invited George
Thompson, a distinguished orator in the cause of
abolition in Great Britain, to lecture in America.
Thompson arrived in New York in September, 1834.
He was greeted by a warning in the Courier and En-
quirer not to lecture in that city, and was ejected
from his suite in the Atlantic Hotel at the demand of
an angry Southerner. He then began a lecture tour
of New England and fared no better. In Augusta,
Maine, the windows of his lodging were stoned and
he was requested to leave town under penalty of a
mobbing; at Concord his meeting was broken up,
and in Lowell he was prevented from speaking by a
mob that later adopted a resolution assuring the South
that its rights would not be interfered with by the
North.

For all these adverse reactions, the Abolitionists
went on with their work. In 1 835 the American Anti-
Slavery Society sent an appeal to the local societies
asking for $30,000 for more agents, more literature,
and wider distribution. Most of the money was sub-
scribed at once, and twenty-five thousand copies of
The Slave's Friend and fifty thousand each of Human
Rights, Anti-Slavery Record, and The Emancipator
were sent into southern states. None was addressed

47

JUDGE LYNCH

directly to free Negroes or to slaves, though the
zealous agents were not instructed to limit their dis-
tribution to the whites.

Almost simultaneously with this flood of aboli-
tionist literature into the southern states, two Negroes
in Lexington, Mississippi, were overheard talking of
a planned insurrection among the slaves. Rumors al-
ready afloat indicated that the infamous Murrell gang
was planning a revolt of the blacks. The two Negroes
were examined at public meeting, and so improbable
were their stories that they were remanded to jail to
await further developments. A mob immediately
formed and, fearing the Negroes would be set free,
seized and hanged them.

This was excellent training for young Judge Lynch.
Too, it was excellent mob action: the investigation
now had to proceed without its two most important
witnesses. The mob action continued with the ap-
pointment of a vigilance committee vested with full
power to arrest, try, condemn, and execute. Two
white men, named Cotton and Saunders, itinerant
steam doctors by profession, were arrested, placed on
trial, and ordered hanged. One, before the noose was
tightened, made a confession in which he boasted
that he had agents on every plantation and warned
the committee to beware of the Fourth of July, nam-
ing several black and white confederates. Those named

48

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

were seized, and some were hanged and others slicked
—that is, stripped naked, laid on their stomachs with
their hands and feet bound to pegs driven into the
ground, and flogged. In all, three white men and an
undetermined number of Negroes were hanged with-
out due process of the law.

It was in the state of Mississippi that Judge Lynch
first mounted the bench, and it is not remarkable that
he is still the court of final justice in that state. Since
1882 it has consistently led all the other states in the
number of cases it has referred to Judge Lynch, and
it has accepted his decision no less than 549 times
(December i, 1937). But the Judge's services were
in too great demand to permit him to remain in a
single state; a whole section of the country was call-
ing for him. Before he left, however, he took another
case in Mississippi.

Vicksburg was long a noted gambling town, har-
boring a nest of gamblers who had become so power-
ful that they dominated the political life of the city
and terrorized all who were not sympathetic to their
activities. During the Fourth of July celebration of
1835, one of the gamblers became so insulting that he
was taken into the woods, tied to a tree, flogged, and
ordered to leave town within twenty-four hours. The
underworld at once showed its teeth, and, before the
day's festivities were over, a great mass meeting of

49

JUDGE LYNCH

indignant citizens was held. "For years past, the
gamblers have made our city their place of rendezvous.
They support a large number of tippling-houses . . .
no citizen is ever secure from their villainy. Our
streets are ever resounding with the echoes of their
drunken mirth. . . ." 3 A set of resolutions was sub-
mitted and adopted by unanimous acclaim:

"Resolved: That notice be given to all professional gam-
blers, that the citizens of Vicksburg are resolved to ex-
clude them from this place and this vicinity; and that
twenty-four hours' notice be given them to leave the
place.

"Resolved: That all persons permitting faro-dealing in
their houses, be also notified they will be prosecuted
therefor.

"Resolved: That 100 copies of the foregoing resolutions
be printed and stuck up at the corners of the streets—
and that this publication be deemed notice."

Some fifty of the gamblers took heed and fled, but
they were the small fry, easily frightened; the top
men, the worst characters, remained, and on the night
of the fifth, another was taken out and treated like
his fellow of the day before. More left, but five re-
mained, and, deciding to give the mob a dose of its
own medicine, barricaded themselves in the tavern of
John North, ready for anything. On the sixth, the

3 Coates: The Outlaw Years.

5°

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

mob reassembled and, followed by a crowd of towns-
men, marched to the barricaded gin mill and de-
manded the unconditional surrender of the gamblers.
This was refused.

The tavern was surrounded, and an effort made to
force an entrance. As the door was burst open, the
gamblers replied with gunfire, and Dr. Hugh S. Bod-
ley went forward to parley. A shot from an upper
window killed him, and the fight was on. Incensed,
the mob rushed into the building and overcame the
gamblers by force of numbers. Five were captured,
including the owner of the tavern, and they were
dragged out, pummeled, and strung up in convenient
doorways along the street. Orders were issued that
their bodies were to hang for twenty-four hours, "as a
warning against those that had escaped." Later the
bodies were cut down and buried in a ditch.

The year 1835, his first on the bench, was a heavy
one for Judge Lynch. His jurisdiction was broaden-
ing and he was being requested to hear cases of all
types, all over the South. Many of the lesser cases
were turned over to Squire Birch. The Judge con-
fined his interests to cases having racial, politico-
economic backgrounds, and those involving religious
controversy. But, he insisted, they must be capital
cases or referred to the lower court of Squire Birch.
Niles' Weekly Register, in its issue of September 5,

51

JUDGE LYNCH

1835, commented upon the activities both of Lynch
and Birch.

"During the last and present week we have cut out
and laid aside more than 500 articles, relating to the various
excitements now acting upon the people of the United
States, public and private! Society seems everywhere un-
hinged, and the demon of 'blood and slaughter' has been
let loose upon us! We have the slave question in many
different forms, including the proceedings of kidnapers
and manstealers— and others belonging to the free Ne-
groes: the proscription and persecution of gamblers:
with mobs growing out of local matters— and a great col-
lection of acts of violence of a private or personal nature,
ending in death; and regret to believe, also, that an awful
political outcry is about to be raised to rally the 'poor
against the rich'! We have executions and murders and
riots to the utmost limits of the union. The character
of our countrymen seems suddenly changed, and thou-
sands interpret the law in their own way— sometimes in
one case, and then in another, guided apparently only
by their own will."

In that year and in the years immediately follow-
ing, Judge Lynch set the pattern for his entire career.
Those brought before him were no longer beaten as
a punitive measure and sent off; if they were beaten,
it was to the death— if they escaped death in that

52

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

manner, it was to meet it by hanging, drowning, or
burning. Only with the aid of inventions, not yet
perfected, was the Judge to be able to vary his orders
in carrying out the death sentence.

Even before the Niles' Register lament had ap-
peared, Judge Lynch had been summoned across the
border into the state of Alabama. The Liberator of
July 4, 1835, reprinted an item from a Mobile paper.
Two Negroes were on trial for most barbarously mur-
dering two children, and obviously guilty. "As the
Court pronounced the only sentence known to the
law ... the smothered flame broke forth. The laws
of the country had never conceived that crimes could
be perpetrated with such peculiar circumstances of
barbarity, and had therefore provided no adequate
punishment. Their lives were justly forfeited to the
laws of the country, but the peculiar circumstances
demanded that the ordinary punishment should be de-
parted from . . . they were seized, taken to the
place where they perpetrated the act, and burned to
death."

It might have been 1935; the story would almost
read the same. On November 12, 1935, in Colorado,
Texas, a mob estimated at seven hundred persons took
two Negroes, accused of the murder of a white girl,
from the officers of the law and hanged them at the
scene of their crime.

53

JUDGE LYNCH

Before Judge Lynch had been a year on the bench
of the higher court, he had struck his full stride. The
earliest of his many causes celebres first came before
him for hearing in the spring of 1836, in St. Louis,
Missouri, and, though an attempt was made to reverse
his decision, it was upheld by none other than— Judge
Lawless.

"Greater love hath no man— " . . . the tremendous
implications of the words were not meant for colored
men, free or slave, black or mulatto. Subsequent to
the actions of 1836, no Negro may lift his hand in
defense of another Negro, not if the first Negro's
opponent is a white man. Too many colored men have
stretched hemp for aiding their friends to escape from
the law and from the lawless to make exception to
this ruling of Judge Lynch.

In April, 1 836, a colored man was arrested for some
forgotten offense on a Mississippi river boat. A mu-
latto, a freeman named Mclntosh, it was alleged,
aided the prisoner to escape and was in turn arrested
by the officers. He turned upon the officers, drew a
knife, and stabbed a deputy sheriff, killing him in-
stantly, and seriously wounded a constable. Mcln-
tosh made his escape, but was later captured and
locked up in a St. Louis jail. Later a mob assembled
and threatened to tear down the jail if the prisoner
was not delivered to it, secured the Negro and con-

54

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

ducted him to the outskirts of St. Louis. His body
was bound with ropes and fastened to a tree with
chains, a few feet from the ground. A fire was then
started beneath him and he was roasted to death.

Even in those rough and tough days, this atrocity
was too much for the citizens of St. Louis, and the
matter was placed before the Grand Jury of St. Louis
County for action. Judge Lawless made the following
astounding charge:

"I have reflected much on this matter, and after weigh-
ing all the considerations that present themselves as bear-
ing upon it, I feel it my duty to state my opinion to be,
that whether the Grand Jury shall act at all, depends
upon the solution of this preliminary question, namely,
whether the destruction of Mclntosh was the act of the
'few' or the act of the 'many.'

"If on a calm view of the circumstances attending this
dreadful transaction, you shall be of the opinion that
it was perpetrated by a definite, and, compared to the
population of St. Louis, a small number of individuals,
separate from the mass, and evidently taking upon them-
selves, as contradistinguished from the multitude, the re-
sponsibility of the act, my opinion is that you ought to
indict them all, without a single exception.

"If on the other hand, the destruction of the murderer
of Hammond was the act as I have said, of the many— of
the multitude, in the ordinary sense of those words— not
the act of numerable and ascertainable malefactors, but
of congregated thousands, seized upon and impelled by

55

JUDGE LYNCH

that mysterious, metaphysical and almost electric phrensy,
which, in all nations and ages, has hurried on the infuriated
multitude to deeds of death and destruction— then I say,
act not at all in the matter— the case transcends your
jurisdiction— it is beyond the reach of human law."

Which seems as nice a bit of judicial fence-strad-
dling as one could hope to find in a lifetime's search.
What Judge Lawless— his tribe has increased— meant
was that if two or three do the lynching, it is inde-
fensible, but that if it is perpetrated by a number, un-
countable at a glance or undeterminable in the night,
it is all right. To avoid prosecution in the future, mobs
must be bigger and better, at least "many." As travel
conditions improved, the Judge believed, he would
be able to command mobs numbering more than ten
thousand.

The case was not yet finished. For denouncing the
burning of Mclntosh and violently attacking the
decision of Judge Lawless in his weekly paper, The
Observer, The Reverend Elijah F. Lovejoy had his
printing office destroyed by the mob. The press, how-
ever, was saved and shipped twenty-five miles up the
Mississippi to Alton, Illinois, where Lovejoy planned
to set it up and resume publication. But the mob took
it from the wharf and dumped it into the river the
night it arrived. Alton people, led by the Presby-
terians, held a mass meeting, denounced the action

5*

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

of the mob, and subscribed money for a new press.
Lovejoy started The Alton Observer with the state-
ment:

"As long as I am an American I shall hold myself
at liberty to speak, to write, and to publish whatever
I please on any subject, being amenable to the laws
of my country for the same."

He continued his attacks on slavery and lynching
and, in July, 1837, the mob again destroyed his print-
ing equipment. A third press was ordered, and when
it arrived the mob broke it up and threw the pieces
into the Mississippi. Lovejoy's friends were with him;
they rallied, and a fourth press was ordered. At three
in the morning the river boat carrying it made fast
to the wharf and fifty men escorted the press to the
stone warehouse. A small mob hooted, blew horns,
and threw stones, but the precious machine was de-
livered in safety and a guard placed over it.

That night the mob re-formed and demanded that
the press be delivered to them for destruction; when
this demand was refused, they hurled stones through
the windows. Then a gun was fired and other shots
followed. One of the defenders of the press fired his
piece and killed a man in the mob. The assailants
withdrew for a time but returned with ladders, which
were placed against the building, and an attempt was
made to fire the roof. When Lovejoy and a few of his

57

JUDGE LYNCH

supporters tried to prevent this, the clergyman re-
ceived five shots in his body and died a few minutes
later. The men guarding the press, seeing their leader
down, beat a hasty retreat, and the mob entered the
warehouse unresisted and threw the offending press
from the windows. The work of destruction was
finished with sledge hammers by the mob in the street.

There was yet another voice raised against Judge
Lynch. A young lawyer of twenty-eight arose before
the Young Men's Lyceum of Springfield, Illinois, on
the night of January 27, 1837, to deliver an address
on "The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions."
Abraham Lincoln, speaking before Lovejoy's death,
said, in part:

"Accounts of outrages committed by mobs form
the everyday news of the times. They have pervaded
the country from New England to Louisiana. . . .
It would be tedious as well as useless to recount the
horrors of all of them. Those happenings in the State
of Mississippi and at St. Louis are perhaps the most
dangerous in example and revolting to humanity. In
the Mississippi case they first commenced by hanging
the regular gamblers. . . . Next, Negroes suspected
of conspiring to raise an insurrection were caught up
and hanged in all parts of the State; then, white men
supposed to be in league with the Negroes; and,
finally, strangers from neighboring states, going

58

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

thither on business, were in many instances subjected
to the same fate. Thus went on the process of hang-
ing, from gamblers to Negroes, from Negroes to
white citizens, and from these to strangers, till dead
men were literally dangling from the boughs of trees
by every roadside. . . . Turn then to that horror-
striking scene at St. Louis. A single victim was sacri-
ficed there. ... A mulatto man by the name of
Mclntosh was seized in the street, dragged to the
suburbs of the city, chained to a tree, and actually
burned to death; and all within a single hour from
the time he had been a freeman attending to his own
business and at peace with the world.

"Such are the effects of mob law, and such are the
scenes becoming more and more frequent in this land
so lately famed for love of law and order, and the
stories of which have now grown too familiar to at-
tract anything more than an idle remark."

In Alton the Grand Jury brought in indictments
against several men involved in the slaying of the
Reverend Elijah Lovejoy, but the cases were not
pressed. When the case of one of the assailants came
up in the municipal court, the jury considered him
guilty of all the charges but returned a verdict of
not guilty on a question of jurisdiction.

Judge Lynch for a time stuck pretty close to the
cotton states. He found them fertile fields for his

59

JUDGE LYNCH

peculiar type of justice and, in those early days, he
was but little concerned with the complexion of his
victim's skin. In Louisiana a white man killed another
white man, and the murderer was tried in a summary
manner and executed by hanging. In 1839 two alleged
white murderers who had escaped from jail were re-
taken and remanded to jail to await the collection of
testimony; the mob was impatient and, without await-
ing the trial, condemned the pair out of hand and
hanged them.

Cutler reprints from N ties' Register of August 24,
1844:

"Four men, Rea, Mitchell, White and Jones were
tried and condemned before his honor, Chief Justice
Lynch, on the i6th inst. at South Sulphur, Texas,
for killing two men and one boy of the Delaware
tribe of friendly Indians. They were executed under
said sentence the next day, in the presence of a large
number of persons."

In 1 845 the Judge was back in Missouri where, in
September, he hanged without further trial two white
men on the charge of murder. Early the following
year he introduced his system of jurisprudence into
Florida, and he had to stretch matters to make a go
of it.

"A man by the name of Yeoman, accused of being
a noted slave stealer, having been discharged by Judge

60

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

Warren of Baker County, Georgia, on a writ of
habeas corpus . . . on his arrival at Jefferson County,
Florida, ninety citizens assembled and took a formal
vote, which stood 67 for and 23 against hanging him.
He was hanged accordingly." 4

In 1855 Judge Lynch added Tennessee to his list
with a mass-hanging of Negroes; a year later he in-
vaded Virginia, but the Old Dominion victim got off
with a slicking. In all the slave states, Abolitionists,
when caught, were slicked without further ado, and
it was only upon occasion that they were put to death.
Slaves accused of almost any kind of criminality were
transported, and as a rule only free Negroes were put
to death. When a slave was destroyed by the mob,
the state or the community invariably reimbursed the
owner for his loss.

By 1860, lynchings had disgraced every one of the
slave states and many of the free states; the fruit of
Judge Lynch's decisions hung from many trees. As
though bored with simple hangings, and even burn-
ings, the Judge regularly increased the barbarity and
savagery of the punishments. They began with whip-
ping, went on to mutilation and half -hanging to burn-
ing. Today, as in the case Claude Neal, it is not in-
frequent for the victim to be slowly hoisted by the
neck and then lowered just before death comes to his

4 N lies' Weekly Register, January 17, 1846, quoted by Cutler.

61

JUDGE LYNCH

relief and for the torture to be repeated until the
lynchers weary of their sadism and mercifully— if
the term be permitted in such an instance— kill. The
practice of increasing the severity of the punishment
continued through the years until, in 1937, a Missis-
sippi mob brought in an entirely new development
of torture.

The Liberator of September 14, 1880, printed an
extract from a letter written from Houston, Texas.
It voices a general Southern complaint.

"Tell your abolition friends to go on and soon they
will have the pleasure of seeing the Negro reduced to
such a state of hopeless bondage that they may well
pity them. I solemnly declare that today the Negro is
not as free as he was two or five years ago; and why?
Simply because his master has been goaded on to des-
peration by incendiary acts and speeches. Now he
fears the Negro and binds him down as you would
a savage animal. One year ago all was peace and quiet-
ness here. The Negro was allowed to go out, to have
dances and frolics; today one dare not show his head
after nine o'clock in the evening. Seven companies
of patrols are organized and guard the city each night,
sixteen horse-patrol scour the country around. Forty-
eight vigilance men say live, banish or die, as the
proof may go to show. . . . Men are hung every day
by the decision of the planters, lawyers, judges and

62

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

ministers. It is no hot impetuous act, but cool, stern
justice."

Three years before, The Liberator reported that
a traveler in Texas had seen twelve bodies hanging
from one tree and five from another. Editorially,
Garrison had said in 1856:

"A record of the cases of 'Lynch Law' in the
Southern States reveals the startling fact that within
twenty years, over three hundred white persons have
been murdered upon the accusation— in most cases
unsupported by legal proof— of carrying among slave-
holders arguments addressed expressly to their own
intellects and consciences, as to the morality and ex-
pediency of slavery."

It would be difficult to estimate the number of
Negroes lynched in the same twenty years, and it is
possible that any estimate based on the few known
cases would show that number was considerably less
than that for the whites. As has been pointed out, the
Negro was property, each adult male of under forty-
five being worth approximately $1,500, more if he
knew a trade, less if he was "a bad nigger." Garrison's
statement cannot be questioned, for most of the
white men lynched had been sent to the tasks, to the
work that earned for them the death they received at
the hands of the mob, by the American Anti-Slavery
Society and its branches. Few of the white men were

63

JUDGE LYNCH

offered the indignities to which the Negroes were sub-
jected; they were politely hanged and their bodies
left for the coroner to bury. Savagery and brutality
were reserved for the blacks; even after death their
bodies were further subjected to mortification. Even
in those days, before the Civil War, the lynching of
colored people meant more than reprisals for crimes
committed, than measures taken to keep the Negro
in his place, to protect white womanhood.

Judge Lynch went to California long before gold
was discovered. His first recorded case was in San
Diego, a city now ill-famed for its tendency to mob
action in matters concerned with labor. Like so many
subsequent Golden State lynchings, it was a jail
snatch.

On the night of March 26, 1833, Antonio Alipas, a
private in the presidial company of Loreto, was in the
guardhouse for an unrecorded offense. During the
evening a corporal and his squad, all mounted and
armed, rode up to the jail and demanded that the
sergeant deliver Antonio to them. The sergeant re-
fused, and the soldiers forced the guardhouse and took
the prisoner for California's first lynching.

Four years later, in Los Angeles, another snatch
occurred. Domingo Feliz, a poor but honest cuckold,

64

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

was murdered by his wife's paramour, Gervasio,
aided and abetted by the woman. Gervasio and Maria
del Rosario were duly arrested and incarcerated in
the local jail. Before they could be brought for trial,
a mob assembled, but decided that death was too good
for the pair, and returned to their homes. When the
funeral of Feliz took place, public clamor demanded
the blood of the guilty pair, but Holy Week was at
hand and the impetuous demand was postponed until
the day after Easter. On Easter Monday it rained and
public enthusiasm for the lynching was dampened,
and it was put off until the California climate should
improve. On Tuesday another postponement threat-
ened when it was found there was no priest available
to hear the last confessions of the two sinners. But pub-
lic clamor could no longer be stilled, and at four-thirty
in the afternoon Gervasio was hauled out of jail and
shot. After him came the woman, and California gets
credit for the first recorded lynching of a woman.5

Vigilance as it was conceived was not lynch-law.
The discovery of gold in California in 1848, the
change from Spanish law to the absence of American
law, the indecision about what form of government
would prevail, and the corruption after the territory
had been admitted to the Union in 1850 all combined
to make California a place to be avoided by the peace-

5 Bancroft: Popular Tribunals.

65

JUDGE LYNCH

loving. The stampede to the gold fields included men
of the highest types and those whose departure from
their accustomed haunts brought sighs of content from
local peace officers. Once in the mines, the search for
the metal occupied the minds and efforts of all, each
man using the talents at his command to get rich as
quickly as possible. Americans competed with Rus-
sians, Frenchmen, Spanish-Americans, and others
whose language they did not understand, with crimi-
nals from Australia and South America, whose ways
they but partially understood.

The Americans protested that these foreigners were
being permitted to dig American wealth from Ameri-
can soil and take it, without hindrance, to their own
countries. The cry that "the greasers must go" was
heard throughout the mines, and a law was passed,
the Foreign Miners License Tax, requiring all South
Americans to pay twenty dollars monthly for permis-
sion to dig for gold. It drove them from the mines into
the towns, and their places were taken by Chinese and
Pacific Islanders as employees. Later the China Boys
and the Kanakas were driven from the mines to the
settlements and, added to the natural accretion of a
criminal element, made Sacramento and San Francisco
nests of crime and criminals.

The absence of strong governments in the cities
made criminal activities a profitable venture. Gangs

66

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

preyed upon merchants and restaurateurs, and when a
miner came down from the hills, his poke well-filled
with gold, he too became the prey of the vultures.
Men of respectability were so absorbed in the accumu-
lation of wealth they could not spare the time for civic
activities. When conditions got so bad that they them-
selves were in danger, they turned and found that the
criminal element had completely taken over the local
governments. In 1 85 1 they turned to vigilance and ef-
fected a superficial and temporary reformation. That
the committees made errors, that at times the wrong
man was executed, cannot be denied. Even the most
firmly established courts err and learn of their mis-
takes too late for correction.

Like the kangaroo courts of Judge Lynch, the Vigi-
lantes superseded the offices held by the regularly con-
stituted police and peace officers as well as the judi-
ciary. They apprehended the accused, tried him and
sentenced him, and, if necessary, executed the duties
of the hangman. Considering their success in stamp-
ing out criminality, it is difficult to condemn them;
they did not take to the execution of summary jus-
tice until formal justice had broken down.

Vigilance pursued its way through the West. All
the coast states and most of the mountain states sought
in it peace and protection of life and property. When
the people had stamped out criminality, they returned

67

JUDGE LYNCH

to their gold-grubbing, ignoring the old adage. The
criminals lost no time in returning to their old haunts,
and again in 1885 vigilance was called upon to rid
the communities of their presence. This time it was
stronger, it was more complete and effective, and,
when its first tasks were complete, it went on to the
polls and elected officials who could be trusted, a judi-
ciary that could not be easily tampered with. The new
form, radical and permanent, was adopted throughout
the West and, in too many places, became common
lynching. Men suspected of crime, others accused of
criminal activities, some of them already in the hands
of the law, were taken by pseudo-vigilance committees
and put to death.

Hangings became spectacles; the condemned were
forced to build the scaffolds from which they were
later hanged. Men and women came great distances to
witness the executions of five, ten, and even twenty
robbers and murderers (Idaho). The New York
Times, on March 19, 1864, commenting upon the ac-
tivities of the Vigilance Committees throughout the
mineral territories, said they "are holding Lynch
courts in extraordinary number, and carrying out the
decrees of that ferocious judge with unprecedented
energy." The same editorial mentions that bills had
been passed in Congress enabling Nevada and two
other territories to form constitutions preparatory to

68

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

their admission as states. A condition of admission was
an irrevocable ordinance prohibiting slavery, and the
writer added: "we think lynching might have been
included."

Horse thieves, murderers, and desperadoes have
been hanged under the guise of vigilance as late as
1915 in Arizona, when two alleged bandits were
lynched at Lonely Gulch; in Texas in 1915, at San
Benito, when six were hanged on charges of murder
and desperadism; and in Arkansas in 1916 for highway
robbery.

The War Between the States did not interrupt the
activities of the Vigilance Committees operating in
the western territories, but it did change, to some de-
gree, the Southerner's relation to the Negro. After the
surrender of General Lee, the Thirteenth Amend-
ment became effective in the former slave states; the
slave was now free, but he was still a Negro, still ig-
norant, still loyal in many cases to his former master.
Governor Walker of Florida said in his inaugural ad-
dress:

"Not only in peace but in war they have been faith-
ful to us. Our women and infant children were left
almost exclusively to the protection of our slaves and
they proved true to their trust. Not one case of insult,

69

JUDGE LYNCH

outrage, indignity has come to my knowledge. They
remained at home. They raised food for our armies.
We know many were anxious to take up arms in our
cause. For several years along six hundred miles of
coast they heard the guns of Federal ships of war, yet
not a thousand of them left our service to find shelter
and freedom under the Union flag."

On the other hand, the former slave states began to
enact repressive laws barring the free Negro from the
expression of his rights. Despite the words of the Gov-
ernor, Florida would give her assent to the Thirteenth
Amendment only with the understanding that no
power was given Congress to legislate on "the political
status of freedmen in this State." Emancipation having
been forced upon the southern states, they, in retalia-
tion and without delay, enacted apprentice acts, va-
grancy laws, black codes to define the economic rights
of the colored people. To the people of the South the
freed Negro differed in no way from the plantation
slave, except that he could not be bought and sold, he
must be paid for his labor. The sweeping Reconstruc-
tion policies of the triumphant North, aimed at chang-
ing the whole fabric of a civilization almost overnight,
brought about something like chaos in many places.
As a result, color lines were drawn with added sharp-
ness, and only such laws for the whites as could with
safety, from the Southerner's point of view, be ex-

70

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

tended to the blacks were enacted in the Negro's
favor.

He could not serve in the militia, or sit in a jury
box, or testify in court in civil suits unless he was a
party to the record, or in criminal actions unless all
parties were Negroes or if the culprit before justice
was a white man charged with some act of violence
to a Negro. He could not carry firearms without a
permit, nor ride in a railroad car with white passen-
gers. He could not rent or lease land or houses save in
segregated areas set aside by whites. All contracts for
labor, if for longer than a month, must be in writing
and attested and read to the Negro by a city or
county officer or two disinterested whites. Should a
Negro run away from his employer, any person
might arrest him and bring him back and receive five
dollars plus ten cents a mile for doing so. Negro chil-
dren under eighteen who were orphans, or whose
parents refused to support them, must be apprenticed
to some suitable person. Freedmen over eighteen who,
on the second Monday in January, 1866, had no law-
ful employment were to be treated as vagrants and
fined fifty dollars. If they did not pay, they were to
be hired out to any who would pay the fine and costs
for the shortest times.6

6 Laws of Mississippi, 1865. Quoted from McMaster: History of the
People of the United States During Lincoln's Administration.

71

JUDGE LYNCH

The state of Mississippi enacted such laws, and, al-
though they were promptly set aside by the Freed-
men's Bureau, many were later re-incorporated into
the state codes and prevail today in most of the south-
ern states.

With repressive laws ruthlessly set aside by the
Freedmen's Bureau, it was necessary for the southern
states to call for mob action against any attempt of
the Negro to assert his new-found freedom. The Ku
Klux Klan may have been started as a social club with
no idea of anything but good clean entertainment for
its members. When men pull masks over their faces
for anything but a masquerade, they are encroaching
upon the practices of those engaged in criminal activ-
ity. The original Klan called itself a social organiza-
tion, but its conception of society was terrorizing
Negroes. The newly freed Negro was, as a rule, igno-
rant as a child, often stupid, and as superstitious as any
of his race who remained in Africa. The weird Klans-
men riding about in hoods and nightshirts did make
the night hideous for him for a time. But the average
Negro learned quickly that there was nothing to fear
from their simple appearance, and the Klan, to con-
tinue its work eff ectively, added whippings and lash-
ing, later hangings and burnings, to its repertory of
repressive measures. For a few years it flared across
the darkened southern skies, terrorizing black and

72

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

white alike, until the Government had to put it down
forcibly.

But the Southerners who despised the Negro, who
feared him, had learned a valuable lesson. Masks,
horses, and a sudden foray into the night left no eye-
witness who could prove recognition, no accusing
fingers. They achieved in an instant the pseudo-re-
forms they desired, they wreaked vengeance without
fear of reprisal. When the Klan was demobilized, it
was almost a national or, at least, a sectional institu-
tion, and the local units, realizing their powers as a
weapon of repression, continued to meet secretly.
They called themselves by different names: the White
Camelia, Whitecaps, Night-riders, Regulators, etc.
The Klan did not need an organization; as such, it
merely reflected a type of mentality that prevailed
and would continue to prevail no matter what laws
were passed. That mentality still prevails, and,
whether the resurrected Klan of today thrives or fails
as an organization, the hysterical appeals to uphold
white supremacy and to protect American woman-
hood will produce the mob action required.

The dispersion of the Klan in March, 1 869, did not
stop the activities charged against the organization,
and "Ku Klux outrages" continued to be reported in
the papers. Coupled with executions by lynch-law on
the frontier, the totals for the entire country must

73

JUDGE LYNCH

have been high. James Elbert Cutler, in his Lynch-
Laiv, reports that he turned to the files of The New
York Times for the three years, 1871-1873, and com-
piled the following statistics. It will be noted that the
Klan, then legally dead for more than two years, is
still mentioned.

KENTUCKY: 2 Negroes hanged for rape, i white man
hanged for rape, i Negro hanged for murder, 3 Negroes
shot by masked men, i Negro "murdered" by the Klan.
TENNESSEE: 2 Negroes hanged for robbery and arson, i
Negro shot and hanged for robbery and murder, i Negro
shot for attempted outrage, i Negro hanged and shot for
murder, i white man shot for murder of wife.
MISSOURI: 5 horse thieves hanged, i Negro hanged for
outrage, i white hanged for murder, 3 whites hanged for
murder and robbery, 3 whites shot for defending and
being bondsmen of county officials accused of peculation.
CALIFORNIA: 2 whites hanged for murder, i white hanged
and shot for murder, i Indian hanged for murder, i Malay
(steward of steamer) shot and thrown overboard for
ravishing sick girl, eleven years old.
MONTANA: 2 whites hanged for murder.
LOUISIANA: 4 Negroes hanged for murder, 3 horse thieves
hanged.

VIRGINIA: i desperado, horse thief and murderer hanged.
ALABAMA: i white shot for murder.
SOUTH CAROLINA: 2 whites shot for murder, 10 Negroes
shot and hanged by the Ku Klux Klan.

74

THE EARLY LIFE OF JUDGE LYNCH

NEVADA: i desperado hanged, i white man hanged for

murder.

WISCONSIN: i white hanged for murder.

INDIANA: 3 Negroes hanged for murder, i desperado and

i horse thief "killed in jail."

NEBRASKA: i Negro and i white "killed" for robbery

and shooting woman.

KANSAS: 2 whites hanged for murder, i desperado and

i horse thief "killed in jail."

COLORADO: 2 whites hanged for keeping gambling outfits.

MICHIGAN: 2 whites died from beating they received for

killing a man in a German-Irish riot on the streets.

OHIO: 2 whites hanged for murder.

MARYLAND: i Negro hanged for arson.

Total: 41 whites, 32 Negroes, i Malay, i Indian.

"The majority of those lynched," says Dr. Cutler,
"were forcibly taken from officers of the law. In
some instances, the jails were broken into, and the
prisoners were taken out and hanged or were killed
in the jail; in other instances, the prisoners were taken
from the officers and put to death before they could
be taken to the jail. Some of the lynchings were car-
ried on by vigilance societies, others by mobs of
masked persons or by Ku-Kluxes."

These statistics, compiled from a single newspaper,
represent only a small percentage of the persons
lynched in those years. The total given for three

75

JUDGE LYNCH

years is only seventy-five, and in 1882, the first year
that a comprehensive effort was made to compile a
lynch record, we have reported a total of 1 14 lynch-
executions, both white and black.

By 1882 the kangaroo court of Judge Lynch was
firmly established throughout the Union; his juris-
diction was limited only by the reaches of our own
states and territories; his code, or body of laws, was
all-embracing, covering every offense from murder
down to the thumbing-of-the-nose (Negro to white)
and merely being unpopular.

76

Chapter Three

JUDGE LYNCH'S CODE

To attempt to codify the great body of offenses com-
ing within the purview of Judge Lynch's activities is
almost impossible, and the result would be useless.
The formal rules of procedure are dispensed with, his
advocates do not have to pass any rigorous examina-
tions before they may practise, and precedents set by
other cases seldom have any bearing on the one being
heard. The usual crimes against person and property
head the list, but they share their places with many
other offenses, many of which are not recognized in
the conventional civil and criminal codes of the land.
One needs only to be suspected or accused of a
crime to be dragged before Judge Lynch; the trials
are quick, the defendant is never given a chance to
defend himself, nor to summon witnesses in his own
defense or even hear the charge against him. In mo-
ments of great benevolence the Judge will permit the
prisoner to plead guilty. Many times the stating of the
charge would be unnecessary; the prisoner has heard
it in the lower court, proven his innocence, and been

77

JUDGE LYNCH

acquitted. In too many cases to number the Judge has
reversed the lower courts, placed the prisoner in
double jeopardy, and, entirely ignoring the first
judge, determined the prisoner guilty. Jack West,
Negro, of Seminole County, Florida, was such a one.
West was acquitted of the charge of breaking and en-
tering and of an assault on a white child. As he was
returning to his home, happily proven innocent of the
charges, Judge Lynch snatched him from the train
and lynched him beside the tracks.

"Not turning out of the road for white boy in
auto"; "insulting white man"; "activities in politics";
"demanding pay for work done"; "being brother of
a murderer"; "too prosperous"; "too uppity"; "remain-
ing in town where Negroes are not permitted after
sunset"— these are capital offenses in Judge Lynch's
court.

Often when the Judge's advocates can find no
charge against a victim, they convict him of "suspi-
cion of rape" or "suspicion of murder," even when
no assaulted girl is to be found and no corpus delicti
can be produced. Great numbers of white and black
men have been lynch-executed for no better reason
than that they were trying to improve the conditions
of their fellows and themselves. The spectacle of a
worker trying to organize a union, of a sharecropper
going among his fellows seeking to improve their

78

JUDGE LYNCH S CODE

working conditions, of a Negro refusing to remain
in peonage or not caring to pick cotton, when there
is cotton in need of picking, sends the hanging judge
into a fury.

Murder, rape, assault, arson, theft, desperadism,
and a wildly assorted list of minor offenses are what
usually call forth summary action from Judge Lynch,
but there are also the categories "cause unknown,"
"by accident," "without cause," and "mistaken iden-
tity."

Of the seven major causes:

Murder includes attempted murder, murderous as-
sault, assault with intent to kill, suspected murder,
suspicion of murder, alleged murder, accessory to
murder, conspiracy to murder, complicity in murder.

Rape includes attempted rape, suspicion of rape,
alleged rape, aiding and abetting a rapist.

Assault is usually connected with murder and rape
and includes assault with intent to kill, assault with in-
tent to rape. By itself it includes common assault, as-
sault with intent to rob.

Theft includes breaking and entering, larceny,
burglary, robbery, suspected and alleged robbery,
cattle, mule, and horse stealing.

Arson includes incendiarism, barn and house burn-
ing, haystack burning.

Desperadism includes outlawry, highway robbery,

79

JUDGE LYNCH

train robbery or wrecking— in general, the action of a
desperado.

Minor offenses are multitudinous and sometimes
unbelievable. They differ for blacks and whites. For
instance, in the case of miscegenation, it is only the
male black who is punished. Those minor offenses for
which only whites are punished by lynching are
wife-beating, cruelty, kidnaping, seduction, incest;
no Negroes are lynched for these offenses as long as
they are committed against members of their own
race. Among the many offenses that apply to colored
offenders are these:

Turning state's evidence, and refusing to turn
state's evidence.

Testifying against a white man.

Insulting a white man.

Informing on a white man.

Writing insulting letters to a white man.

Writing any kind of letter to a white woman.

Slandering a white man.

Asking white woman in marriage.

Paying attention to a white girl.

Forcing white boy to commit crime.

Refusing to give right of way to white persons.

Riding in train with white passengers.

Trying to act like a white man.

Other minor offenses are grave robbery; slander;

80

JUDGE LYNCH'S CODE

self-defense; cutting levees; voodooism; poisoning
horses, mules, cattle, and swine; incendiary language;
swindling; colonizing negroes; gambling; quarreling;
throwing stones; poisoning wells; making threats; be-
ing troublesome; bad reputation; drunkenness; entic-
ing a servant away; fraud; strike rioting and strike
participation; rioting; conspiracy; introducing small-
pox; conjuring; concealing and aiding criminals to
escape; passing counterfeit money; disobeying ferry
regulations; resisting assault; testifying by a Negro
for another Negro; lawlessness; circulating radical
literature; being found under bed in white man's
house; jumping labor contract; insanity; being a rela-
tive of a man already lynched; peeping in white girl's
window; not stopping an auto when ordered; organ-
izing share-croppers; insulting colored girl; and being
unpopular.

After the Armistice, many Negroes came home
who had served in the Army and Navy and learned,
in the limited freedom given them in the armed serv-
ices of the country in wartime, that their manhood
was what they themselves made it; that a "good nig-
ger" was the Negro who could take care of himself,
hold up his end, in any company. When they re-
turned to their homes in the South, they sought to
practise their new lesson, and, as a result, within the
first year of the peace, ten Negro veterans, some still

81

JUDGE LYNCH

in their uniforms, were lynch-executed in five south-
ern states.1 How many other Negro heroes were
killed, how many were beaten and barely escaped
with their lives is not in the record. "Frenchwomen-
spoiled niggers," the South called them, another way
of expressing its fear.

If the reader has persevered and read through this
amazing list of offenses for which his fellow-citizens
have paid with their lives, does he recall how many
times he has merited lynching? Let him take heart;
few of the persons lynched were destroyed for the
particular offenses cited. These were but the sparks
that lighted already smoldering prejudices.

The Negro is almost consistently the principal per-
former in American lynch-executions, the victim who
can no longer state his case before any earthly court.
But seldom does he pull the rope, never in any re-
corded case has he lighted the faggots. In 1908, at Pine
Level, Johnston County, North Carolina, it is re-
corded that an unnamed Negro entertainer was
lynched by Negroes for putting on a poor show, and
it is within the bounds of probability that all were
drunk; many white performers have felt the ire of
their cheated audiences. In 1934, at Caddo Parish,

1 Alabama, i; Arkansas, 2; Florida, i; Georgia, 3; Mississippi, 3.

82

JUDGE LYNCH S CODE

Louisiana, Grafton Page, a thirty-year-old Negro,
was beaten to death by members of his own race be-
cause of an alleged insult offered by Page to a colored
girl who had been out driving with him.

One of Judge Lynch's most severe reversals was
when Negroes, at Clarksdale, Tennessee, in 1914,
lynched a white youth for the rape of a Negress. The
coroner's jury, believe it or not, brought in a verdict
of justifiable homicide and freed the blacks.

Chapter Four

JUDGE LYNCH'S JURORS

"He who is not against me, is with me."
—JUDGE LYNCH.

WE can dismiss as absurd the contention that lynch-
ings take place only in the backwoods and rural dis-
tricts of the South. Climate and section do not make
for lynch-executions any more than does the lack of
theatres or motion picture houses, merry-go-rounds,
and symphonic orchestras. There are few places with-
in the territorial United States where it is impossible
to rouse a lynch-minded mob, even though it may be
frustrated by effective police action. The mob is lying
dormant and needs but the spark of an overt act to
bring it into snarling action, whether it be in Jack-
sonville, Florida, San Jose, California, or Duluth,
Minnesota. Since the Armistice, lynchings have been
prevented in New Hampshire, New York City, and
the District of Columbia.

Nor are Judge Lynch's jurors confined to a single
class or economic group. The man who pulls the rope

JUDGE LYNCH'S JURORS

or strikes the match is no more guilty of murder than
the police officer who refuses to arrest him, the pro-
secuting attorney who refuses to seek an indictment,
the Judge who refuses to convict him; or than those
sheriffs and deputies, wardens and jailers, and guards
who, brazenly or with a false play at resistance, re-
lease their prisoners to the death mobs. Add to these
those who commit the crime of refusing to recognize
or of denying recognition of members of the lynch
mob; those mayors and governors who refuse to call
out their state troops to protect one or more of their
citizens; and those coroners whose stereotyped ver-
dict that "the deceased came to his death at the hands
of persons unknown" is given in the face of criminal
knowledge of the actual participants in the murder.
The guilt reaches to those representatives of the people
who sit in state legislatures or in Congress at Wash-
ington and vote against proposed laws to help abolish
the crime of lynching.

When the Hanging Judge cries "guilty as charged"
and utters the sentence of death, it is the jurors, the
mob, who determine the method by which the sen-
tence is to be carried out. Americans who but a few
hours before were going about their usual tasks,
simple or intricate, become a blood-lusting mob, ex-
ercising their imaginations to think up new and more
hideous tortures. Shrieking and dancing, men, women,

85

JUDGE LYNCH

and little children go out to kill or to look on sym-
pathetically while others kill, indulging in practices
that would make savages blush.

These are not the lawless elements; nor are they
irresponsible mobs, no victory of the lawless over the
law. The mob is you and me, and every other Ameri-
can.

Mobs are created; they are man made and man led;
they are not the result of spontaneous action, of a sud-
den uprising of public indignation or community
sense of outrage. Mobs have been persistent, suffering
several frustrations, only to return weeks later to
achieve their determined purpose. Lynch mobs are
more baffling than other types of mobs: they seem
not content with the punishment of real or alleged
offenders, but wish to wreak upon their bodies, both
before and after death, greater and more horrible
humiliations.

The usual lynch mob is made up of three com-
ponent parts:

(a) the leaders, who instigate the lynching;

(b) the lynchers, who perform the lynching;

(c) the spectator mob, which encourages the
lynchers.

The mob leaders are often, as a matter of record,

86

JUDGE LYNCH S JURORS

men of some local importance, of substance and repu-
tation, prosperous business men and merchants; some-
times they are leading churchmen; and in instances
women have been numbered among the leaders. Most
often they are local and petty politicians, men of easy
living, good fellows who seem to achieve an excellent
standard of living with no great amount of mental
or physical effort. Often, especially in the South, they
are employing farmers, planters, and landlords. Still
in the South, they are likely to be members of the
Democratic party, of either the Baptist or the Meth-
odist Church; they believe the Klan was, and still is,
a good idea— real Americanism, that every Negro's
crowning ambition is to rape a white woman, and
that Negroes can be kept in their place only by oc-
casional warnings in the form of lynch-executions.
The southern mob leader also detests Catholics, labor
leaders, and most Northerners, especially those who
believe the Negro is entitled to the same rights as the
whites. In the North the mob leader may belong to
either major political party, he seldom sees the inside
of a church, and, though he belongs to no repressive
clans, he is in entire sympathy with them. He, too,
hates labor leaders, Communists, "wops," "kikes." In
the West he follows the general pattern, and his added
hates are Japanese, Mexicans, and Filipinos.

The mob leaders, one or more of them, have what

87

JUDGE LYNCH

can be called a working agreement with the Sheriff
or other officer who has the person of the proposed
victim. By working agreement is meant that the
leaders have definite knowledge or assurance of the
officer's sympathy with their intent; that one or more
of the leaders have "something on" the officer; that
they know him to be a coward and a craven; or that,
because he is seeking political advancement or re-
election, he will not offer any militant opposition.

On the part of the officers this working agreement
may take the form, as it has in certain instances, of
delivering in advance the keys to the jail; of informing
the leaders of the proposed route over which the
prisoner is to be transported; of placing the prisoner
in charge of deputies acquiescent in the will of the
mob or willing to be overpowered. Invariably the
mob leaders have enough information to determine
the weakest link in the police chain. The snatch is
made en route to or from the jail, in the jail, at the
entrance to the courthouse, or in the courtroom it-
self. The snatch completed, the victim is hurried to
the place of the proposed execution and delivered or
released into the hands of the lynch mob.

The lynch mob is, as a rule, made up of young
men between their teens and their middle twenties,
with a sprinkling of morons of all ages. Its members
are native whites, mostly the underprivileged, the un-

88

JUDGE LYNCH'S JURORS

employed, the dispossessed, and the unattached. Few
of them have completed high school studies, none of
them can be classified as adult. They are grocery
clerks, soda-jerkers, low-paid employees in jobs that
require neither training nor intelligence; jobs that
might often be filled more competently by Negroes
and" at lower wages. In rural communities this mob is
made up of day-workers and wage-hands, the more
shiftless type of tenants, those who through birth
and former position are bound to the locality. The
hobo or itinerant worker is seldom a mob member.

The lynch mob, recruited in pool halls and beer
parlors, is egged on by the leaders and encouraged
by the spectator mob. Its members give full expres-
sion to the defeated lusts, to the savage bestiality that
was engendered in their hangouts. In their defeated
imaginations they believe, during the progress of the
lynch-execution, that they are doing a public service,
that they have at last taken their place alongside the
leaders. They sense the envy and the approval of the
spectator mob whose members, in the natural course
of local affairs, regarded them as loafers and bums.
It is a foul moment, bringing all classes and types to-
gether in a sort of vicious brotherhood.

The spectator mob does not actively participate in
the lynching, though at times the lynch mob will
permit members to take part in protracted bestiali-

JUDGE LYNCH

ties, before and after the death. Its chief purpose is
by its presence and voice to lend encouragement to
the actual lynchers and to urge them on to greater
and more fiendish actions. Like spectators at a
baseball game or boxing exhibition, its members shout
their personal instructions, urging speed or demanding
that those in front sit down. They chant "burn that
nigger" and sing that happy days are here again.

This mob is composed largely of men in their
thirties and women in their forties. Many, though
they do not approve lynching in general, are held
in a strange and morbid enchantment, unable to tear
themselves away from the sight they will spend years
in trying to forget, unwilling to lift their voices in
protest or to shut their eyes to the horror.

One thing all three parts of the mob hold in com-
mon is the willingness to accept without qualification
any and all reports as to the absolute guilt of the
victim. If the various reports conflict, those that in-
dicate the possibility of innocence or of mistake are
rejected. Too often the charge of rape is brought in
by the spectator mob, even when the original charge
will not permit it to be considered.

The mob leaders, actuated by motives best known
to themselves, recruit the actual lynch mob from the
pool halls and beer parlors, as has been said. The

90

JUDGE LYNCH'S JURORS

spectator mob is created by the usual methods of the
ballyhoo. Publicly to whip up the emotions of the
populace is dangerous; there are too many sane per-
sons in any community who would seek every means
to prevent the proposed murder. Only the known
lynch-minded are informed, and the statement is
made in the form of a foregone conclusion: "A nigger
will be lynched at Slayden at sundown." "Be at the
courthouse at eight. You know why!" Only the
lynch-minded respond, and the anti-lynchers avoid
the scene. Should anyone opposed to lynching raise
his voice, he is warned, boycotted, or labeled "nigger-
lover." Wisely he remains at home.

The methods used to produce this audience are
the conventional advertising of commerce: news-
paper announcements, telegraph, telephone, the radio,
word of mouth, and, less commonly, the United States
mail. It is direct advertising and its appeal is to the
local carnivora. As each lynch-enthusiast gets the
news he passes it on, elaborating on the crime the
victim committed, whetting the listeners' appetite for
blood by suggesting the methods to be employed.
Automobile owners make up parties and journey
long distances to witness a hanging or a burning. An
announced "slow-burning" will bring out the largest
crowds.

JUDGE LYNCH

As early as 1893, Cutler notes, railways were used
to augment the spectator mob. On January 31, 1893,
Henry Smith, a Negro charged with murder, was
publicly burned at Paris, Lamar County, Texas. Ex-
cursion trains were run for the occasion and there
were many women and children in the throng that
watched the sufferings of the victim.

The automobile cut deeply into this neglected
feature of railroading, but modern trainmen, schooled
in the doctrine of service, may be of help in an in-
formative way. Witness the lady returning to Mary-
ville, Missouri, on a Burlington train, Saturday,
January 10, 1931. "Getting home just in time," said
the conductor. "They're going to lynch that nigger
Monday." Sure enough, Raymond Gunn was burned
to death in Maryville on Monday the twelfth.

"Memphis, Tennessee, with its men of mighty
beards, of cowhide boots and bowie-knives, was once
famous as a boat-landing where captains stopped to
hang offending travelers." * It is still an important
lynch center, strategically located; the lynch-minded
of seven states can be summoned within a few hours.
If there happen to be hostile officers at the scene of a
proposed lynching, there is a conjunction of state
lines that can be crossed with little delay or loss of
numbers. The Memphis press, through its frequent

1 Bancroft: Popular Tribunals.

92

JUDGE LYNCH S JURORS

editions, will keep the lynchers posted and direct
spectators over the shortest route to the rid otto.

In 1917, Ell Person, a confessed ax-slayer, was
wanted by the mob. He was being held in Nashville
for safekeeping when the glad news was printed in
the newspapers that he would be brought back to
Memphis the evening of May 21. Fifteen thousand
persons read and answered the summons. Again in
1921 The Memphis Press repeated its role of barker
and made the burning of Henry Lowry an outstand-
ing lynch success.2

When John Hartfield, Negro farm laborer charged
with assault on a white woman, was snatched from
the law by a lynch gang at Ellisville, Mississippi, in
June, 1919, the Jackson Daily News, principal news-
paper in the state, carried the announcement of the
exact time and place in the headlines. Ten thousand
persons attended the burning and were addressed by
the District Attorney, T. W. Wilson, while the
lynching was in progress.

In 1934, the Marianna, Florida, lynching of Claude
Neal 3 was ballyhooed over the Dothan, Alabama,
radio station, and seven thousand persons from eleven
states answered the invitation. In 1935, Ab Young,

2 See Chapter Six: "Some of Judge Lynch's Cases": The Burning of
Henry Lowry.

s See Chapter Six: "Some of Judge Lynch's Cases": The Law Never
Had a Chance.

93

JUDGE LYNCH

Negro accused of murder, was held by the mob until
an obliging Memphis newspaper could publish the
announcement: "Persons around Mt. Pleasant, Missis-
sippi, are saying that a Negro will be lynched at sun-
down at Slayden." The Memphis Press-Scimitar sent
a reporter over the sixty-three miles of road to cover
the event, and he arrived forty minutes ahead of the
lynching, even though it was held two hours in ad-
vance of sundown. The drollery of the County
Prosecuting Attorney in this case should not be lost:
"So far as the proof is concerned, we don't know
whether it was a hanging or a suicide."

After the ballyhoo has brought the event to the
point of a great popular uprising, when the spectator
mob is en route to the carnival or returning to its homes
and firesides, choking the roads and endangering one
another's lives, the officers of the law have to be re-
lieved of other duties to direct traffic. While Matt
Williams was being barbarously tortured in the pub-
lic square in Salisbury, Maryland, the police were
directing traffic so that the lynching would not be
interrupted. Again, when Gunn was to be burned in
Maryville, Missouri, the traffic became badly snarled,
and it was only due to the snappy work of the Mary-
ville police that the entire mob was able to witness the
lynching.

94

JUDGE LYNCH'S JURORS

In legal jurisprudence the aim has always been to
make the punishment fit the crime. An eye for an eye
has been the yardstick, and it is only when a crime
becomes too prevalent that a heavier or harsher
penalty is devised for offenders: the Federal kidnap-
ing act may be cited as an example. In Judge Lynch's
court the enormity of the offense has but little re-
lation to the penalty. Here what counts is opportunity,
imagination of the mob leaders, the time element.
Another factor is experience.

No death seems to be too bad for a Negro; whites
are seldom burned, seeming to rate the quicker meth-
ods of shooting, hanging, and drowning. If the mob
is in complete control of the situation, without fear
of gubernatorial or other interference, there are op-
portunities for protracted orgies that are limited only
by the imagination of the lynchers. If there is danger
that the National Guardsmen or state troopers may in-
tervene and time is important, it may be necessary
to dispose of the victim by the quickest method pos-
sible. But mobs also become blase; a hanging or other
quick execution no longer sufficiently satisfies; burn-
ing, especially protracted tortures followed by slow
burning, are necessary to attract the spectator-mob
interest.

Torture is often resorted to to extract a confession

95

JUDGE LYNCH

from the victim. Confessions so obtained would not
stand up in any other court. In many cases where the
prisoner has been taken from jails or courts, after
he has either been found guilty or confessed to his
crime, the mob will torture him to extract another
confession. Raymond Gunn had confessed to the
County Attorney, and the confession had been pub-
lished in whole or in part in the Missouri newspapers,
where it was read by all literate mob members. Yet,
before Gunn was burned, he was compelled to con-
fess his hideous crime at the scene. The average mob,
however, does not need a confession, convinced as
it usually is that the victim is guilty, that it has the
right man.

Torture used to extort a confession and torture
practised as punishment to fit the crime differ not at
all. Hanging and lowering just before death, a favorite
Mississippi practice, is used in both instances. Gouging
of eyes, cutting off of ears and nose are choice bits
of mob mayhem, which may be protracted by cutting
off the fingers and toes joint by joint. While the
victim is still in the hands of the lynchers, members
of the spectator mob often invade the sacred circle and
use their pocket knives to stab and cut. Corkscrews
have been used to tear the flesh from the body and,
in 1930, at Ocilla, Georgia, a mob tried to make its
victim swallow a sharpened pole. Wire-pliers are used

JUDGE LYNCH S JURORS

to extract teeth, and gasoline blow-torches, in 1937,
were introduced to peel the skin from the bodies of
the mob's two victims.

Death often mercifully intercedes during the pro-
tracted tortures, but even death does not stop the
bestiality. In the case of Claude Neal the mob ex-
hausted its collective energies in torturing its victim,
and was at last compelled to put him to death. It
managed to summon sufficient energy to fasten the
dead body to the rear of a car and drag it to the scene
of the original crime, where it was turned over to
other mobs for further mutilation and indignities.

Burning with torture has long been reserved as an
especial death for Negroes. As early as 1708, it was
recorded that a Negro named Sam, accused of mur-
dering the family of his white master, was burned
at the stake at Jamaica, now a part of New York City,
and put to all possible torments as a terror to others.
Water was given him from a horn fastened to a pole
to allay his thirst and so prolong the suffering.

Lynching by burning is the vengeance of a savage
past and survives today only in the United States.
Even the savage did not devise any death so horrible,
even to the spectator, as slow burning. Fire is started
at the victim's feet and he is literally burned to death
by inches, sometimes remaining conscious until the
lower limbs are already in ashes. In the larger lynch-

97

JUDGE LYNCH

carnivals, especially when the victim is a Negro
charged with rape upon a white woman, burning is
used because it is more spectacular and because
through the shrieks and writhings of the victim the
spectator mob is brought into a closer relation to the
criminal lynch mob.

Part of the ritual of a well-conducted lynching is
the unsexing of the victim. George Hughes was un-
sexed after death in the presence of women and chil-
dren. The symbolism is simple: the mob-desire to
destroy the symbol of creation. In cases of burning,
the victim is unsexed before lynching, and in shoot-
ing and hanging, after death. In the case of Wesley
Everest the unsexing was an act of purest sadism.
There is a ritual followed in this perversion, and, at
a certain moment, one of the mob leaders steps for-
ward and performs the operation. In certain cases
he may be the father or husband of the original vic-
tim.

White women who have been lynched were not
degraded before or after death. Negro women who at-
tract the attention of lynchers are, regardless of age,
invariably mob-raped before being executed.

Chapter Five

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

LYNCHING today is as American as apple pie. The
practice does not prevail in Canada or in Mexico.
Lynching, hand in hand with the Constitution, fol-
lows the flag, and follows it across the mountains
and the seas. Canada could not stand as a bar against
its introduction into Alaska, and neither the Atlantic
nor the Pacific Oceans were wide enough or deep
enough to stop the Hanging Judge. In Cuba, Puerto
Rico, and the Philippines Judge Lynch set up his
kangaroo court and brought in his single decision al-
most from the minute of American occupation. Even
peaceful Hawaii has known the violence of Judge
Lynch.

Though Judge Lynch today finds most of his cases
in the southern states and the great majority of his
victims are Negroes, the Judge is ready at all times
and in all sections to bring in his grisly verdict. From
Aroostook County, in northern Maine, along the
Canadian border to the Pacific Coast, down to the
Rio Grande, no section of the country is without the
blood-stained marks of lynch-executions. Only four

99

JUDGE LYNCH

states can boldly proclaim that since 1882 Judge
Lynch has been considered incompetent within their
borders: Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire,
and Rhode Island. If one could only gloss over the
condign summary punishment of working men in all
four states, there might be reason to become lyric over
their records.

One finds it difficult to become lyrical over sunny
California, to stand in admiration of the majestic
mountainous coast of the Northwest or the breeze-
swept vistas of old Florida; too many listless, dangling
shadows, slowly swinging to the winds, mar the pleas-
ure. The shadows cross and re-cross the land and give
little comfort to anyone. That they are decreasing
yearly may be a matter for gratification, but, as the
chart-lines show a decline in numbers, others show a
sharp increase in torture and bestiality.

Five other states are entitled to a but slightly fly-
specked crown for meritorious conduct. Arizona,
Idaho, Maine, Nevada, and Wisconsin have no re-
corded lynchings of Negroes.

Let's look at the record!

MISSISSIPPI

Mississippi's most important crop is cotton, but her
production of that commodity is surpassed by that of
Texas. In the matter of lynch-executions and the low

100

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

degree of bestiality expressed by her mobs, she reigns
supreme. Since 1882 this state has conducted more
than 1 1 per cent of all the lynchings in the country,
591 out of an ignoble total of 5,112, and but forty-
four of the victims were whites. Only in one recorded
year, 1932, has the state been without a single lynch-
ing, but its enviable effort in that year did not in-
validate its standing. Mississippi leads in the number
of women lynched— fourteen, of whom one was a
white (1898); in the number lynched whose offenses
were unknown; and in the number who could not be
identified after death. She shares with Georgia and
Texas the records for lynch-executions for no offense
whatever. She stands alone in the wide number of
fantastic offenses for which her mobs demand the
lynch penalty and in originating and putting into
effect newer and more barbarous forms of torture.

To this damning indictment may be added the
episode at Duck Hill, in 1937.

The Magnolia State has had thirty-three double
and nine triple lynchings, again topping all other
states. In her records of multiple lynchings she has on
six occasions lynched four at a time and has found
three opportunities to claim five victims. Her various
centers of civilization and culture have enjoyed some
excellent lynch-carnivals: Vicksburg, eight; Jackson,
five; Yazoo City, six.

101

JUDGE LYNCH

Her mobs are responsive and easy to rouse and
usually large, though on occasion (1934) as few as
four Mississippians can successfully conduct a lynch-
ing, especially if the victim is a Negro aged seventy
who has merely "talked disrespectfully" to his white
landlord. Her mobs are made up of resolute and
determined men who are able to outwit the ablest and
cleverest sheriffs. In one year two Negroes accused
of murder had been sent to separate jails, miles apart,
to circumvent any attempt at mob-reprisal. After a
year in their respective jails, they were being returned
in separate parties for trial. Two mobs, working like
teams, were formed and snatched the prisoners from
the deputy sheriffs, joined forces, and hanged the ac-
cused men to the same tree.

In 1918, four Negroes, all of them minors— Major
Clark, 20; Andrew Clark, 15; Maggie Howse, 20, and
Alma Howse, 1 6— were taken by a mob from a jail
at Shubuta and lynched from a bridge over the Chick-
asawha River. They were suspected of having mur-
dered Dr. E. L. Johnston, a white dentist.

An investigation conducted by the National As-
sociation for the Advancement of Colored People
disclosed the fact that Johnston had been having
illicit relations with both Maggie and Alma Howse;
that Major Clark, who worked on Johnston's planta-
tion, wished to marry Maggie. The dentist had gone

102

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

to Clark and warned him to leave his woman alone.
This had led to a quarrel that was made more bitter
when it was learned that Maggie was to have a child
by the white man. Later it was revealed that Alma,
the younger sister, was also pregnant by Johnston.

Shortly after this episode the dentist was found
mysteriously murdered. The finger of mob-suspicion
pointed to Major Clark, though there were some who
held to the theory that Johnston had been killed by
another white man who had accused him of seducing
a white woman. The Mississippi mob was not to be
cheated by any such theories nor by the fact that both
girls were pregnant.

Mississippi mobs prefer the torch and faggot to the
rope, and even burning alone does not always satisfy
their sadistic lusts. In 1925, Jim Ivy was taken from
the officers of the law and burned at the stake for an
alleged attack on a farmer's daughter. Ivy had been
taken to the hospital for identification by the attacked
girl; she was not certain, but he looked like the man
who had assaulted her. That was identification enough
for the Rocky Ford mob, and Ivy was taken to the
scene of the attack and lynched.

Another outstanding characteristic of Mississippi
mobs is their determination to get their man; nothing
is permitted to stand between them and their quarry.
The chase is part of the rare sport. In 1904, Luther

103

JUDGE LYNCH

Holbert, Negro, of Doddsville, had a quarrel with
James Eastland, a white man, and with another Negro,
John Carr. The white planter was killed in the dis-
pute that arose when he came to Carr's cabin, found
Holbert there, and ordered him to leave the planta-
tion. Carr and another Negro named Winters were
also killed. Holbert and his wife fled the plantation
and the man hunt was on; two innocent Negroes
were shot and killed before the mob took the Holberts.
There was no charge against the woman, but simple
facts like that do not deter Mississippi's mobs.

"They were tied to trees, and while the funeral
pyres were being prepared they were forced to suffer
the most fiendish tortures. The blacks were forced
to hold out their hands while one finger at a time was
chopped off. The fingers were distributed as sou-
venirs. The ears of the murderers (sic) were cut off.
Holbert was beaten severely, his skull was fractured,
and one of his eyes, knocked with a stick, hung by a
shred from the socket. . . . The most excruciating
form of punishment consisted in the use of a large
corkscrew in the hands of some of the mob. This
instrument was bored into the flesh of the man and
woman, in the arms, legs, and body, and then pulled
out, the spirals tearing out big pieces of raw, quivering
flesh every time it was withdrawn." l

1 Vicksburg (Mississippi) Evening Post.

104

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

After the mob had wearied of its sadistic frolic, it
is supposed, they mercifully burned the Negroes to
death.

It is probably easier to get lynched in Mississippi
than in any other state. The ideal American is sup-
posedly the man who works with his hands and thus
prospers, takes loving care of his family, building
honestly for their future; if he can lend a helping
hand to his fellowman in passing, so much more to
his and his community's credit. Not so in Mississippi.
Take these two cases of March, 1935.

In Lawrence County the body of R. J. Tyronne,
a prosperous Negro farmer, was found shot to pieces
in the woods near his home on the night of the
twenty-sixth, where he had been lynched by a mob
of white Mississipians about four days previously.
Tyronne was said to have been too prosperous for
his white neighbors.

Four days later, at Hernando, the body of the
Reverend T. A. Allen, of Marks, a Negro, was found
weighted down with a chain in the Coldwater River.
His only crime had been the effort to organize the
sharecroppers of his neighborhood.

Sometimes a Mississippi mob has difficulty in mak-
ing up its mind as to the best manner of lynching.
There are various schools of torture. While a Brook-
haven mob in 1928 decided that the Bearden brothers

105

JUDGE LYNCH

should be hanged, the ritual to be observed caused a
schism; one was taken by the adherents of one form
and the second by the dissenters. The first brother was
tied to the back of an automobile and dragged through
the city streets before being carried out of town and
hanged; the other brother was hurried off in a car
in the opposite direction and hanged from a bridge.

In 1934, at Hernando, De Soto County, where the
lynching of Negroes has long been regarded as a
public necessity, the lynch-execution of three Negroes
was prevented by the startling expedient of calling
out the National Guard. Judge Kuykendall apologized
for the presence of the troops by saying:

". . . there are now several anti-lynching bills
pending in Congress. The effect of these bills would
be to destroy one of the South's most cherished
possessions— the supremacy of the white race— and
I believe a lynching in this case would have effect
inevitably in the passage of one of these laws by Con-

gress." 2

GEORGIA

Georgia is a proud state and Georgians are a proud
people. It is a diversified state: Atlanta is known as
the capital of the New South, and Savannah shares
with Vicksburg, Mississippi, and Charleston, South

2 Twenty-fifth Annual Report (1934), The National Association for
the Advancement of Colored People.

1 06

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

Carolina, the honor of being one of the last stands of
the unreconstructed rebels. Georgians the state over
point with pride to their state's leadership in many
departments of human endeavor and, for all one
knows, there may even be a few Georgians who are
proud of the state's record of lynch-executions. Al-
though the state has to bow to the superior leader-
ship of Mississippi in the practice of neck-cracking,
it can claim that it has lynched fewer white men in
proportion to blacks than any state in the Union. In
point of numerical lynchings, it led all the other states
in the years 1919, 1921, 1930, 1932, 1933, and 1936.
Since 1882 the Buzzard State has lynched no less
than 570 persons (November, 1937), of whom only
thirty-nine were whites; of the 531 Negroes liqui-
dated, six were women. One was Mary Turner, whose
killing brought forth one of the most gruesome ex-
pressions of bestiality recorded in modern times. Of
the Negroes executed by mobs, two were lynched
for no reason at all, ten were killed for offenses un-
known and unrecorded, and sixty-one lynch-victims
were unknown in the communities in which their
bodies were found. Negroes have been lynched in
Georgia because they were unpopular, for throwing
stones, and for window-peeping. In Salt City, in 1917,
two Negroes were lynched for disputing a white
man's word.

107

JUDGE LYNCH

The Gem of the South has had, since 1882, thirty
double and ten triple lynchings. In her record of
multiple lynchings Georgia mobs have twice had four
victims, and on four occasions they have had five. In
December, 1894, a Brooks County mob lynched
seven Negroes; in June, 1905, the citizens of Oconee
County achieved what they believed to be an all-
time high of eight victims, seven of whom were
charged with murder and one with rape. In 1918,
Brooks County was again drenched with blood, and
Georgia's record for mass-lynchings was established
with eleven black victims. With this ignominious
total she shares second place with Louisiana; Arkansas
still holds the unenviable record of having lynched
the greatest number at a single ridotto.

The scenes of Georgia's lynch-executions are well-
distributed over the state; no one locality, save the
ill-famed county of Lowndes, can lay claim to dis-
tinction for any numerical score, nor can the state
centers of culture and commerce dodge the accusa-
tion that, at some time within the last fifty years, their
citizens have on occasion pushed aside the legally
constituted judiciary and summoned the rump court
of old Judge Lynch.

Only in Mississippi and Arkansas do mobs equal
Georgian barbarity and savagery in lynch-executions.
In April, 1 899, Samuel Hose, a Negro farm worker,

108

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

had a quarrel with his employer over wages due. The
farmer was killed and Sam Hose escaped. The mob
that sought him lacked, in the minds of the leaders,
the required ginger, and the man-hunt was pepped up
with the added charge that Hose had raped his em-
ployer's widow. When he was captured, the Negro
confessed to the murder but refused, even under tor-
ture, to confess to the second crime.

"In the presence of nearly two thousand people,
who sent aloft yells of defiance and shouts of joy,
Sam Hose (a Negro who had committed two of the
basest acts known to crime) was burned at the stake
in a public road. . . . Before the torch was applied
to the pyre, the Negro was deprived of his ears, fingers
and other portions of his body with surprising forti-
tude. Before the body was cool, it was cut to pieces,
the bones were crushed into small bits and even the
tree upon which the wretch met his fate was torn up
and disposed of as souvenirs.

"The Negro's heart was cut in several pieces as
was also his liver. Those unable to obtain the ghastly
relics directly, paid more fortunate possessors ex-
travagant sums for them." 3

Georgian vengeance is long, and it will go to any
lengths to achieve its grisly ends. On more than one
occasion Judge Lynch has proved his court to be the

8 New York Tribune, April 24, 1899.

109

JUDGE LYNCH

dominant court of that realm, reversing the highest
courts and setting aside decisions and sentences that
were not in accord with his own limited views. Judge
Lynch's court is unlike the legal courts of appeal in
that he does not wait until cases are brought to him
for a rehearing; in Georgia he has on occasion gone
right into the courts of justice and snatched his vic-
tims from under the nose of the presiding judge.

In 1904, two Negroes, Paul Reed and Will Cato,
were on trial in Statesboro, Bulloch County, for the
atrocious murder of the Hodges, a white family.
They had already been convicted and were before
the bench for sentence when the mob broke into the
courtroom and carried them off. In spite of the plea
of the brother of the murdered man that the law be
allowed to take its course, the two Negroes were
burned to death in the presence of a large crowd.
That was April 16. The day following was given
over to rioting in which many citizens were beaten
because their skins were black, and Albert Roger and
his son were lynched for no other reason. Miles away,
in the same Bulloch County but in the town of Portal,
Sebastian McBride, a respectable Negro, was beaten,
kicked, and shot to death for trying to defend his
wife, who was confined with a three days' old baby,
from a whipping at the hands of a white mob.

In 1908, Statesboro again gave way to its tradi-

no

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

tional jitters, and on February 17 lynched an un-
known Negro on a charge of rape and, a week later,
another Negro, Gilbert Thompson, on the same
charge. Later, far too late for the two Negroes, they
were proved innocent.

Sidney Johnson was a Negro peon whose fine of
thirty dollars had been paid by a white farmer. Smith
had the reputation of ill-treating his Negro employees,
and Johnson rebelled. After having suffered beatings
and abuse, the Negro shot and killed his employer as
he sat in his window at home; he also shot and
wounded Smith's wife.

For this crime a mob of Georgia whites scoured the
surrounding country for more than a week, engaged
in a hunt for the guilty man. Failing to find him, they
began to kill every Negro who could even remotely
be identified with either the victim or his slayer. Will
Head, Will Thompson, Chime Riley, Eugene Rice,
Simon Shuman, Hayes Turner, and three unidenti-
fied Negroes helped expiate Johnson's crime. Mary
Turner, who was within a month of confinement,
loudly proclaimed the innocence of her husband, cry-
ing out maledictions on the mob and threatening to
swear out warrants for their arrest. She was herself
taken out and lynched: hanged head downward while
gasoline and motor oil were thrown on her clothing
and set afire. Life still lingered in the dead body, and

in

JUDGE LYNCH

a member of the mob stepped forward and with his
pocket knife opened the abdomen. The prematurely
born child fell to the ground, and the cruel surgeon
then crushed its head with his heel. Before the mob
dispersed, further pleasure was derived from using
the mother's body as a target for pistol practice.

The murderer, Sidney Johnson, was at length dis-
covered in a house in Valdosta. The house was sur-
rounded by a posse headed by the chief of police, and
Johnson elected to shoot it out. Before his ammuni-
tion was exhausted, the fugitive had wounded the
chief. When the house was entered, he was found
dead. His body was mutilated.

When the courts of Georgia are not dominated by
mobs, as in the Leo Frank case, or overruled by mob
law as in the Bulloch County case related above, they
sometimes co-operate with the mob. In 1911, Thomas
Allen, a Negro, was in jail on a charge of attempted
rape and Foster Watts was being held on a charge of
"loitering in a suspicious manner." The Judge ordered
Allen brought to Monroe for trial and, though the
Judge knew that citizens had organized a mob to
lynch the prisoner, refused to accept the troops
offered him by the Governor. Allen was sent to Mon-
roe in the charge of two officers; the train was stopped
and the prisoner hanged beside the tracks. The mob
then proceeded to Monroe and snatched Watts from

112

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

the jail and hanged and shot him. Judge Brand on a
previous occasion had refused proffered troops with
the statement that he "would not imperil the life of
one man to save the lives of a hundred Negroes." 4

It is not necessary to commit a crime nor to be sus-
pected of one to be lynched in Georgia. As recently
as 1933, in the town of Newton, the body of T. J.
Thomas, a middle-aged Negro, was found hanging
to a tree. No reason for the lynching could be given,
no clues to the slayers could be found, and no arrests
were made. Three days later, at the same place, was
found hanging the body of Richard Marshall, a mid-
dle-aged Negro. No reasons for the lynching could
be given, no clues to the slayers were found, and no
arrests were made.

These incidents may explain the resolution adopted
on November 29, 1937, by the Georgia House of
Representatives and sent at once to the Senate. It
charged that the Anti-Lynching bill, then pending in
Congress, was "manifestly unjust, unfair and would
work an oppressive burden upon the entire South."

No comment.

TEXAS

Recorded lynchings in the Lone Star State are a
little confused. The totals do not resolve themselves

4 The Crisis, August, 1911.

JUDGE LYNCH

into blacks and whites, but also include Indians and
Mexicans who may have been either white or In-
dian. Since 1882 there have been 549 lynchings
(1937) involving 384 Negroes, 128 whites, 36 Mexi-
cans, and i Indian. Fifty-five of those lynched were
unknown by name, twenty-two were lynched for
no known reason, and one for no reason whatever.
Seven were women, of whom two were white, and
one was a case of mistaken identity.

Texas has had twenty-three double and twelve
triple lynchings. On three occasions Texas mobs have
had four victims, one had five, and four had six. In
1 897, a record was set with seven that was not broken
until 1908, when eight victims were claimed. Texas
mobs achieved their all-time high in 1915 when they
lynched near Brownsville ten Mexicans who were
charged with train-wrecking and murder. Since the
Armistice, Texas mobs have lynched sixty victims;
nineteen were shot, twenty-three were hanged,
twelve were burned, two were flogged to death, and
four came to their deaths by means unknown.

In 1891 a Cass County mob lynched two Negroes
for being troublesome; others were lynched for gam-
bling, window-peeping, marrying a white woman,
and eloping. The latter case was that of a white
minister, a Reverend Captain Jones, of Paris, Lamar

114

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

County. Texans are touchy and resent any form of
irregularity.

The year, 1922, when Texas romped off with
numerical dishonors, she achieved a total of sixteen
out of a national total of sixty-one lynchings. May was
the banner month in Texas, ten being the total for the
month of merriment; of the year's total, eight vic-
tims were taken from officers or jails.

In August, 1916, the simple citizens of San Benito
got so much pleasure out of lynching six Mexicans
on the charge of pillage and murder that they spent
the next two weeks assembling six more Mexicans
whom they lynched on the charge of banditry. As a
matter of record it seems that 1916 was a bad year
for Mexicans in Texas; twenty-six of their total were
lynched in that year, but many of these cases were
the result of border trouble with Mexico.

Texas mobs have little to distinguish them from
other mobs. There is a directness about them that is
not found elsewhere, and only on occasions do they
stoop to the savagery of their sister states. They do
err, like others, and at times let Judge Lynch take over
their most sacred tribunals of law. In 1895 a Negro
was lynched for riding his horse over a little white
girl and inflicting serious injuries upon her. Later the
mob found that the guilty man had escaped and the

"5

JUDGE LYNCH

Negro lynched was innocent, but he was already too
dead for them to do anything about it.

Dan Davis, a Negro, was burned at the stake at
Tyler for the crime of attempted rape, May 25, 1912.

"There was some disappointment in the crowd and
criticism of those who had bossed the arrangements,
because the fire was so slow in reaching the Negro.
It was really only ten minutes after the fire was
started that smoking shoe soles and twitching of the
Negro's feet indicated that his lower extremities
were burning, but the time seemed much longer. The
spectators had waited so long to see him tortured
that they begrudged the ten minutes before his suffer-
ing really began.

"The Negro uttered but few words. When he was
led to where he was to be burned, he said quite
calmly, 'I wish some of you gentlemen would be
Christian enough to cut my throat,' but nobody re-
sponded. When the fire started, he screamed, 'Lord,
have mercy on my soul,' and that was the last word
he spoke, though he was conscious for fully twenty
minutes after that. His exhibition of nerve aroused
the admiration even of his torturers." 5

Texas lays claim to one of the largest mobs ever
assembled, 15,000. There is, of course, a fine distinc-
tion between the mob and the spectators; the mob does

5 The Crisis, June, September, 1912.

116

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

the actual work of securing the victim, making all
preparations, and finally killing him. In the case of
Jesse Washington, the actual mob was 1,500 and the
balance, no one of whom attempted to stop the execu-
tion, merely accessories before the fact.

Jesse Washington was a defective Negro boy of
about nineteen years, unable to read or write; he was
employed as a farm hand in Robinson, a small town
near Waco. One day the wife of his employer found
fault with him, whereupon he struck her on the head
with a hammer and killed her. There was some, but
not conclusive, evidence that he had raped her. He
was arrested, tried, and found guilty, and sentenced
to death by hanging within ten days of the commis-
sion of the crime.

As the sentence was pronounced, a mob of 1,500
white men, who feared the law's delay, broke into the
courtroom and seized the prisoner. He was dragged
through the streets, stabbed, mutilated, and finally
burned to death in the public square in Waco in the
presence of a crowd of 15,000 men, women, and chil-
dren. The Mayor and the Chief of Police witnessed
the lynching.6

In 1930, a mob in Sherman, unable to intimidate
the officers who were holding the person of George
Hughes for trial on charges of assaulting a white

6 Thirty Years of Lynching in the United States.

117

JUDGE LYNCH

woman, achieved their desire by burning the court-
house in which the Negro was jailed.

In 1935, in Colorado County, a mob of 700 persons,
many of them women, took two Negro boys, aged
fifteen and sixteen, from the officers who were taking
them to face a charge of murder, and hanged them to
a tree. The County Attorney, who should have prose-
cuted the lynchers, said: "I do not call the citizens
who executed the Negroes a mob. I consider their
action an expression of the will of the people." The
County Judge, before whom the lynchers should have
been tried, said: "I am strongly opposed to mob vio-
lence and favor orderly process of the law. The fact
that the Negroes who so brutally murdered Miss Koll-
man could not be adequately punished by law because
of their ages prevents me from condemning those citi-
zens who meted justice to the ravishing murderers
last night." 7

Judge Lynch concurring.

LOUISIANA

Louisiana, with only 421 lynchings to her credit,
hardly belongs in the big company dominated by
Mississippi, Georgia, and Texas. Her high rating is
hardly justified today, for she has had but thirty-six
lynchings since the Armistice, and only her previous

7 The Crisis, January, 1936.

118

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

numerical strength keeps her so high on the list. Of
Louisiana's total of 42 1 (1937), sixty-two were white
men, three were colored women, and one was a white
woman. Three were lynched for no offense what-
ever, eleven for offenses that could not be determined
by investigators, and forty-six victims were unknown
in the communities in which their bodies were found.
There have been twenty-nine double and twelve triple
lynchings since 1882. On three occasions mobs have
had four victims, and on one, five. In 1891 a New
Orleans mob invaded a jail and lynched eleven Italians
who had been convicted of murder. In 1894 a mob
at Talullah, in Madison Parish, lynched seven Negroes
charged with murder.

Such centers of civilization as New Orleans had six
lynchings with seventeen victims; Shreveport, eleven
lynchings, each mob content with a single victim;
Baton Rouge, four. Talullah, with only three lynch-
ings, rolled up a total of twelve victims, but has had
no lynch-executions since 1906.

Louisiana mobs are fallible, like those of other
states. In 1892 a mob was seeking John Hastings, a
Negro of Calaboula, for murder. Failing to find John
at home, they lynched his son and daughter. Three
days later the mob caught up with the murderer and
completed the job. Again, in 1899, at Lindsay, a town
near Jackson, there had been an attempted assault on

119

JUDGE LYNCH

a white woman by a Negro, Val Bages. Mitchell
Curry, a white farmer, hearing that someone was in
his cornfield, took two Negroes with him to drive
away the intruder. He proved to be a large Negro,
and Curry, becoming convinced that he was Bages,
gave chase and finally treed him. The man was or-
dered to remain in the tree while one of his pursu-
ers went for a rope to hang him, but he slid down and
was shot to death. Examination showed that his cloth-
ing was that worn at the State Insane Asylum at Jack-
son, and investigation proved that he was an inmate
who had escaped a few days before. Wandering at
large, he had suffered death for a crime that he had
not committed.

In 1914, at Sylvester Station, three Negroes were
lynched for the murder of the postmaster. One, an
old man, bore an excellent reputation in the neighbor-
hood; there was no evidence against him and, under
duress, he refused to confess to the crime. He was
burned at the stake in the presence of a large crowd.

The Houston (Texas) Post, commenting editori-
ally on the lynching, said:

"The conviction is irresistible that the old man
who was burned to death had nothing whatever to do
with the crime. If he had been guilty, the torture to
which he was subjected would have forced a confes-
sion, and the wonder is that he did not confess any-

120

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

how, in the agony of his roasting flesh, as many inno-
cent victims have done in the vain hope of escaping
torture. In all probability the guilty murderers of the
village postmaster are at large, while the blood of in-
nocents rests upon the hands of those who took it
upon themselves to discharge the functions of the
law." 8

In 1 897, William Gordon, of Jefferson, was lynched
for disobeying ferry regulations, and, in 1910, Laura
Porter, Negress of Monroe, was lynched for keeping
a disreputable house.

Lynching offenses in Louisiana include miscegena-
tion, slapping a child, making threats, insulting a lady,
vagrancy, and bringing suit against a white man.

Louisiana can boast one of the few lynchings con-
ducted by Negroes. On August 3, 1934, at Caddo
Parish, Grafton Page, a thirty-four-year old Negro,
was beaten to death by members of his own race be-
cause of an alleged insult by Page to a colored girl
who had gone out riding with him.

ALABAMA

Alabama sits pleasantly in the deep center of the
Lynch belt and, through the use of the radio and the
automobile, her mob-minded citizens can participate
in and have participated in lynchings in Georgia,

8 Thirty Years of Lynching in the United States.

121

JUDGE LYNCH

Mississippi, Tennessee, and Florida. The Cotton State
has an unenviable record of her own: 375 victims, of
whom fifty-five were whites and eight were colored
women. Forty-one were unknown in the communi-
ties where their bodies were found, but only four suf-
fered death for offenses unknown, and two through
mistaken identity. Alabama mobs have had fourteen
double and twelve triple lynchings. Lynch-carnivals
have claimed four victims four times and five victims
twice. In 1891 the citizens of Choctaw County got
together and lynched seven white men for outlawry,
and therewith established the state's record.

Since the Armistice was signed there have been
forty-two persons lynched, of whom twenty-six were
shot, three hanged, three beaten to death, one cut to
pieces, and one burned. Eight came to their deaths by
means unknown to the investigators. Lynching scenes
are evenly distributed throughout the state, and such
important centers as Montgomery and Birmingham
have had seven and four lynchings respectively. Ala-
bama mobs seldom descend to the bestiality exhibited
by her sister states of the Lynch belt, and only once
in recent years has one run hog-wild; when the smoke
cleared away there were four dead Negroes and two
dead white men.

Clarence Boyd, filling station operator at Geiger,

122

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

seven miles from Emelle, picked a bad time to try to
collect three dollars and a half that Esau Robinson,
Negro, owed him for a second-hand battery. It was
July 4, 1930, and a large number of Negroes had
gathered at an Emelle Negro church for a picnic.
Clarence Boyd happened to be there, and he de-
manded payment for the battery; when it was re-
fused, he lifted the battery from the Robinson car
and placed it in a store at Emelle, refusing to let Esau
have it until he had paid for it. Esau left to get the
money.

At four that afternoon Esau returned, accompanied
by his father, Tom, two brothers, Ollis and King, and
a cousin also named Robinson. The Negroes were
armed and were drinking. They searched the stores
of Emelle until they found Clarence Boyd. Motion-
ing him outside the store, Esau hit him over the head
with a bottle. Boyd called to his uncle Grover for
help, and as the latter approached, old Tom hit him
with a heavy stick. Grover ran to his car for his pistol
and began firing at Tom who, though wounded, made
his escape. While Boyd was still firing at Tom, either
King or Ollis Robinson came up behind him, took
aim, and fired. Grover Boyd fell dying, and another
member of the Robinson family fired several shots
into him. With the exception of Esau, all the Robin-

123

JUDGE LYNCH

sons made their escape. A white merchant held on to
Esau and tied him to a post to await the coming of
the sheriff.

When the sheriff arrived, he was told that Esau
was not the man who had killed Grover Boyd. Leav-
ing the Negro tied to the post, he went in pursuit of
the fleeing Robinsons. Some time before midnight
Esau was released from the post and shot to death by
a mob of less than fifty persons.

The armed man-hunters converged on the home of
farmer-preacher John Newton Robinson, brother of
Tom and uncle of Esau. John would not give up his
gun nor would he permit his house to be searched.
In the resulting quarrel he was shot to death and a
white overseer, a member of the posse, was killed,
probably unintentionally, by a member of the mob.
The sheriff, believing that the fugitive Robinsons
were hiding in the house, ordered it fired. There were
no Robinsons within, and the mob went on with its
hunt. On the night of the fifth, Winston Jones, Ne-
gro, received a fatal shot at Narkeeta, Mississippi, just
across the state line, for failing to stop when ordered.
Later in the night a Negro woman, Viola Dial, who
was in a car with her husband and three other men,
was shot when the driver refused to stop the car at the
order of the man-hunters.

For weeks the search for the fugitives went on, but

124

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

the mob-minded had deserted and the search was
brought to an end by State Enforcement Officers.
Tom Robinson and his sons, Ollis and King, were
taken to Kilby Prison at Montgomery. Others of the
Robinson family, including women and children,
were confined in Kilby for safekeeping and as wit-
nesses.

Certain Negroes, familiar with the Emelle com-
munity, reported that the altercation over the battery
was the immediate but not the real cause of the out-
break. According to them, the trouble grew out of
the insistence of certain white men upon "running
with" the Robinson and other Negro women.

The persistence of Alabama mobs and their high
standing in their communities is best shown by the
recent ill-smelling Scottsboro cases. Seven colored
boys were sentenced to death on the testimony of
two disreputable women, neither of whom knew the
meaning of the phrase "sexual intercourse" but only
of the usual gutter term. Even when one of the girls
recanted her story, only a nationwide clamor could
obtain new trials for the defendants.

ARKANSAS

Although Arkansas has achieved the distinction of
having been the scene of the largest lynching carnival
in the history of the industry, her lynch-executions

125

JUDGE LYNCH

lack distinction: her mobs merely take their victims
out and dispose of them with dispatch. Since 1882
there have been 315 lynchings; sixty-nine of these
involved whites, two of them women charged with
or suspected of murder, and five colored women.
Only one was lynched through mistaken identity,
four for offenses unknown; thirty-two were un-
known in the communities where their bodies were
found.

Arkansas mobs have held eleven double and six
triple lynchings. On four occasions they have had
four victims and, in 1899, the good folk of Little
River lynched seven on the charge of murder. In
1904 the white citizens of St. Charles, Arkansas
County, went berserk and destroyed thirteen of their
colored fellowmen in an orgy of race prejudice, es-
tablishing the state and nation records for known
lynch-executions.

Of the state's centers of fashion and culture, Hot
Springs leads with a total of six lynchings; Pine Bluff
follows with five, Little Rock with four, and Arkan-
sas City with two, one of which was a triple lynching.
Since the Armistice there have been thirty-three per-
sons lynched; fourteen of these victims were merci-
fully shot, thirteen were hanged, three burned, and
three went to their deaths by means unknown to the
investigators.

126

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

If there is one thing an Arkansan dislikes more
than a black skin, it is the white skin of a class-
conscious sharecropper. So far the record shows that
the dominant whites are content with slapping such
about, whipping and beating them out of the state.
That none have been killed is due only to bad marks-
manship; enough shots having been fired.

FLORIDA

In 1903, when Cutler completed his records of
lynchings, Florida was placed ninth in numerical or-
der; in Walter White's records (1927) she was placed
seventh, a position she still holds. However, in the
number of lynchings since the Armistice, Florida is
securely in third place. Of the 290 victims of lynch-
executions since 1882, only thirty-one were whites;
three were women. Florida mobs are willing to de-
stroy for alleged offenses, but none were lynched for
no offense or through mistaken identity. Forty-six
were unknown to the communities in which their
bodies were found, and the offenses of eight were
undetermined by investigators.

Florida has had sixteen double and seven triple
lynchings. On two occasions the mobs have had four
victims and on one, five. In 1911 and 1916 they had
six victims, but the state's record was established in

127

JUDGE LYNCH

1897, when eight blacks were executed on the charge
of murder.

Since the Armistice, sixty-eight Floridians have
been lynched, of whom twenty-eight were shot,
eighteen hanged, seven burned, four drowned, and
one beaten to death. Ten came to their deaths by
means unknown.

While the city of Ocala seems to lead the state in
number of lynchings, eight with nine victims, Tampa
has achieved in fewer years the same number of vic-
tims in but six lynch occasions. Lake City also had
six lynchings, but with only the same number of vic-
tims.

Florida mobs may be distinguished for their direct-
ness; they will not be put off when they lust for blood.
In August, 1916, in Newberry, a Negro farmer
named Boisey Long was accused by white farmers of
hog stealing. The sheriff and the white man who had
sworn out the warrant for Long's arrest went to take
him. Both white men were shot, the sheriff later dy-
ing of his wound.

Boisey Long escaped and when the mob came to
get him they had to be content with his wife, Stella,
and a friend of hers, Mary Dennis. The two Negresses
were taken to jail where, it is said, they were tortured
to secure information. Two other Negroes, Bert Den-
nis and Andrew McHenry, were arrested and tor-

128

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

tured. The mob, failing to find Long, had shot a Ne-
gro named James Dennis, Bert's brother, and when
Bert had gone to Newberry to get a coffin they had
seized him and thrown him in jail. The mob contin-
ued its search and, its blood lust running high, hanged
a Negro preacher, Josh Haskins, because he happened
to be a neighbor of Long's. Then they went to the
jail and secured the four prisoners and took them out
and hanged them. Mary Dennis was the mother of
two children and was pregnant; Stella Long had four
children.

Long was finally apprehended and indicted for the
murder of the sheriff and for shooting the man who
had sworn out the warrant for his arrest. None of the
lynchers was indicted.

The other sextuple lynching occurred in Lake
City in 1911. A Negro named Norris and a white
man quarreled over some trivial matter, and the white
man made a murderous attack on the Negro. The
matter was brought before a justice of the peace, and
the Negro was exonerated. Later the white man went
to the Negro's house, accompanied by some of his
friends, and reopened the quarrel. A shooting affray
followed, in which one white man was killed and an-
other wounded. Norris and the friends he had with
him awaited the coming of the sheriff and surren-
dered. Six of them were arrested and sent to Lake City

129

JUDGE LYNCH

for safekeeping. A party of lynchers gained admission
to the jail by means of a forged telegram and secured
the prisoners under the pretext of taking them to
Jacksonville for greater protection. They then took
the Negroes to the outskirts of Lake City and shot
them to death.

TENNESSEE

Though Tennessee stands eighth in numerical or-
der, she has less than half the number of lynchings of
Mississippi to her credit. Of Tennessee's 275 lynch-
executions, only fifty-three involved white men and
two white women. Three Negresses were lynched;
twenty-eight victims were unknown by name, and
six were executed for unknown offenses. Only one
suffered through mistaken identity.

Tennessee mobs have had twenty-one double
lynchings and five triple lynchings. On one occa-
sion the mob had four victims and on another six.
Since the Armistice there have been but eighteen
persons lynched; of these nine were shot and nine
were hanged. Lynchings have been well distributed
throughout the state, though a small place named
Tiptonville has succeeded in rolling up a lynch-total
of twelve victims in seven lynchings. Memphis has
had five; Nashville, three; Chattanooga, two; and

130

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

Knoxville, one. Ripley, another small town, has man-
aged to stage five lynchings, one a double.

In 1901, at Rome, a Negro named Crutchfield stole
a purse. He was taken from the sheriff by a mob and
started for the place of execution. In some way he
managed to escape, and this so enraged the mob that
it took the Negro's sister out and lynched her.

Tennessee mobs continued their ungallant conduct
in 1911. Ben Pettigrew, a successful Negro farmer,
and his two daughters were on their way to Savannah
(Tennessee), taking a load of seedcotton to a cotton
gin. On no known provocation they were ambushed
by four white men who shot the father, hanged the
daughters, and then drove the load of cotton under
the tree from which the bodies dangled and set fire to
it. Two of the white men were ultimately hanged for
their part in the lynching.

Tennessee's greatest lynching carnival was held in
Memphis in May, 1917. Ell Person, confessed ax-
murderer of a id-year-old white girl, was burned to
death in the presence of 15,000 men, women, and
little children. The mother of the murdered child
cheered the mob as they poured oil on the Negro and
set him afire. The Memphis Press, in reporting the
lynching, said that the mob "fought and screamed
and crowded to get a glimpse of him, and the mob

JUDGE LYNCH

closed in and struggled about the fire as the flames
flared high and the smoke rolled over their heads.
Two of them hacked off his ears as he burned; an-
other tried to cut off a toe, but they stopped him."

Jim Mclllherron was a Negro who resented the
slights and insults of white men; he went armed, and
even the sheriff was afraid of him. On February 8,
1918, at Estill Springs, he got into a quarrel with
three young white men. Threats were made, and Mc-
lllherron fired six shots, killing two of the whites. He
then fled to the home of G. W. Lynch, a colored
clergyman, who helped him to escape and was him-
self shot and killed by the mob. Mclllherron was cap-
tured and arrangements made for a gala lynching.
Men, women, and children came to Estill Springs
from a radius of fifty miles. The Negro was chained
to a hickory tree while the mob howled about him. A
fire was built a few feet away and the torture began.
Bars of iron were heated, and members of the mob
amused themselves by holding them close to the vic-
tim, at first without touching him. One bar he grasped,
and as it was torn away all the inside of his hand came
with it. Then the real torture began, lasting twenty
minutes.9

During this time, while his flesh was slowly roast-
ing, the Negro never lost his nerve. He cursed those

9 The Crisis, May, 1918.

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

who tortured him, and almost to his last breath de-
rided the attempts of the mob to break his spirit.

In 1934, at Shelbyville, Bedford County, a minor
lynch center, a mob assembled to take E. K. Harris,
who was on trial for criminal assault; they were re-
pulsed by state troops who killed three and wounded
twenty more. The mob was so enraged at losing its
victim that it burned down the $150,000 courthouse.

KENTUCKY

Since 1882 Kentucky has had 236 lynchings; of
these eighty-three involved whites, three of them
women, and two, colored women. Twenty of those
lynched were unknown in the communities where
their bodies were found, and six were executed for no
known offense. Kentucky mobs have staged twelve
double and three triple lynchings, and on two occa-
sions have had four victims. On November 13, 1914,
Night Riders took ten unknown Negroes from the
town of Rochester and hanged them for reasons best
known to the riders. Of the three white women
lynched, one was executed with her husband and two
other members of her family for making threats,
one on the charge of murder, and the last as a result
of mob-indignation. What made the mob indignant
is not recorded. The two Negresses were charged
with murder.

133

JUDGE LYNCH

Most Kentucky lynchings have been confined to
the smaller communities. Among the larger cities,
Frankfort has had two; Shelby ville, three, with six
victims; Paducah, three— one a double lynching; and
Bowling Green, two. Since the Armistice there have
been ten lynchings; four of these were hangings, three
shootings, and three of the killings were by methods
unknown.

Kentucky mobs do their jobs thoroughly. At Shel-
by ville, in January, 191 1, a mob felt it its duty to give
two Negroes the hemp cure for insulting white
women. They took the two young Negroes from the
jail and then, as a sort of afterthought, returned and
secured an old Negro who was awaiting death sen-
tence. The Chicago Tribune, reporting the affair,
stated:

"All three Negroes pleaded for their lives but the
lynchers paid no attention to them. The lynching was
devoid of the minor brutalities that frequently mark
such occasions. There was no abuse of the prisoners.
The mob was made up of quiet, determined men
whose mission was to execute but not to torture."

The rope used on the two younger Negroes broke
and they made a dash for liberty, but were riddled
with bullets. The mob numbered only twenty men,
all masked.

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

SOUTH CAROLINA

Only nine of South Carolina's 180 lynch victims
were whites. Of the 1 7 1 Negroes, seven were women,
two were executed through mistaken identity, four-
teen were unknown in the communities where their
bodies were found, and one's offense was unknown.
South Carolina mobs have held thirteen double and
three triple lynchings; in 1889 they found eight vic-
tims and again, in 1898, they found eight more. Ai-
ken, the between-season resort of the bon ton, seems
to have achieved an unenviable reputation as a lynch-
center; three carnivals produced seven victims. Co-
lumbia, the capital, has had but one, and Charleston
has a clean bill of health. Barnwell and Phoenix share
honors in octuple lynchings.

There have been nineteen lynchings since the Armi-
stice; thirteen of the victims were shot, one hanged,
two beaten to death, and three died by methods un-
known to the records.

The alleged miscarriage of justice is what turns
honest South Carolinians into mobs. In 1916, at Ab-
beville, Anthony Crawford, a wealthy Negro farmer,
came into town to sell a load of cotton. He had an un-
fortunate run-in with a white storekeeper over the
price of the cotton, and cursed him. For that he was

135

JUDGE LYNCH

thrown into jail and released on bail of fifteen dollars.
Enraged at this miscarriage of justice, a mob pursued
him into a gin mill and became further infuriated
when he tried to defend himself. He was dragged out,
beaten, kicked, stabbed, and partially blinded before
the sheriff rescued him and took him back to jail.
Later in the afternoon the mob broke into the jail,
dragged the Negro through the streets to the fair
grounds, hung him to a tree, and riddled his body
with bullets.

Prohibition provided Aiken with its greatest lynch-
ing bee. A sheriff and three deputies were sent to
arrest Sam Lowman, who was suspected of selling
whiskey. Sam was away, but his wife and daughter,
Bertha, were at home; when they saw the four white
men, wearing no insignia to indicate their official po-
sitions, they ran into the house. The officers sur-
rounded the house and the sheriff entered and struck
Bertha in the mouth with his fist. The girl's mother
started to her defense and was shot through the heart
by one of the deputies. A son and nephew, working
in a nearby field, heard the screams and shots and
hurried to the rescue. In the shooting that ensued, the
sheriff was killed and Bertha, her brother, and her
cousin seriously wounded.

The trial of the three Negroes was dominated by
the Ku Klux Klan, of which the dead sheriff and his

I36

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

deputies were known members. The two Negro boys
were sentenced to death and Bertha Lowman was
given life imprisonment. The Supreme Court of
South Carolina, on the appeal of a Negro lawyer,
granted the three a new trial. So well was the new
case prepared that the Judge was forced to direct a
verdict of not guilty for Demon Lowman, the son.
Fearing a further miscarriage of justice, the mob
overpowered the jailer and took the three Negroes
to a tourist camp on the outskirts of Aiken.

South Carolina mobs like their little jokes. Before
2,000 men and women the prisoners were told they
were free to run as fast as their legs would carry them.
Off they started, and a volley of bullets brought the
two boys down. Bertha Lowman, with many bullets
in her body, was making good her escape when an-
other round of fifty shots brought her down for good.

OKLAHOMA

Oklahoma is the first state outside of the real South
to get into big company. Since 1882 she has staged
143 lynchings; ninety-five of the victims were white
men, two were white women, two Negresses, twelve
Indians, and two Mexicans. Thirty-one were un-
known in the communities where their bodies were
found, and five were lynched for unknown reasons.

137

JUDGE LYNCH

The state has staged nine double and two triple lynch-
ings, two in which there were four victims, and one
with five; in 1894 a mob hanged seven horse thieves
at a single fiesta. Since the Armistice, Oklahoma has
had ten lynchings; four victims were hanged, four
shot, one was drowned, and the tenth came to his
death by means unknown. One white woman was
lynched by Indians for an unknown reason, and the
other with her husband for an equally unknown rea-
son.

Oklahoma mobs do not require much reason for
lynching. In 1911, at Okemah, Laura Nelson, Ne-
gress, was accused of murdering a deputy sheriff who
had discovered stolen goods in her house. She and her
son, a boy of fifteen, were taken from the jail, dragged
about six miles to the Canadian River, and hanged
from a bridge. The woman was raped by members
of the mob before she was hanged.10

Further example of Oklahoman gallantry: In 1914,
Marie Scott, seventeen-year-old Negress of Wagoner
County, was assaulted and raped by white men. She
was alone in the house when the men entered, but her
screams brought her brother to the rescue. In the
fight that ensued, one of the white men was killed.
The next day the mob came to lynch her brother,
but, finding he had escaped, lynched Marie instead.

Crisis, July, 1911.

138

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

MISSOURI

With Missouri the lynch record, in order, returns
to the South. In the 120 lynch-executions, fifty of
the victims were white men, one was a white woman
accused of murder, and one a colored woman whose
offense was unknown. Missouri mobs have witnessed
eight double and three triple lynchings and have had
four victims who were unknown in the communi-
ties in which their bodies were found; five were
lynched for causes unknown. Since the Armistice,
Missouri has had eleven lynchings with eight hang-
ings, one shooting, one burning, and one by means un-
known.

Two Missouri lynchings are considered of suffi-
cient significance to be treated fully in another chap-
ter.11

VIRGINIA

Of Virginia's 109 lynch victims, twenty-four were
whites; one of them a woman who was lynched be-
cause of her disreputable character. Thirteen victims
were unknown in the communities in which their
bodies were found, and three were lynched for of-
fenses known only to the lynchers. There have been

11 "Some of Judge Lynch's Cases": The Five Thousandth; Three
Governors Go Into Action.

139

JUDGE LYNCH

five double and one triple lynchings, one with four
victims, and another with five. Since the Armistice,
Virginia has had but five recorded lynch-executions,
and three of these were accomplished by shooting
and two by hanging.

Negroes have narrow escapes in the Old Domin-
ion. In 193 1, William Harper was convicted of crimi-
nal assault on a white woman and condemned to
death. At a second trial the "assaulted" woman's es-
cort courageously came forward and testified that
she had spent the night of the alleged assault with him.
The woman was subsequently convicted of perjury.

NORTH CAROLINA

Of all the states in the South, North Carolina has
made the noblest effort to eradicate the crime of
lynching. Yet she has had 105 recorded lynchings, in
which only twenty-one of the victims were whites;
twelve victims were unknown in the communities in
which their bodies were found and two were lynched
for undetermined offenses. One white woman, a girl,
was lynched with an Indian doctor in 1897 for an
offense that is still unknown. North Carolina mobs
have held six double lynchings. Since the Armistice,
nine lynch-executions were achieved by shooting,
seven by hanging, and two by methods unknown.

140

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

MONTANA

Most of Montana's ninety lynchings involved bor-
der warfare or frontier justice and included but two
Negroes as principals. One case that is still a stench in
American nostrils is that of Frank Little, a cripple,
who in 1917 was brutally lynched in the city of
Butte.12 In 1920 a white man named E. P. Lampson
who was resisting arrest was burned to death in the
streets of Billings.

COLORADO

Since 1882 Colorado has lynched seventy persons,
of whom sixty-six were white men. The offenses
meriting lynching— that is, inflaming the Coloradoan
into mob action— are, in the case of white men, mur-
der, bank robbery, and desperadism. Negroes are
lynched on the usual charges, real or alleged.

Colorado has had but one lynching since the Armi-
stice, that of two Mexicans taken from the officers
of the law and hanged at Pueblo on September 13,
1919.

NEBRASKA

Mob spirit in Nebraska is aroused by murder,
cattle-rustling, arson, and wife-beating. In 1889 and

12 "Some of Judge Lynch's Cases": Those Who Defied the Bosses.

141

JUDGE LYNCH

1895 vigilantes rode wild in Keyapaha County and
hanged four for rustling. Fifty-five of Nebraska's
fifty-nine victims were white, and she has had but
one lynching since the Armistice: in 1919 Will
Brown, Negro, was burned to death in Omaha for
an alleged attack on a white woman.

KANSAS

On fifty-six occasions Kansans have risen in wrath
and lynch-executed the same number of their fellow-
citizens; nineteen were Negroes, a high percentage
for a western state. On four occasions mobs have con-
ducted double lynchings; murder seems to have been
the usual cause. Kansas has had three lynchings since
the Armistice; two of the victims were hanged, and
the third came to his death by means unknown.

WEST VIRGINIA

On the night of December 5, 1 894, Lincoln County
White Caps took Mrs. T. Arthur, a white woman,
from her home and lynched her for reasons known
only to themselves. In 1902, a Negro was lynched for
conjuring and another through mistaken identity.
With these exceptions, murder and rape seem to be
the crimes that rouse mob action in West Virginia.
Of the state's fifty-six lynchings, twenty-one have
involved white men; on five occasions mobs have

142

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

found two victims, and on one, three. Since the Armi-
stice, five men have been lynched in West Virginia,
three by hanging and two by shooting.

In Bluefield, in 1912, Robert Johnson, Negro, was
accused of rape. He gave an alibi and proved every
statement he made; when he was taken before the
girl who had been attacked, she failed to identify
him. She had previously described very minutely the
clothes her assailant wore. The Bluefield police took
Johnson out and dressed him to fit the description,
and the girl screamed: "That's the man!" A Bluefield
mob dragged Johnson out and severely abused him
and then hanged him to a telegraph pole. It was later
conclusively established that Johnson was innocent.

INDIANA

Fifty-four lynchings: forty-one whites, thirteen
Negroes.

Long Klan-ridden, the state of Indiana had still
been free of lynch-executions, though beatings and
murders were frequent, from 1902 to 1930, when the
mob spirit flared with shocking intensity. In that year,
at Marion, two Negroes accused of murder were
taken from jail and hangdd before a mob estimated to
number between 10,000 and 15,000. Young girls and
women, some with babies in their arms, urged on the
lynchers, and one girl, seated atop an automobile,

H3

JUDGE LYNCH

screamed: "Hang-that-Nigger! Hang-that-Nigger! "
Unquestionably the finest example of mob-madness
outside of the Deep South.

CALIFORNIA

Fifty-three lynchings: forty-seven whites, two
Negroes, three Chinese, one Mexican. Two double
and one triple lynching; two lynchings of four, and
one of five.

Since the Armistice, California has had four lynch-
ings with a total of seven victims, all white. Six came
to their deaths by hanging and one was beaten to
death. In 1933, a San Jose mob entered the jail and
snatched Thurmond and Holmes, confessed kidnap-
slayers of Brooke Hart, and hanged them in a public
park.

WYOMING

Forty-one lynchings: thirty-seven whites, four
Negroes.

Wyoming has had but one lynching since the Armi-
stice. That was on December 19, 1918, when Ed-
ward Woodson, a Negro charged with killing a rail-
road switchman, was lynched at Green River.

NEW MEXICO

Thirty-nine lynchings, three Negroes.

144

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

NORTH AND SOUTH DAKOTA

Thirty-six lynchings, one a Negro.

The two Dakotas were linked in lynch-statistics
before they were admitted to the Union in 1889, and
no attempt has ever been made to separate them. This
may be due to the fact that many of the early lynch-
ings were held at undetermined places. Since the Armi-
stice there have been no lynchings in South Dakota
and only one in North Dakota. On January 29, 1931,
Charles Bannon, white, confessed slayer of six mem-
bers of the family of A. E. Haven, was taken from
jail, carried to a bridge two miles east of Schafer, and
hanged.

ILLINOIS

Thirty-two lynchings, nineteen involving Negroes.

Illinois has had only one lynching since the Armi-
stice. In 1924, William Bell, Negro, charged with an
attempted assault on two white girls, was killed by a
Chicago mob.

ARIZONA

Thirty-one lynchings, all involving white men or
Indians.

Arizona has had no lynchings since 1917.

H5

JUDGE LYNCH

WASHINGTON

Twenty-nine lynchings with only one Negro vic-
tim.

Washington has had but one known lynching since
the Armistice. This took place in 1919, when a blood-
hungry mob of patriots took Wesley Everest from
the jail at Centralia, mutilated him, and hanged him
three times.13

MARYLAND

Twenty-nine lynchings with but two white vic-
tims.

Maryland has had but two lynchings, two bad out-
breaks of mob-violence since the Armistice. On De-
cember 4, 193 1, at Salisbury, Matthew Williams, Ne-
gro, was snatched from his hospital cot by a lynching
party of three hundred, dragged three blocks to the
courthouse square, and hanged to a tree. He is said
to have confessed to the murder of his employer, stat-
ing that he was paid but fifteen cents an hour for his
work in a basket factory. Two years later, at Princess
Anne, not fifteen miles from Salisbury, George Arm-
wood, Negro, said to have confessed to waylaying
and attacking an eighty-two-year-old white woman,

13 "Some of Judge Lynch's Cases": Those Who Defied the Bosses.

146

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

was taken from jail and hanged by a mob of nearly
2,000. His body was dragged through the main thor-
oughfare for more than half a mile and then tossed on
a burning pyre.

OHIO

Twenty-eight lynchings, twelve white victims.

Ohio has had but one lynching since the Armistice.
On June 7, 1932, a mob took Luke Murray from the
South Point jail, where he was being held for threat-
ening two white men with a knife. On June 1 1, Mur-
ray's battered body was found in the Ohio River.
Four white men were arrested but later exonerated by
a jury.

IDAHO

Twenty-one lynchings, all white victims.
Idaho has had no recorded lynching since 1911.

OREGON

Twenty lynchings, one Negro victim.
Oregon has had no lynchings since 1914.

IOWA

Eighteen lynchings, two Negro victims.
Iowa has had no lynching since 1907.

H7

JUDGE LYNCH

MICHIGAN

Ten lynchings: seven white and three Negro vic-
tims.

Michigan boasted a slate clean of lynchings from
1902 until 1935. In that year Silas Coleman, a Negro
war veteran, was shot to death in a swamp near
Pinckney by members of the Black Legion "for tar-
get practice," or "just to see how it feels to kill a nig-
ger." In 1936, members of this hooded secret order
of alleged patriots and regulators killed Charles A.
Poole, a white WPA worker for allegedly beating his
wife (who later denied she had ever been struck by
her husband) and hanged Roy Pidcock, white, whose
only known offense was that he refused to join the
repressive order.

Eight persons were sentenced to life terms for the
lynching of Poole and five received similar sentences
for the killing of Coleman. As this is being written,
Virgil F. Effinger, reputed head of les cagoulards, has
been arrested and will be tried on charges of criminal
syndicalism and bomb possession.

MINNESOTA

Nine lynchings: four white, four Negro and one
Indian victim.

148

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

Minnesota had no lynchings from 1896 until 1920,
when a Duluth mob in June hanged three Negroes.

PENNSYLVANIA

Eight lynchings, involving two whites and six Ne-
groes.

Pennsylvania's last lynching was in 191 1; the affair
of that year probably shocked Pennsylvanians out of
the lynch-madness.

At Coatesville, Zachariah Walker, Negro, had a
quarrel with a constable; the officer was killed and
Walker badly wounded. A mob took him from the
hospital where he was chained to his cot. The bed-
stead was broken in half and the man, still chained to
the lower half, was dragged half a mile through the
streets, thrown upon a pile of wood, drenched with
oil, and set afire. When Walker, with superhuman
strength, burst his bonds and tried to escape, mem-
bers of the mob drove him back with pitchforks and
fence rails and held him until his body was burned to
ashes.

All attempts to indict members of the mob failed.
After several who were accused were taken before
the Grand Jury, they were given an ovation when
they were freed.

149

JUDGE LYNCH
UTAH

Eight lynchings, involving six white and two Ne-
gro victims.

Utah has had but one lynching since 1900, and
that was in 1925, when Robert Marshall, Negro slayer
of a police officer, was taken from jail and hanged
near Castlegate.

NEVADA

Six lynchings, involving four whites, one Indian,
and one Chinese.

Nevada has had no lynchings since 1905.

WISCONSIN

Six lynchings, all involving white men.
Wisconsin has had no lynchings since 1903.

NEW YORK

Three lynchings, involving two white and one Ne-
gro victim.

New York's last lynching was in 1916, in Wash-
ington County.

CONNECTICUT
One white lynched.

NEW JERSEY

One Negro lynched in 1900 at Hackensack.

150

THE JURISDICTION OF JUDGE LYNCH

MAINE

One white man lynched in 1 907 at Bancroft, Aroos-
took County.

DELAWARE
One Negro lynched in 1903, near Wilmington.

Recapitulation by States
State Blacks All Others Total

Mississippi 547 44 591

Georgia 531 39 570

Texas 384 165 549

Louisiana 358 63 421

Alabama 320 55 375

Arkansas 246 69 315

Florida 259 31 290

Tennessee 220 55 275

Kentucky 153 83 236

South Carolina 171 9 180

Oklahoma 32 in 143

Missouri 69 51 120

Virginia 85 24 109

North Carolina 84 21 105

Montana 2 88 90

Colorado 4 66 70

Nebraska 4 55 59

Kansas 19 37 56

West Virginia 35 21 56

Indiana 13 41 54

JUDGE LYNCH

State

Blacks

All Others

Total

California

2

5i

53

Wyoming

4

37

41

New Mexico

3

36

39

Dakota, North and South

i

35

36

Illinois

19

13

32

Arizona

0

31

31

Washington

i

28

29

Maryland

27

2

29

Ohio

16

12

28

Idaho

0

21

21

Oregon

i

19

20

Iowa

2

16

18

Michigan

3

7

10

Minnesota

4

5

9

Pennsylvania

6

2

8

Utah

2

6

8

Nevada

0

6

6

Wisconsin

O

6

6

New York

I

2

3

Connecticut

o

I

i

New Jersey

I

0

i

Maine

0

I

i

Delaware

I

0

i

New Hampshire

0

0

0

Vermont

0

0

o

Rhode Island

0

0

0

Massachusetts

0

0

0

152

Chapter Six

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH'S CASES

(A) Judge Lynches Cause Celebre— Leo Frank

ON Sunday morning, April 27, 1913, the body of a
young girl was found in the cellar of a pencil factory
in Atlanta, Georgia. It was early identified as that of
an employee of the factory, pretty little Mary Pha-
gan. The man who found the body was a Negro,
Newt Lee, the night watchman.

A hasty investigation revealed that the crime had
been committed by a degenerate and rapist, and that
the last man known to have seen Mary Phagan alive
was Leo M. Frank, the factory superintendent. Lee
and Frank were arrested.

Within twenty-four hours of the commission of
the crime the orderly processes of the law ceased to
operate and the mob had take-over the case. From
the beginning throughout to the end the malignant
presence of the mob guided the action, and before its
evil power orderly government cringed and ceased
to exist.

153

JUDGE LYNCH

Accused of a most atrocious murder, this young
Jewish superintendent was put on trial the following
summer. Newt Lee, the night watchman, was exon-
erated from any share in the guilt. Outraged by the
barbarity of the crime, certain people in Georgia, and
particularly in Atlanta, where the crime was com-
mitted, and in Marietta, where the murdered girl's
family lived, insisted a victim be found to pay the
penalty, and they fastened on the young Jew as the
one whose death would most surely satisfy their de-
sire for vengeance. The mob, led by Thomas E. Wat-
son and his weekly paper, The Jeffersonian, at this
point turned the case over to Judge Lynch in actu-
ality.

The flimsiest evidence was admitted as long as it
was detrimental to the prisoner. Certain facts not in
the nature of conclusive evidence, such as that Frank
had phoned the night watchman at seven the evening
before the discovery of the body to learn if every-
thing was all right, were seized upon as proof of guilt.

Whether or not the testimony at the trial was con-
vincing is entirely immaterial in considering the real
significance of this case. What made it a noted one
was the spirit that pervaded the courtroom and the
vicinity of the courthouse— the malevolence of the
mob.

The courtroom was thronged with a hostile crowd

154

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

of people. The jury had to pass through this crowd
on its way to and from the jury box. Outside the
courthouse the state militia was deployed for action.
The local newspapers had lashed the people of the
vicinity into a lynch-f renzy. The crowd in the court-
room was demonstrative in approval of the accusers
and the evidence against Frank. He was a Jew. He
did not know his place; as superintendent he had had
true-blue Americans under him. Mary Phagan had
been an employee; for the employed class this was
convincing proof that the young girl had been help-
less.

Inside the courtroom and outside the courthouse
the mob spirit was vocal and demonstrative; it yelled
for blood and it meant, as the end proved, to have
blood. The trial consumed thirty days and the case
was turned over to the jury. Can anyone believe that
those jurors were insensitive to the mob spirit that
was manifesting itself on all sides?

When the jury was ready to give its decision, the
Trial Judge and the Counsel did not dare to have the
prisoner brought into court; because of the mob
spirit, his right to be present and face his accusers
when the verdict was given was denied him. If that
jury had decided that the evidence they had heard
and considered was insufficient to convict, if their
verdict had been "not guilty," there was obvious dan-

JUDGE LYNCH

ger to themselves; if their verdict was against Frank,
there was equally obvious danger to the prisoner.

The Judge who had presided at the trial in his an-
swer to a petition for a new trial later gave sufficient
reason for doubting the verdict of the mob spirit in
this case:

"It has given me more concern than any other case
I was ever in, and I want to say right here that, al-
though I heard the evidence and arguments during
those thirty days, I do not know this morning whether
Leo Frank is innocent or guilty."

Frank's absence from the courtroom at the time
of his sentence was one of the grounds upon which
he appealed his case to the state Supreme Court and
then to the United States Supreme Court. The state
Supreme Court held that the question should have
been raised at a certain stage in the proceedings; since
it was not raised then, it could not be raised at all. The
highest court in the land said it was a question of pro-
cedure that is to be determined solely by the state
courts. The mob spirit that dictated the verdict and
the absence of Frank from the courtroom was never
considered.

During the whole process of appealing the deci-
sion, the mob kept up its threats. When the case came
before the Prison Commission of Georgia, where the
mob's action and influence could be weighed, the

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCHES CASES

mob itself made its voice heard and menaced those
who had power to recommend commutation of sen-
tence.

The case was finally brought before the Governor.
Governor Slaton was braver than the mob and he
dared to ignore its demands. After reviewing the case
and taking into consideration the refusal of the Prison
Commission to recommend commutation of sentence,
he commuted Leo Frank's sentence from death to life
imprisonment. It was a courageous action; a lone man
against the mob. Governor Slaton had a legal and
moral right to do this, and his action did not interfere
with the prerogatives of the jury or with the author-
ity of the Prison Commission. He defied the mob and
the mob snapped and snarled at his heels. Against the
Governor it was impotent, for he himself saw that
during the rest of his term it was held in check.
Within a few days he left office.

Frank was sent to the State Prison at Milledgeville
to finish out his natural life. The spirit of the mob in-
vaded the prison, and soon after Frank entered, his
throat was slashed by a fellow-prisoner sentenced for
murder who thought the Jew too vile to live.

The mob was not yet done with Leo Frank. On
August 17, 1915, while he was still recovering from
the attack of his fellow-prisoner, a mob of twenty-
five, evidently agents selected by the greater mob,

JUDGE LYNCH

whose power had been growing all these months, en-
tered the prison and, with suspicious ease, overawed
the warden and the guards, dragged Frank from his
bed in the dormitory, carried him in an automobile
to within a few miles of the birthplace of Mary Pha-
gan, and hanged him to a tree. Former Governor
Slaton was compelled to flee his native state because
of threats on his own life.

The lynching was done with fatal deliberation; it
was the result of no hasty, impulsive passion but of
cool plottings for weeks in homes and barrooms by
hundreds of willing murderers. How, one may ask,
were the twenty-five selected from the greater mob?
By vote? Or because they knew the interior of the
State Prison through previous incarceration? Or was
this an occasion when the actual mob leaders took
matters into their own hands?

The lynchers believed they had done a solemn
duty; in trampling upon the law they believed they
had executed justice. Listen to the Marietta Journal
the day after the lynching in its own town:

"The people demanded that the verdict of the
court be carried out, and saw to it that it was. We in-
sist that they were, and are, law-abiding citizens of
Georgia."

And race-prejudice got into full flight in Thomas
Watson's weekly:

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH?S CASES

"A Vigilance Committee redeems Georgia and
carries out the sentence of the law on the Jew who
raped and murdered the little Gentile girl, Mary Pha-
gan. . . . Let Jew libertines take notice."

The mob went even further and let it be known
throughout Cobb County and the entire state of
Georgia that it would not be safe to try to discover
and punish them, for they were determined men.

The fullest accounts of the lynching appeared in all
Georgia papers. Every newspaper reader read the
story of Frank's death ride; each reader, by referring
to his newspaper, could learn all that had happened
and all that had been said between Frank and the
lynching party on their way from the prison to the
place of hanging; how Frank sat in the automobile
and how he acted during the trip. The stories re-
corded every word that had been said to him and
every word he replied during the seven-hour journey.
The lynch mob, the stories went on, had not been
rough with him, and Frank had shown stoicism.

Yet the very day this story broke, the Coroner's
jury brought in the verdict that Frank "had come to
his death at the hands of persons unknown." Many
witnesses had been summoned, but they all declared
they knew nothing, had seen nothing, and recognized
no one. Only one witness ventured to admit that he
had seen two men step out of an automobile near the

159

JUDGE LYNCH

scene of the lynching and that he had had a pretty
strong suspicion of what was going on. This slight
admission evidently made an uncomfortable sensation
in the courtroom. The Acting Solicitor turned to the
witness and very slowly asked:

"You did not recognize anybody?"

The witness moved nervously in his chair and re-
plied:

"Nobody, sir."

At this word there was audible relaxation in all
parts of the courtroom.

The man who wrote the revealing story of the
lynching, who was either a member of the mob or
had had his story, not from a single member of the
mob but from several members, was not called. The
one witness who could have been made to testify or
be declared in contempt of court was not called. It
was the final stigma on the formerly fair name of
Georgia, the mob's beau geste to law and justice and
honor.

The leading newspapers of Georgia, as well as those
of the rest of the South, condemned the murder of
Leo Frank and the expression of mob-law it had
evoked. The general tenor of these writers was that
it would take the state from twenty-five to one hun-
dred years to live down the disgrace; that Georgia
had probably learned its lesson and would, in the fu-

160

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH S CASES

ture, refrain from recourse to mob-law and lynch-
executions.

Since Frank was hanged, Georgia has had 133
lynchings, only two of which involved whites.

(B) The Mob Was Orrferfy-New Orleans Mafia

Lynching was pretty much an affair entirely our
own until the beginning of the nineties, when a group
of Italians was lynched in New Orleans. Since then
the entire world has watched our homely practice
with misgivings. Are we an entirely civilized people?
Missionaries in Africa complain that our continued
lynching of Negroes seriously interferes with their
efforts to convert the heathen. Enemies within and
without make worth-while capital of our uncontrol-
lable impulse to resolve ourselves into mobs and hoist
our f ellowmen into the foliage of trees.

In the late eighties and at the beginning of the nine-
ties the Sicilian society known as The Mafia held the
Italian population of many large American cities in
its power. It was the beginning of racketeering in the
United States, and, so long as the extortioners worked
among their own inarticulate people, little could be
done to stamp out the practice. The victims were
warned that if they talked it would be bad for them
and their families. The petty extortion involved even
the lowliest laborer, who turned over a portion of his

161

JUDGE LYNCH

wages to his padrone; the richest and juiciest plums
came from those Italians who had been successful in
business. Here the shakedown ran into the thousands,
and no one knew how extensive the gross takings
were. Blackmail followed petty extortion and led to
kidnaping and even murder. The conditions existed
in New York, Chicago, and other large cities with
sizable Italian groups. It was in New Orleans, how-
ever, that this secret society first exceeded itself.

In 1890 the four-year-old son of a wealthy Italian
merchant was kidnaped and held for $75,000 ransom.
When kidnaped, the child was healthy and robust; a
month later, when he was returned to his parents, his
health was so impaired that he died within a short
time. The case aroused public feeling to such a point
that the police were compelled to take cognizance of
the society's criminal activities. Chief of Police David
C. Hennessey himself took entire charge of the in-
vestigation. Detectives were sent to Italy to trace the
records of known members of the order; others were
sent to Chicago, St. Louis, and San Francisco, and,
within a short time, the Chief knew enough to begin
making arrests and to be assured that he would secure
convictions.

Late one foggy night, just before the trap was to
be sprung, Chief of Police Hennessey was on his way
home. As he neared his residence, a boy darted out of

162

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

the fog, shrilled a peculiar whistle, the Mafia signal,
and a volley of bullets mowed the policeman down.
He was shot three times in his abdomen, his right
knee and left hand were shot through, and his
face and neck were horribly mutilated by gunshot
wounds. He languished until the next morning, but
only one word passed his lips: it was the whispered
"Dagoes."

The evidence the Chief had secured was used to
round up the members of the society. One, Pietro
Monasterio, who lived in a shack within sight of the
Chief's home, was arrested. In his house were found
six shotguns, five with sawed-off barrels and with
stocks hinged so that they might be doubled and car-
ried under the clothing. The boy who whistled the
signal and twelve others were arrested; fourteen in all
were brought to trial.

The State's case was exceptionally strong and was
presented by District Attorney Lionel Adams, who
was considered by bar and laity to be an outstanding
and able prosecutor. Judge Romon, the presiding jus-
tice, was uncompromising, dignified, unapproacha-
ble, and a capable judge. Aside from convincing cir-
cumstantial evidence, there were eyewitnesses, one
young couple identifying no less than eight of the
prisoners. The defense was based on the old reliable
alibi, backed up with terrorized witnesses.

163

JUDGE LYNCH

In Louisiana the jury is competent to fix the terms
of punishment in criminal cases and, when this jury
brought in their written verdict, the Court was
stunned. Twelve of the defendants were sentenced to
jail for terms varying from ten to four years and two
were declared innocent. Judge Romon looked at the
written verdict with horror and stupefaction.

"Bribery," was the first cry, while others claimed
the jury had been intimidated. Public indignation
flared to such a degree that the convicted prisoners
and the two who were acquitted were remanded to
the Parish Prison. The verdict had been rendered on
Friday, March 13. That evening the New Orleans
Item and the States, and the following morning the
Picayune and the Times, carried the following adver-
tisement:

MASS MEETING

All good citizens are invited to attend a mass meeting
on Saturday, March i4th, at 10 o'clock A. M. at Clay's
Statue, to take steps to remedy the failure of justice in
the Hennessey Case. Come prepared for action.

About Clay's statue the streets were blocked, but
the people were orderly and attentive. They were
addressed by many leaders, temperately at first. John
M. Parker, who later was to become Governor of the
state and in 1916 the Progressive party's candidate for

164

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCHES CASES

Vice-President, was one of the earlier speakers. Later
on the mob leaders took over; one, who remains un-
named, announced rhetorically:

"When the law is powerless, the rights delegated
by the people are relegated back to the people, and
they are justified in doing what the law has failed
to do."

The speaker went on to charge the jury with cor-
ruption and intimidation and asked if the people were
ready to follow him. The response of the mob was
loud and unanimous. Jumping from the platform, he
shouldered his way toward the Parish Prison, some
two miles distant. Members of the Washington Artil-
lery and the Crescent Rifles fell in behind him, and
the demonstration took on the appearance of a well-
organized parade, not of a mob out of hand.

The prison occupied a whole square, its main
gates giving on Orleans Street. Inside, the wardens
and guards heard the constantly growing crowd, and
this, with their knowledge of the protest meeting at
Clay's statue, warned them what they could expect.
Carpenters were called and were jeered while they
hastily barricaded the side entrances. The Mafia sig-
nal, the shrill whistle, was now used as an expression of
derision and was on everybody's lips. Then, to those
within the prison, guards and prisoners, came the sound
of the tread of footsteps, the cheers of the onlookers as

JUDGE LYNCH

the mob hove into sight. Three patrol wagons of City
Police that had been summoned by the warden were
disarmed by members of the militia, and the police
were placed under military guard.

A nearby lumber yard provided the battering-rams,
and the work of demolishing the entrances was soon
finished. The mob leaders admitted not more than
sixty to the prison and posted armed men at all exits
with instructions to shoot any prisoner who at-
tempted to escape.

Ten of the Italians had been confined in a large
new steel cell. The mob found it impossible to open
the lock, the warden having refused to give up the
keys, and their battering-rams failed to gain them
admittance. It was decided to shoot the prisoners.

A few minutes were given them for prayer, and
then the firing squad went into action. The new steel
cell became a shambles, one of the prisoners who had
been a leader of the society receiving sixty-eight
wounds. The boy who gave the signal on the ap-
proach of the police chief was spared, as was Mache-
cia, the second who was acquitted by the jury. The
other two prisoners were lynched outside the prison.
Monasterio was hanged to a cottonwood tree in front
of the prison and his body riddled with bullets. Polo-
viso, insane from fright, was hanged from a lamp-
post, but he was too tall and his toes touched the

166

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

ground. A youngster shinned up the post and, placing
a knee on each shoulder, jolted him to death.

The mob then divided into groups with the inten-
tion of visiting punishment on the jurors who had
taken part in the trials. No jurymen were found; they
had all fled the city.

Unlike so many of our lynch-executions, the affair
at New Orleans did not end with the demise of the
victims; three of the lynched Italians were proved to
be loyal subjects of King Humbert. The Italian Con-
sul at New Orleans made his protestations, agreeing
that some of the victims were very bad men indeed,
but objecting that many of the charges against them
were unsubstantiated, baseless, that his request for the
military had been ignored, and that he and his secre-
tary had been insulted and all but mobbed. The King-
dom of Italy, too, raised her voice; through the
Premier, Marquis de Rudin, relayed through Baron
Fava, the Italian Ambassador to Washington, a de-
mand was made for heavy indemnity for the families
of the lynched and the immediate extirpation of the
lynchers. Mr. Elaine, the Secretary of State, properly
expressed his horror and regretted the incident, but
pointed out that his Government did not regard in-
demnity as a right the Italian Government could de-
mand. Summary punishment of the lynchers, the Sec-
retary was able to maintain, would be un-American

167

JUDGE LYNCH

and unreasonable, since the utmost that could be done
would be to institute judicial proceedings, and this
function belonged exclusively to the State of Louisi-
ana.

There were threats by the Italians of breaking off
diplomatic relations; Mr. Elaine replied that the Ital-
ian Government was trying to hurry him in a manner
contrary to diplomatic usage and that he would an-
nounce no decision until the case was thoroughly in-
vestigated. It was, to him, a matter of indifference
what persons in Italy thought of our institutions. "I
cannot change them, still less violate them."

The Italian Government finally accepted $24,330
to be distributed among the families of the victims,
offered "out of humane consideration, without refer-
ence to the question of liability therefor."

(C) The Burning of Henry Lowry

If the Emancipation Proclamation meant anything
to the Negro as a people, it had no place in the life
of Henry Lowry. As recently as 1920 this Negro was
as much a slave as if he had been sold on the block in
the eighteen thirties. But Henry Lowry's master, a
white landowner named O. T. Craig, of Nodena,
Arkansas, had a better deal than he could have had one
hundred years ago. At that time a black of Lowry's
heft and ability would have cost him at least $1,500.

168

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

In 1918 Craig got his Negro for nothing, made him
feed himself, take care of himself and his wife and
little daughter in sickness and idleness. The nice
name for it is peonage.

For two years Henry Lowry had worked for O.
T. Craig without pay. Came Christmas Day, when
all the world was gay and merry, but to Lowry it
was just another day, and the meal at best would be
side meat and potatoes. He thought of the two years
of labor without pay; he probably thought, too, that
the season might loosen the purse strings of his mas-
ter. Humbly, as befitted a man of his color and station,
he went to his master with his hat in hand and asked
for his due. Instead he received curses and blows.

Henry Lowry fought back. The landlord and his
son ganged up on him, and the son shot him. Then the
black drew his own gun and shot and killed his op-
pressor; he also shot and killed the landlord's daughter,
who had moved in to protect her father. Two sons of
O. T. Craig also were wounded, and Henry Lowry
took to the woods.

For two days he lay hiding in the cornfield of his
friend, J. T. Williams, who fed him while another
friend, Morris Jenkins, raised the money for train
fare to Mexico. The fugitive managed to get to El
Paso, on the Mexican border, but, lacking the money
necessary to get across, he was compelled to change

169

JUDGE LYNCH

his name and seek work in the border city. The job
he got paid him forty dollars a month, and he wrote
to Jenkins to go to see his wife, who was staying with
a third friend, and give her the message that within
a few months he would be able to send for her and
their little daughter. That was the worst mistake
Lowry made.

The white landlords for miles around Nodena had
been thoroughly aroused by this rebellion of one of
their peons. If Lowry was permitted to get away with
his private revolt, other peons and sharecroppers
would rebel. Class consciously they formed them-
selves into an avenging mob, dedicating their entire
efforts to tracking down this helot and wreaking
vengeance on him for assailing their feudal rights. So
complete was their espionage that they managed to
intercept the letter Lowry wrote to his friend, even
though it was signed S. M. Thompson.

El Paso was too far away, too expensive a trip for
the mob. The information as to Lowry 's whereabouts,
his alias, even the address in the border city where
he was living, were given to the police while the mob
bided its time. Two deputies, Dixon and Greer, were
sent to bring Lowry back to face Arkansas justice.
The deputies had instructions, orders, if you please,
from Governor McRae not to take the fugitive back
to the scene of his crime nor to the county jail. They

170

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

were to bring Henry Lowry by the shortest route to
Little Rock for safekeeping.

The deputies, it now seems, had a greater loyalty
to the mob than to their state and their oath. Instead
of following Governor McRae's instructions, they
took the fugitive direct to the mob. They brought
him by way of New Orleans and were taking him into
Memphis, which is many miles away from Little
Rock, in a state that had no relation to the crime, and
could not possibly be considered on the route to
Little Rock. The mob knew the route the deputies
would take with their prisoner and stopped the train
at Sardis, Mississippi, overpowering and disarming
the surprised officers of the law.

The actual snatching was done by a handful of
men early in the morning of January 26, a month
after Lowry's attack on his white master. The balance
of the mob awaited their fellows at the Hotel Pea-
body in Memphis; nearly one hundred of them were
gathered in the hotel lobby, laughing, talking, and
preparing to return to Arkansas come evening. This
was to be no mere hanging: Henry Lowry was not
to be taken to the nearest tree by an enraged citizenry
and strung up. Hanging was too good for this Negro.

The mob dined happily at the Peabody; it was a
gala occasion.

In Little Rock Governor McRae was desperately

171

JUDGE LYNCH

seeking a method of stopping the lynching. He said:
"I can't get in touch with Sheriff Blackwood, so I
wouldn't know who to send the troops to. 1 under-
stand that Sheriff Blackwood is at the Peabody Hotel
in Memphis and I have tried to telephone him there,
but they say he isn't in his room." *

The noon edition of The Memphis Press announced
in a headline the full width of its front page:

LYNCHING PARTY ON WAY TO
ARK. TO PASS THRU MEMPHIS

Negro Who Killed Two on
Christmas Day Taken From
Officers at Sardis, Mississippi

"We are going to parade him through Main Street
when we pass through Memphis," the leader of the
mob boasted at Sardis. "Then we are going to take
him to Arkansas and that will be the end of him."

The Press insisted upon being helpful to anyone
interested enough to wish to attend the lynching. Its
directions were explicit.

"The mob, it is said, is taking Lowry back to Wil-
son, Ark., near where he shot and killed two white
persons on Dec. 25, and is to cross the Harahan
bridge over the Mississippi here. ... As the roads

1 Reported in The Memphis Press, January 26, 1921. Italics are
mine. F. S.

I72

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH S CASES

to the Helena ferry are impassable, there is no other
route by which they can cross the river."

The home edition of the same paper got into the
full spirit of the ballyhoo and promised, in front page
headlines:

MAY LYNCH 3 TO 6 NEGROES
THIS EVENING

LOWRY NEARS TREE ON WHICH
IT IS PLANNED TO HANG HIM;
TAKEN THRU MEMPHIS TODAY

RUMORED OTHERS WILL DIE

A professional press agent could not have done
better. "Reports received here," the home edition
continued hopefully, "indicate that Lowry and three
or four other negroes— perhaps even more— are to be
lynched at Nodena tonight. The other negroes are
alleged to have aided Lowry to escape. . . ."

Were the Memphis police planning to stop the
lynching? After the noon edition had announced the
route of the lynch mob, the home edition reported:
"Police immediately guarded all the roads entering
the city [Memphis] to prevent them from bringing
the prisoner here. The mob must have learned of this
en route from Sardis, for as they neared Memphis
Lowry was turned over to five men in a closed car,
who skirted the city." In another column the Press

'73

JUDGE LYNCH

gave the latest directions. "It is rumored here that
the mob will skirt Memphis and cross the Mississippi
River in launches at Richardson's Landing, Tenn.,
just opposite Nodena."

Only the Memphis police tried to stop the lynch-
ing. Governor McRae could have called out the
Arkansas National Guard, patrolled the river bank,
and prevented the landing of the lynching party, but
he could not have saved Henry Lowry. The mob was
ready to lynch him in any one of three states. But the
Governor of Arkansas made no effort to save the
other Negroes, either by reinforcing the guards at
the penal institutions in which they were incarcerated
or by moving them to what is known in the South
as "a lynch-proof jail." No obstructions were placed
in the way of the mob and its designs save the feeble
efforts of the Memphis police.

The Memphis News Scimitar was more explicit.
In its sixth (final city) edition, it was definitely an-
nounced that the mob would cross at Richardson's
Landing, where they would be joined by a party
waiting on the Arkansas side, "prepared to lynch
Lowry promptly at six o'clock." The News Scimitar's
dispatch was from Millington, Tennessee, and refers
to the mob as "a party of seven in two automobiles
with Henry Lowry, negro murderer." Later, in the
same news story:

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCHES CASES

". . . . The party stopped at Fowler's restaurant
for lunch. The negro was taken into the restaurant
and kept under observation while the party ate.

"The negro said nothing, but showed the strain he
was under. He realized he was on his way to death.
A number of Millington citizens were attracted to
the restaurant, and a few accompanied the party to
the landing. They are not expected to cross the river.

"Nothing occurred to mar the serenity of the
journey. The party ate leisurely and after finishing
went to E. A. Harrold's store, where a quantity of
rope was purchased. It was said that the rope would
be used in place of chains for the automobiles. The
road is very bad and slippery at the approach to the
landing."

The Memphis Press had done a good ballyhoo job
and sent Ralph Roddy, its ace reporter, to cover the
lynching; he did it admirably, even if a bit inco-
herently. He knew his sheet and its audience and he
fed both the pap they most desired. To get the picture
of the lynching of Henry Lowry as a whole, it is
necessary to jump about a bit through Roddy's
story.

"More than 500 persons," he wrote, "stood by and
looked on while the negro slowly burned to a crisp.
A few women were scattered among the crowd of
Arkansas planters who directed the gruesome work

175

JUDGE LYNCH

of avenging the death of O. T. Craig and his daughter,
Mrs. C. O. Williamson.

"Not once did the slayer beg for mercy despite
the fact that he suffered one of the most horrible
deaths imaginable. With the negro chained to a log,
members of the mob placed a small pile of leaves
around his feet. Gasoline was then poured on the
leaves, and the carrying out of the death sentence was
under way.

"Inch by inch the negro was fairly cooked to death.
Every few minutes fresh leaves were tossed on the
funeral pyre until the blaze had passed the waist. . . .
Even after the flesh had dropped away from his legs
and the flames were leaping toward his face, Lowry
retained consciousness. Not once did he whimper
or beg for mercy. Once or twice he attempted to
pick up the hot ashes in his hands and thrust them
in his mouth in order to hasten death. . . . Each
time the ashes were kicked out of his reach by a
member of the mob. ... As the flames were eating
away his abdomen, a member of the mob stepped
forward and saturated the body with gasoline. It was
then only a few minutes until the negro had been
reduced to ashes."

When Roddy had got all he could from the burn-
ing, he anticipated the mob and hurried on to Wilson
and Blytheville, where the other Negroes scheduled

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCHES CASES

by his paper to be lynched were incarcerated. He
told of his trip and the people he met, but he was
compelled to admit in blackface type:

"The almost impassable dirt roads perhaps saved
all these negroes from death. The mob was too tired
to try to get over them."

If Governor McRae had been unable to locate
Sheriff Dwight H. Blackwood in his room at the
Hotel Peabody in Memphis, the Press experienced
no difficulty and was able to secure the following
statement from that officer:

"Nearly every man, woman and child in our
county wanted the negro lynched. When public
sentiment is that way, there isn't much chance left
for the officers. Of course, we may believe that the
Negro ought to be killed, but as officers it is our duty
to carry out the law.

"I knew several days ago that they had men at
Texarkana, Hoxie and Jonesboro, and that we
wouldn't have a chance of going that way, so we took
the only route left open. We found later that they
had men at New Orleans and were tipped off when
my men left that place. I believe that there were
some Arkansas men in the crowd but they didn't
let my men see them."

In all the lynching records Henry Lowry is carried
as having been burned for the murder of two whites,

177

JUDGE LYNCH

never for the killing of two fellow humans in what,
in this America of ours, must always be called self-
defense. But Lowry's skin was black, and for years
to come the shadow will darken the state of Arkansas.

(D) The Law Never Had a Chance— Claude Neal

Marianna is a city in Jackson County, in the north-
western part of Florida, on the Alabama border. It
is a shabby, down-at-the-heels sort of place and in-
habited by shabby people. It is a tourist stopover,
and only travelers in the shabbier cars stop even for
a night. It has an imposing hotel and some stores, and
a few of the tradesmen have built new homes for
their families. Saturday is Marianna's big day, when
the rural folk come to trade and do their week's
shopping, and for that day there is a degree of activity
that has its attractiveness. The balance of the week
it is, at best, a very dull town.

Marianna itself has been the scene of several lynch-
ings, and Jackson County has many others, two of
them double lynchings, to its credit. All the lynched
have been Negroes. Wages are low in Marianna, and
morals do not achieve an altogether high in Jackson
County. White men openly run with colored women,
and white women, not openly at all, are known to
have colored lovers. The Negroes of Jackson County
know this and deplore the practice, and when it is

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH S CASES

mentioned shake their heads and shuffle out of ear-
shot. The whites deny it and, should the investigator
pursue the matter, he is answered with vituperation
and threatened with physical violence. It is a lynch
country.

It was that way with Lola Cannidy and Claude
Neal. Lola was a white girl and Claude a Negro. "For
some months," says the white investigator for the
National Association for the Advancement of Colored
People, "and possibly for a period of years, Claude
Neal and Lola Cannidy had been having intimate re-
lations with each other. The nature of their relation-
ship was common knowledge in the Negro com-
munity."

Neal's friends had advised him of the danger of
the relationship and had urged him to discontinue it.

On the afternoon of October 18, 1934, Lola dis-
appeared from her home. It is alleged that she told
her parents, Mr. and Mrs. George Cannidy, that she
was going to water the pigs and to attend to some other
chores that were part of her tasks about the farm. The
family took no particular notice of her absence when
she failed to return in the late afternoon. Her brother,
who had been working in a nearby field, reported
that he had seen her talking to someone. When she
still failed to return that night, a search was begun
for her in the vicinity of her home. Early the next

179

JUDGE LYNCH

morning her body, fully clothed, was found by an
uncle, John King, a short distance from her home,
badly mutilated about the head and arms and partially
covered with brushwood and pine logs. A watch, a
ring, a piece of clothing, and a hammer were among
the articles discovered near the place where she came
to her death.

Several boys testified that they had seen Claude
Neal near the scene of the crime that afternoon, and
that he had some wounds on his hands that he said
he had received while repairing a fence. The first
home visited by the sheriff was that of Annie Smith,
mother of Claude, just across the road from the
Cannidy home. The officers claimed to have found
some bloody garments in the house.

A search for Claude Neal was started and he was
arrested on a nearby peanut farm. He confessed and
implicated another man, Herbert Smith. Smith was
arrested and with Neal was taken, as is the custom
in the lynch country, to a nearby woods and ques-
tioned. It was understood that Neal had had a fight
with Smith and Herbert had beaten him. Neal finally
admitted that Smith had nothing to do with the crime
and that he alone was involved. Smith was subse-
quently released by the officers.

What Neal told the officers in the woods was not
revealed. Later he told a friend that Miss Cannidy had

1 80

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH S CASES

informed him that she wanted to break off their
affair, that she did not want him to speak to her again,
that if he did so she would tell the whites in the com-
munity on him. Neal is reported to have said:

"When she said she didn't want me to speak to her
and then told me that she'd tell the white men on me,
I just got mad and killed her."

With Neal were arrested his mother, Annie Smith,
and his aunt, Sallie Smith. Sheriff W. F. Chambliss,
sensing the awakening lynch-spirit, wisely ordered
that the prisoners be taken to the jail at Chipley for
safekeeping.

Lola Cannidy was murdered Thursday, Neal was
arrested Friday, and the big day in Marianna's week
became the second biggest day in the city's history
and the beginning of a week of shameless mob fero-
city. The county men drove their women to Mari-
anna as usual and the women did their shopping as
usual. The men resolved themselves into little groups
in which the common topic was how to "get the
nigger." From that moment a bloodthirsty mob re-
lentlessly pursued Claude Neal. And it must be
credited to the Jackson County sheriff that he made
every effort within his power to circumvent the mobs.
The angry mob at Chipley caused the sheriff to re-
move Neal to Panama City and the two women to
Fort Barrancas at Pensacola. Later Neal was removed

181

JUDGE LYNCH

by boat to Pensacola, and when a mob threatened
that jail, he was moved across the line into Brewton,
Alabama, two hundred and ten miles from Marianna.

On October 2 3 the Marianna Daily Times Courier
said:

"In a determined effort to locate the three Negroes
held for the murder of Lola Cannidy near Greenwood
last Thursday, a relentless mob continued to search
the jails of West Florida."

George Cannidy, father of the slain girl, stated to
a representative of the same paper:

"The bunch have promised me that they will give
me first chance at him when they bring him back
and I'm ready. We'll put those two logs on him and
ease him off by degrees. . . . When I get my hands
on that nigger, there isn't any telling what I'll do."

On the morning of October 26, a mob of a hundred
armed men stormed the Escambia County jail, at
Brewton, Alabama, and snatched Claude Neal after
jailer Mike Shanholster had unlocked his cell. "We'll
tear your jail up and let all the prisoners out, if you
don't turn him over to us," the mob leaders had
threatened. They also told Shanholster that they were
going to turn Neal "over to the girl's father and let
him do what he wants with him." The mob came in
thirty cars all bearing Florida plates, and the prisoner

182

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH S CASES

was placed in the first car for the return trip. No
attempt was made by officers to follow the mob.

Within an hour of the snatching, the people of
Marianna, more than 200 miles away, knew that
Claude Neal was in the hands of the mob, and news-
papers all over the country were able to print advance
announcements of the forthcoming lynching. Word
was passed all over northern Florida and southern
Alabama that there was to be a "lynching party to
which all the white people are invited." Others got
their jubilee invitation through the Dothan, Ala-
bama, radio station, which scored another "first" for
the radio. The lynching was to take place in front
of the Cannidy home.

How many people responded to the invitation is
not known. Marianna has a population of about 3,500
and Jackson County has 30,000 all told. But there
were cars from eleven states, and the Chipola Hotel
and the rooming houses had a hard time finding room
for all the guests. To say that 10,000 attended Mari-
anna's lynch-carnival would be stating it conserva-
tively.

While the mob still held the murderer, it was en-
couraged by word from the law. Deputy Sheriff S.
Paul Greene, of Jackson County, stated, "In my
opinion the mob will not be bothered, either before

183

JUDGE LYNCH

or after the lynching." Editorially the Jackson County
Floridian feebly said:

"Although many have strongly favored the court
of Judge Lynch for the brutal slaying of a Jackson
County girl this week, local officers have spared no
effort to uphold their oath of office and to protect their
prisoner. In many instances this action has been con-
trary to the wishes of citizens, but the consensus of
opinion is that one crime in a week is enough."

The lynch mob, the original group of a hundred
that had snatched Neal from the Brewton jail, felt
that the secondary or sight-seeing mob was too large
for safety, and that it would be better if they attended
to the lynching themselves. From the time they had
brought him back to Jackson County they had been
submitting their victim to various sadistic indignities
and finally took him to the woods about four miles
from Greenwood.

From time to time during the torture a rope would
be tied around Neal's neck and he was pulled up over
a limb and held there until he almost choked to death;
then he would be let down and the torture would be-
gin all over again. After several hours of this unspeak-
able torture, "they decided just to kill him."

After death the body was tied to a rope from the
rear of an automobile and dragged over the highway

184

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

to the Cannidy house. Here the sight-seeing mob,
estimated at between 7,000 and 10,000, took over.
The rope was cut adrift from the car. A woman came
out of the Cannidy house and drove a butcher knife
into the dead man's heart. Then the crowd passed in
review; some kicked the body and others drove their
cars over it. Little children, neighbors of the Cannidys,
waited with sharpened sticks for the return of the
body and, when it was rolled into the road that night,
these children drove their weapons deep into the dead
flesh.

The sight-seeing mob felt cheated; it had been
promised participation in the actual lynching and all
it got was the sight of the already lynched body. The
explanation given them by one of the lynchers was
that they were fearful that someone would be injured
in the melee if they brought the prisoner to the wait-
ing crowd. A Cannidy kinsman stated, "the nigger
was too low for anyone to be hurt on his account."
The secondary mob, to be appeased, burned the home
of NeaPs mother, Annie Smith, to the ground.

The horribly mutilated body was next taken to
Marianna, a distance of ten or twelve miles, and at
three o'clock in the morning it was hanged to a tree
in the courthouse square. Scores of citizens viewed the
body, which was nude until early morning, when

185

JUDGE LYNCH

someone had the decency to hang a burlap sack over
the middle of the body. It was not cut down until
about eight-thirty Saturday morning.

As soon as the body was cut down, the members
of the mob quickly dispersed. There were not so
many Negroes in Marianna that Saturday. The entire
week had been one of terror, and all Negroes who
could stayed away from the city. Those who were
compelled to remain kept to themselves.

Before noon, a white man and a Negro had a scuffle,
and the sight of a Negro resisting a white man threw
the crowd of loungers into a fury. The black finally
tore himself away and took refuge in the courthouse,
where he was given protection by a friendly group
of white men. The mob clamored for their victim,
but were held at bay by a machine gun. The frus-
trated mob began a systematic attempt to drive all
Negroes from the town. It attacked men, women,
and children, and several blind persons were ruth-
lessly beaten. The Negroes started from the town in
droves, some running, some crying, all frightened.
After emptying the streets, stores, and places of busi-
ness of Negroes, the mob started for the residential
district to drive out the colored maids. One man,
whose wife shielded her maid from the mob, said,
"Saturday was a day of terror and madness, never to
be forgotten by anyone."

1 86

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

The mob also drove the policemen of Marianna
from their posts, and during the rioting the town was
without police protection. Members of the mob
threatened to beat up any member of the force they
found. The Mayor tried to deputize some special
officers, but was unable to find anyone who would
serve. Then the Mayor called the Governor in Talla-
hassee. In response to his request, a detachment of
guardsmen was ordered from Apalachicola, but a
rainstorm saved Marianna. At eleven a downpour so
dampened the spirits of the mob that it probably pre-
vented further rioting and terrorism. The guardsmen
arrived at four-thirty and quickly dispersed the rem-
nants of the mob.

(£) The Five Thousandth—Raymond Gunn

A Texas mob, incited by a woman in a red dress,
burned down a courthouse to lynch its victim, and a
Missouri mob, led by a man in a red lumber jacket,
used a school to make a funeral pyre for Raymond
Gunn, who became Judge Lynch's five thousandth
recorded victim. Red is a color that irks bulls; it seems
to be an appropriate color for the garb of mob leaders.

Raymond Gunn was guilty and he made no effort
to conceal it. His crime, that of murder, was com-
mitted in a county that had never before had a lynch-
ing, had never been laid open to contempt by a mob

187

JUDGE LYNCH

in any form; a county where the courts functioned
rapidly and peace officers were, supposedly, above re-
proach and loyal to their oaths. Yet, in 1931, the
people of Nodaway County, city of Maryville, threw
off their veneer of civilization and for a time became
savages of the lowest order. They put aside their
perfectly good court and filed their case in Judge
Lynch's Court of Uncommon Pleas.

Raymond Gunn was known as a bad nigger. In
1925 he had been convicted of attempted rape and
sentenced to four years in the state penitentiary. In
the prison he was rated as a "smart nigger" and he was
released in January, 1928. After returning to Mary-
ville, Gunn made two further attempts at assault on
college girls who refused to push the cases because of
the notoriety that would result. Shortly after, Gunn
married a mulatto girl and moved with her to Omaha.

In 1930, the Negro returned without his wife; she
had died supposedly of pneumonia— but, according
to many, from the frequent beatings administered by
her husband. Some opinions are that Gunn had a
criminal record in Omaha, but it seemed hardly worth
while to check on that after the Negro had been
lynched.

On December 16, 1930, a nineteen-year-old white
teacher in the little one -room school at Garett, lo-
cated about three miles from Maryville, was found

188

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

brutally murdered. Raymond Gunn was immediately
suspected and warrants for his arrest were sent to all
nearby peace officers. In two days he was arrested;
he still had on the bloody clothes worn when he com-
mitted the crime, and his shoe-print fitted the impres-
sion found in the soft earth outside the schoolhouse.
He was given the third degree, but did not confess
until "they tried religion on him." This brought out a
complete confession that was heard, in part, by news-
papermen from St. Joseph, Kansas City, and other
points.

Gunn's confession told of how he had been in the
neighborhood of the school on Monday afternoon,
passing that day to look at some of his traps, when the
idea occurred to him to rape the school teacher. Ac-
cordingly, the following day he returned to the school-
house to carry out his plan. He lay in hiding until
the pupils had gone home and then crept to the win-
dow and watched while the teacher made prepara-
tions to close the school. She took the coal bucket and
went to the coal box outside and filled it. Just as she
was re-entering Gunn appeared at the door. She was
frightened and he followed her inside. He carried a
hedge club in his hand.

In the struggle the teacher bit the Negro's thumb
and he swung his club and struck her over the head.
She seized the coal bucket and attempted to strike

189

JUDGE LYNCH

him with it, whereupon he hit her again and knocked
her down. She fell between the desks and he dragged
her out into the aisle.

Here he was interrupted by a passer-by, a girl on
a bay horse riding down the lane in front of the school-
house. He watched until she had passed out of sight
and then returned to the teacher. She had revived, and
asked him to give her a drink of water; instead, he hit
her another blow with his club. The examining physi-
cian later stated that it was this blow that fractured
her skull and caused her death. Gunn, at this point,
heard another noise and, again becoming frightened,
left without performing the intended rape. The ex-
amining physician again reported that the Negro's
statement in regard to this was true; there had been no
rape. Later the prosecuting attorney, after checking
on Gunn's various statements, stated that the confes-
sion was complete.

Lynch-f eeling was high in Mary ville, and Gunn was
removed at once to St. Joseph for safekeeping. All
the next day, Friday, crowds milled around Maryville
talking lynching. Plans were laid to go to St. Joe and
storm the jail, provided it was not too strong and the
officers did not put up too much opposition. When
the mob arrived on Saturday, it found the officers
ready. A unit of the Missouri National Guard was on
duty with a machine-gun truck barring entrance to

190

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCHES CASES

the jail; others were mounted on the roof and dis-
tributed about the yard. The mob was defeated in its
purpose, but it set up a great howl, booing, catcalling,
and demanding the person of the Negro. The machine-
gun crew on the roof were oiling their weapon; one
of the crew swung the barrel back and forth in a way
that suggested he was getting the range of the mob.
It forgot its booing, evaporated, returned to Nodaway
County and Maryville, and that night the prisoner
was taken to Kansas City.

Raymond Gunn's trial was set for Monday, January
12. This date was determined by the officials of the
court and the Prosecuting Attorney. As soon as the
announcement was made, the mob unofficially an-
nounced that Monday the twelfth would be the day
Gunn was lynched. The mob was right. Gunn never
went on trial, at least not in Maryville, Nodaway
County, Missouri. Rather, say he was sentenced in
that center of culture and civilization and executed
at a little higher than usual cost to the taxpayers.

The date set for the trial was given full publicity
in all newspapers in that section of the Ozark state.
Preparations for the lynching went forward just as
surely as preparations for the trial progressed in the
Prosecuting Attorney's office. The lynching was de-
liberately planned; it was known to all Nodaway
County that the Negro was not to be brought to trial

191

JUDGE LYNCH

and it cannot, by any stretch of the imagination, be
termed a quick flare-up of mob frenzy. These Mis-
sourians of Nodaway County were as deliberate in
this affair as they would be in a horse trade or betting
on a horse race. The leaders were known, they were
Maryville and Nodaway County men; they met in
the heart of Maryville and openly discussed their
plans.

The Negro was to be seized at the courthouse. Even
if the Sheriff and his deputies tried to protect their
prisoner, which was not expected, one of the con-
spirators was to pick him off with a rifle. The point on
which these men commonly agreed was that Ray-
mond Gunn was not to come to trial. In so far as they
were concerned, he had already been tried, found
guilty, and sentenced by the Hanging Judge.

The spectator mob began forming on the Saturday
before the trial. Men who came to Maryville for their
weekly shopping on this day planned to stay and "see
the fun." Those neighbors who lived in distant parts
and who did not have first-hand knowledge of the
coming lynching were informed of developments by
telephone. All day Sunday they received calls, the gist
of the message being: "Be at the courthouse at eight.
You know why! " By Sunday evening every parking-
space in Maryville was crowded with out-of-town

192

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH S CASES

cars and the men sat inside them bundled in great
coats and sheepskins, for it was very cold.

The Mayor of Maryville was not ignorant to what
was going on, and he appealed for reinforcements for
the local peace officers. The Governor sent the State
Adjutant General to assist the local authorities in any
way they might need. The Missouri National Guard
may be called out to assist in preserving peace and order
only "at the written request of the sheriff or other
local authorities." This order the Sheriff steadfastly
refused to give, insisting that there was not going to
be any trouble. In view of the common knowledge of
the proposed lynching, the Sheriff's refusal to give
the Adjutant General a signed order can have but one
meaning. The Adjutant General, in the presence of
the Sheriff, ordered the Captain of the local guard
unit to mobilize his men and have them in uniform and
armed by seven-thirty Monday morning. In consider-
ing the non-use of the militia, one unanswered question
is why, in the face of the Sheriff's refusal to request
their use in writing, the Mayor did not give the Adju-
tant General the required document.

The guard unit was ready at the appointed time.
Rifles, side arms, and tear bombs were issued, and the
men put through their drill inside the armory. The
mob, too, was ready, and the leaders posted men at

JUDGE LYNCH

each door of the courthouse to give warning when
the prisoner was brought in. In the light of later events,
that was hardly necessary. The court opened at nine
and the clerk called the first arraignment, "State versus
Gunn," and the Court ordered the Sheriff to bring
in the prisoner. While the Judge and Prosecutor
waited, the Sheriff left the court, went through the
crowds to the jail to secure the Negro. There he found
a car with two deputies awaiting him. Gunn was placed
in the back seat with one; the Sheriff climbed into
the front with the other.

The reporter for the St. Joseph Neivs-Press wrote:
"It was an amazing sight; here was the prisoner be-
ing taken straight to the mob waiting for him. I was
standing there with the editor of the local paper. We
ran toward the car, and the crowd nearly beat us to it.
'Here he is!' they yelled, and crowded around the car
as it came to a stop just opposite the courthouse en-
trance on that side. 'Grab him!' several men yelled.
I saw the sheriff open his door, and a big man put an
arm around him and pulled him over. Another leader
opened the back door in the meantime and held the
deputy, while a third reached in and seized the Negro.
A dozen men swarmed around the prisoner and pulled
him out into the street. The sheriff picked himself up,
dusted off his coat and walked back toward the jail.

194

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

I don't know what happened to the deputies. They
just sort of melted away."

The National Guard unit was still in the armory
awaiting the call that did not come. The mob, as
though by common assent, did not lead their prisoner
past the armory but took him through another street.
Here the arrangements went awry; there had been no
plans beyond the snatching of the Negro. At this point
the unknown man in the red mackinaw took command.
He mounted the running board of an automobile and
announced that they would take the Negro to the
scene of his crime and burn him in the schoolhouse.
The mob yelled its approval. They would march, con-
tinued the man in the red coat, and they would avoid
the armory. Miles down the road to the schoolhouse
marched the mob with their prisoner in chains.

When they arrived at the schoolhouse, Raymond
Gunn's face had been badly mutilated; his nose and
ears had been cut and torn. There were still no signs
of any resistance on the part of the authorities, al-
though, from the time that the man in the red coat
had announced from the running board of the car
what the mob intended doing with their victim, the
march had consumed no less than one and a half hours.
Time for the Sheriff to have gone into action, if he
had had any intentions of doing so; time, too, for the

195

JUDGE LYNCH

Mayor, who was one of the "other local authorities"
mentioned in the state law, to see that the Guard was
sent to protect the Government's prisoner. The mob
showed far more intelligence than did the city officials.

The simple announcement that the prisoner was to
be burned was sufficient for some members of the mob.
Disregarding the red-coated man's instructions to
march, many drove at once to the proposed scene of
the lynching. When the main body of the mob ar-
rived, it found that much of the work of clearing the
schoolhouse had been done.

Gunn was taken into the schoolhouse and made to
repeat his confession. When he had finished, he asked:
"Now what are you going to do with me?"

"Well, nigger," said the leader. "We're going to
burn you."

Two members of the mob found a short ladder and
mounted to the roof of the schoolhouse. They tore
away some of the shingles on either side of the peak,
baring the ridge pole. The Negro was pulled up, made
to lie prone along the ridge pole, and then was chained
to it. Gasoline was sent up and poured over the vic-
tim's body and about the top of the roof. Below, car
tanks were drained and the gasoline thrown inside the
schoolhouse. Then the leader ordered the crowd to
fall back while he lighted a paper and tossed it through
a window. The interior of the schoolhouse was aflame

196

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

at once, and in another moment the roof burst into
flames about the victim. There was a single long scream
from Gunn, then his clothing burned off and the gaso-
line flames died down. The fire continued and the roof
caved in within a quarter hour. Just two and one half
hours after he was snatched, Raymond Gunn was dead;
they were two and one half hours of sadism that Mary-
ville, Nodaway County, and the State of Missouri will
be a long time living down.

Here was a lynching that could have been prevented
at any one of a dozen points. One single, determined
public official— the Mayor, the Prosecuting Attorney,
the Sheriff, the Chief of the police, any one of the
Selectmen or members of the city council, the County
Clerk— could have summoned the National Guard to
to protect the prisoner. Even the Adjutant General
could have disobeyed the law and saved the state's
honor. The only statement ever made in defense of
these public servants came from the supine Sheriff,
who said he was unwilling to turn the guardsmen
"loose in that crowd with their automatic pistols;
somebody would be killed or badly injured, and prob-
ably it would have been the guardsmen."

(F) Twice Lynched in Texas— George Hughes

Negroes in the South should have learned long be-
fore 1930 that they must not ask their white employers

197

JUDGE LYNCH

for money due them, no matter how long overdue
or how badly they may need it. It meant burning to
death for Henry Lowry in Arkansas and it brought
death in the same form to George Hughes at Sherman,
Texas. The law officers of Grayson County tried their
best to give the accused Negro a fair trial, but the mob,
instigated by an illiterate bootlegger and incited by a
woman of questionable reputation, carried the day
and incidentally destroyed the county courthouse and
a considerable portion of the Negro-owned property.
George Hughes, a forty-one-year-old illiterate
itinerant farm-worker, on Saturday, May 3, 1930,
went to his employer to collect the six dollars wages
due him. His employer, a white renter, was not at
home; his wife informed the worker where her hus-
band could be found and said that he would not re-
turn from Sherman until evening. The Negro went
away but came back less than an hour later armed
with a double-barreled shotgun and again demanded
his wages. Again put off, he pushed the woman into
a bedroom and assaulted her. She begged him to let
her go and promised him all the money in the house.
Fearing that her small son might give an alarm, he
tied her to a bed and told her that he was not through
with her and would return. The renter's wife man-
aged to break her bonds and fled across a field to a
neighbor's house. At once the neighbors went to res-

198

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

cue the child, and they found Hughes walking aim-
lessly about the barn. At the approach of the white
men, he fled.

A deputy sheriff arrested Hughes in a creek bot-
tom, and later announced that Hughes had fired at
him with the shotgun. The Negro confessed his
crime, agreed to plead guilty, and was taken to a jail
some miles distant for safekeeping. His trial was set
for May 9, less than a week from the commission of
his crime.

Within two days highly colored rumors about the
crime were widespread; not only had the Negro
raped the woman, but he had a venereal disease, her
throat and breasts were mutilated, she was not ex-
pected to live. Medical examination of the woman
and the Negro proved that all the reports except that
of the rape were untrue. They had served their odious
purpose and Sherman, by the time the Negro was
ready for trial, was sufficiently mob-minded to de-
mand the services of Judge Lynch.

The law officers of Grayson County sensed the
growing mob spirit and sought a change of venue,
but the relatives of the assaulted woman demanded
that the trial be held in Sherman. Hughes was brought
into court on schedule, escorted by four members of
the Texas Rangers. Outside, a constantly growing
crowd made their opinions vocal as the jury was be-

199

JUDGE LYNCH

ing selected. People from outside Sherman were con-
stantly arriving and, it was later learned, had been
urged to attend the trial by an illiterate horse trader
and bootlegger. Cries of "Let's get the nigger right
now" were heard, and a woman, dressed in red and un-
known in Sherman, circulated among the men, chid-
ing them for their yellowness. A small segment of the
mob got into the courthouse and tore an American
flag from a corridor wall and paraded about the build-
ing; later this group was ejected from the courthouse
by the use of tear bombs thrown by the Rangers.

The whipping up of the mob was comparatively
ineffective until one o'clock. At this time the woman
who had been attacked was brought from the hospi-
tal to the courthouse in an ambulance. As she was
being taken into the courtroom on a stretcher, the
mob became active, vicious, and uncontrollable.
Again it charged into the courtroom, and this time
was dispersed with a single charge of buckshot and
more tear gas. The leader of the Rangers instructed
his men not to shoot, and this order was heard by
members of the mob. Later it was interpreted as an
order from the Governor and one that applied not
only to the Rangers and peace officers but also to the
National Guard, who were summoned later.

The woman in red continued to rib the young men
for their lack of courage and, to prove that they were

200

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH S CASES

full-grown men with hair on their chests, they threw
stones through the courthouse windows. At this dem-
onstration, the trial judge decided on a change of
venue and the prisoner was hurried into the fireproof
vault in the district clerk's office on the second floor.
A pail of water was placed beside him.

About two-thirty, a young man threw a can of gas-
oline through one of the broken windows and an-
other pitched in a lighted match. When the gasoline
did not ignite, a third lad climbed to the window-sill
and struck another match. These boys were recog-
nized as students and former students of the Sherman
public schools. The fire department used their ladders
to take people from the second floor of the court-
house, and the crowd protested only when it was the
turn of the Judge, Prosecuting Attorney, Sheriffs,
and Rangers to use the ladders as a means of escape.
Finally all were removed save the Negro in the fire-
proof vault. As the firemen sought to control the fire,
the members of the mob cut their hose.

Every attempt made by the firemen and police to
save the courthouse was rebuffed by the mob. "Let
her burn down; the taxpayers will put her back." By
late afternoon the courthouse was gutted and the mob
had grown to include practically all the population
of Sherman and of the nearby city of Denison. At
nightfall some doubts were expressed as to whether

201

JUDGE LYNCH

or not the Negro was really in the vault, and arrange-
ments were made to blast it open.

Earlier in the evening the Rangers had telephoned
Governor Moody for reinforcements, and a small de-
tachment of National Guardsmen arrived at this time.
The mob greeted the soldiers with hoots and catcalls
and later with bottles and bricks from the burning
building. One woman, a mother, held her baby aloft,
over the heads of those in front of her, and screamed:

"Shoot it, you yellow, nigger-lovin' soldiers!"

The militiamen, realizing they were outnumbered,
retreated to the county jail, some three blocks away.
At seven, another detachment of more than fifty ar-
rived from Dallas and were posted as guards about
the already totally destroyed courthouse.

The mob still gave credence to the "don't shoot"
rumor and they wanted the Negro, dead or alive.
After dark, a pitched battle between the troops and
the mob took place, and the troops were thrown back
to their headquarters in the county jail. Several sol-
diers were badly cut and beaten and many had their
rifles taken away from them. The mob, again in com-
plete possession of the scene, sang "Happy Days Are
Here Again" as a victory song.

By eight o'clock the embers of the courthouse had
cooled sufficiently to permit attempts to open the

202

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

second-story vault. The structure resisted all methods
until an acetylene torch was applied. A hole was
made and a charge of dynamite inserted and deton-
ated. One of the mob leaders entered, and the body
of George Hughes was thrown to the waiting wolves.
Whether the Negro was baked to death or killed by
the dynamite blast is not known; part of his head was
blown off and the water bucket that had been placed
in the vault with him was empty.

The corpse was dragged behind a Ford containing
two young men and two girls to the Negro section,
a distance of less than half a mile. The entire mob
followed, yelling, still singing "Happy Days Are
Here Again," tooting automobile horns: a gala night
in the old Lone Star State. These people were not
through with George Hughes. In the center of the
Negro business district, in front of the Smith Hotel,
they paused and hanged his body to a cottonwood
tree. A further touch of sexual perversion was added
to the necrophilism of the night when a mob leader
unsexed the body in the presence of men, women,
and children. The Smith Hotel, Negro property, was
denuded of chairs, tables, and other furniture to build
the pyre under the hanging body. While the body
was roasting, the mob took everything of value from
the hotel; chewing gum, confectionery, soft drinks

203

JUDGE LYNCH

were passed about the crowd, and then the hotel was
fired. The mob resumed its singing and dancing about
the fires. When the hotel fire died down, the crowd
went to the Andrews building, a two-story structure
owned by Negroes, and fired that, deserting the old
fire for the new. They, the members of the mob,
openly boasted that they would burn the home of
every Negro in town, and they proceeded with their
self-appointed task.

One house was occupied by a white tenant, though
owned by a Negro. The mob considerately helped
the tenant move out his personal goods and then set
fire to the house. Negro property owners called upon
the police, the fire department, the Rangers, and the
National Guard for protection, but the police were
too busy directing traffic, and the entire attention of
the fire department was being given to saving white-
owned property. One white man, named Sofey,
whose son was later indicted as a member of the
actual mob, saved a row of Negro-owned residences
by falsely swearing to the mob that he was the real
owner.

At four o'clock in the morning enough troops were
sent to Sherman to put the mob to rout. Before they
arrived, the destruction, in addition to the courthouse,
included a hotel, the Odd Fellows Hall, the Knights

204

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

of Pythias Building, a life-insurance office, theater,
two cafes, two undertaking establishments, two den-
tists' offices, two doctors' offices, two barber shops, a
drugstore and many residences.

Meanwhile, all of Sherman's two thousand-odd
Negro citizens were under cover; some were given
refuge by white friends and employers. The others
with babies and the aged and the sick hurried away in
whatever conveyance they possessed or upon foot.
Some found refuge with Negro friends in the coun-
try and adjacent towns, but many spent the night hid-
den in ditches and ravines and under bushes.

Dawn found the city of Sherman quiet and under
martial law. There were threats heard to engage the
troops in combat and to continue the job of driving
the Negroes out of town. Dawn, too, found notices
posted on the homes of Negroes, warning them to
leave town or suffer the consequences. One white
employer was notified, by the poster method, to dis-
charge his Negro workers and replace them with
whites. The Negro citizens who returned, under the
protection of the troops, were persecuted and abused
before the situation became normal again.

On the following Monday, May 12, a military
court of investigation was set up for the purpose of
securing evidence for the Grand Jury. Of sixty-six

205

JUDGE LYNCH

men and women questioned by this court, twenty-
nine were arrested and jailed to await whatever ac-
tion the Grand Jury should take. Three women were
arrested, but no indictments were drawn against them.
The two young men and two girls whose Ford had
dragged the body were not identified and the family
of the victim of the assault was exonerated of all re-
sponsibility for the lynching and rioting.

Of the fourteen indicted, only one owned any tax-
able property, and a new courthouse is costing the
county $100,000. And there are other items to be
added to the bill: rent for offices for county officials;
expenses for guardsmen, Rangers, and other state of-
ficers sent to the scene; and the salaries of the fifty
men who served under the Director of Public Safety
when martial law was lifted. Ironically enough, the
Negroes who suffered most, losing their life savings
in fire and smoke, cannot collect on insurance policies
because of the riot clause. When Hughes' burned
torso was cut down, it was offered to the town's two
Negro undertakers, but since both had been burned
out of business, it was turned over to a white under-
taker.

On the night of May 9, 1930, Black Friday as it is
now known, the city of Sherman gave strength to the
statement made years ago by old Bill Sherman. He
said: "If I owned Hell and Texas, I'd rent out Texas."

206

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCIi's CASES

(G) Three Governors Go Into Action—

The almost constant decrease in the number of
lynchings since the high of eighty-one in 1919 to a
low of eight in 1937 received a severe setback in
the first year of President Roosevelt's administra-
tion. Nineteen-thirty-three had twenty-eight known
lynchings, and during the last four days of Novem-
ber, American newspapers carried lynch-news almost
to the total submergence of other matter. During
those days the Governors of three widely separated
states, yet each with its capital approximately on the
line of the thirty-ninth parallel, went into action in
varying manners and with decidedly varying results.
In two of the states Negroes had been lynched; in the
third, two white men had lost the decision before
Judge Lynch.

On October 1 8, a Negro, George Armwood, was
taken from the jail at Princess Anne, Maryland, and
hanged by a mob of 2,000. After the lynching, the
body was dragged through the main thoroughfare of
the town and burned in the public square. Governor
Albert M. Ritchie demanded the arrest and convic-
tion of the leaders. After a month of inaction from the
authorities of Somerset County, he gave the names of
nine alleged lynchers to the Maryland National

207

JUDGE LYNCH

Guard and sent a provisional battalion of 300 men to
make the arrests. The Governor did not declare mar-
tial law; a provision of the Maryland Constitution
gives him power to use the National Guard to quell
riots or enforce the law.

To make the arrests the troops were compelled to
act with military precision and to employ war-time
strategy. They moved secretly from Baltimore in a
fleet of eleven buses, followed by trucks carrying
field kitchens. At Salisbury they took over the town's
armory and waited while a detail of State Troopers
raced along the deserted roads at two in the morning,
taking over the Princess Anne telephone exchange
and stopping all calls to prevent word of the arrival of
the troops from spreading over the wires. Then they
went to the homes of the nine men for whom they
had warrants, routed from bed those they could find,
four all told, bundled them into a truck, and sped
back to Salisbury.

Here the prisoners were taken to the armory and
turned over to the waiting guardsmen. Two of the
warrants were invalid, one having been made out for
a fictitious name and another in the man's nickname.
Of the other alleged leaders for whom warrants had
been issued, one was in Virginia and two had escaped.
The bed of one of them was still warm when the
troopers came for him.

208

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

In the face of extremely bitter criticism from East-
ern Shore people, Governor Ritchie defended his ac-
tion:

"The State Government cannot stand by and per-
mit a State's Attorney to decline to arrest persons
who are reliably charged with crime, and, as long as
neither he nor the judges would act, it became my
duty to put in motion the machinery of the law and
cause the arrests to be made."

The crowd around the armory in which the four
prisoners were held increased as the news spread.
Three thousand heard that the guardsmen were going
to take their prisoners back to court at Princess Anne
for a hearing.

"Like hell they will," one man gave voice to the
mob's thought. "They're not taking them anywhere."
This defy was greeted with cheers, and the mob be-
came menacing. The National Guard officers told off
a hundred men to fix their bayonets, issued them tear
bombs, and posted them about the building. This
show of strength further infuriated the mob and
there was danger that the press from the rear would
force those in front into the bristling steel. Suddenly
the Adjutant General ordered: "Let them have it!"
The soldiers threw their bombs into the mob, blind-
ing some to tears and leaving others gasping. The
bombs had a demoralizing effect for a few minutes,

209

JUDGE LYNCH

and the mob retreated, only to re-form and again ad-
vance threateningly. A second tear gas barrage was
more effective, and the mob pressed back out of the
zone of danger.

Later in the morning the mob, reinforced by more
farmers and more oystermen, again attempted to
break through the line of troops outside the armory,
but were again repulsed with tear gas; this time it was
used in such quantity that from then on the mob
stayed behind what might be called the menacing
point. The Guard officers and the State Troopers had
a conference, and it was decided that it would be
unwise to attempt to take the prisoners to Princess
Anne, a dozen miles away. The temper of the mob
was such that anywhere along the route they might
expect pitched battles or sniping from roadside
bushes. The four prisoners were hustled into buses
and, almost before the mob was aware of it, they were
on their way to Baltimore for, as the phrase goes, safe-
keeping.

The mob, cheated, looked about and saw those it
considered responsible for its predicament: newspa-
per correspondents, photographers, and newspaper
trucks. The reporters were forced to flee to cellars;
the photographers, recognizable by their cameras,
were easy prey; later, when the delivery trucks were
bringing papers, they were met, their loads destroyed,

210

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH S CASES

and their drivers forced to return to their home
towns.

The following day the Governor's prisoners were
returned to Princess Anne on habeas corpus proceed-
ings and taken before the very judge who had refused
to issue warrants for their arrest and freed for lack of
evidence and witnesses. Governor Ritchie sharply re-
buked the judges sitting in the case, charging that
they knew that "evidence entirely sufficient" to war-
rant holding the accused men "would be promptly
produced if they were willing to hear it."

Judge Lynch was not reversed. Governor Ritchie
and the Free State of Maryland did everything in
their power to punish the guilty; there is no stain on
the honor of either. But the people of the Eastern
Shore, and particularly of Somerset County, respect
and revere the Hanging Judge and insist that all oth-
ers accept his decisions without question.

During this time, far across the American conti-
nent, indeed as far as one may travel overland, the
state of California was meeting the problem of lynch-
executions in an entirely different manner, as radical
in its way as that of the Free State. California's double
lynching was in the best moving-picture tradition, a
quickie that wrote its own scenario and was passed by

211

JUDGE LYNCH

a censorship board of the state's most distinguished
citizens with only a few dissenters.

Thomas H. Thurmond confessed that he and John
Holmes had kidnaped and murdered Brooke Hart,
young San Jose businessman. It was a brutal affair;
even a brief review of that part of the crime is revolt-
ing. Hart was snatched as he drove out of a parking
lot on the evening of November 9. His abductors
took him to the San Jose bridge, where they blind-
folded him with a pillow slip, tied heavy cement
blocks to his body, slugged him with a revolver, and
shot him. They then threw him from the bridge and,
observing his struggles in the water, fired half a dozen
more shots into his body.

The kidnap-murderers proposed to collect a ran-
som of $40,000 from their victim's father, carrying
on their negotiations almost entirely by telephone.
The wires were tapped by the police, a trap was set,
and Thurmond, on November 16, was taken into cus-
tody. His confession implicated Holmes, who was at
once arrested, and both were incarcerated in the
Santa Clara County jail to await trial. A reward of
$500 for the recovery of Brooke Hart's body was of-
fered by his father and, on November 26, two duck
hunters found it in three feet of water in San Fran-
cisco Bay.

That night, as peaceful San Josans were returning

212

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

from the movies and theaters, they saw a mob com-
posed of men, mostly young and on the hoodlum side,
attack the county jail. The mob was repeatedly re-
pulsed with tear bombs hurled by officers stationed
about the building, and for a time the attack took the
form of a siege. Then the leaders came forward to
direct the mob's activities, and an eight-inch iron pipe
was stripped from the partially completed San Jose
post office adjoining the jail and used as a battering-
ram. A second group, realizing the efficacy of the
instrument, tore another pipe from the post office,
and together the two crews battered their way into
the jail. Sheriff Emig, who alone in San Jose seemed
to know his duty, put up a stiff resistance but was so
severely beaten that he was later taken to a hospital.

Once the mob was in the jail yard, there was no
further resistance; police and guards were brushed
aside. Thurmond and Holmes had been placed in sep-
arate cells on the second and third floors, and the mob
divided to seize them. One group made a mistake and
snatched the wrong prisoner; learning their error,
they tossed him aside and returned for the right
victim.

Word had spread all over the city, and by the time
the mob brought their victims to the street, all San
Jose was in a carnival spirit. The two kidnap-
murderers were dragged a hundred yards to St. James

213

JUDGE LYNCH

Park; Thurmond had fainted, but Holmes fought for
his life every inch of the way. The unconscious man
was hanged without difficulty and to the jeers of
6,000 spectators. Holmes was a powerful man, weigh-
ing above 200 pounds, and he put up a valiant strug-
gle, fighting furiously. He was beaten down repeat-
edly, only to rise again, his body naked and bleeding.
At last he was beneath the tree selected as his gallows
and a rope was thrown around his neck; almost un-
conscious, he managed to throw it off. Again he was
beaten down, and once more the noose was slipped
about his throat, but he freed his hands and again
threw it off. After a final beating, from which he did
not revive, he was hauled fifteen feet into the air.

Six thousand San Josans applauded the hangings
and 10,000 others, unable to get within sight of the
lynchings, had to be content with adding their vocal
approval. Men, women, and children enjoyed the
barbaric spectacle as they would a circus. The San
Jose police did their level best to help the affair to a
successful climax by keeping out of the way and by
permitting no one to enter St. James Park save the
6,000 already there. When the lynchings were com-
pleted, the police kept the crowds moving so that all
might witness the bodies before they were humanely
cut down.

214

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

Photographers were present, and many shots of the
lynching and the lynchers were made; the actual
lynchers could have been identified, arrested, and
prosecuted. But for what purpose? Governor James
Rolph, Jr., was no Governor Ritchie. Not by far.
Governor Rolph must have had criminal knowledge
of the proposed lynching, for he postponed a trip to
Idaho to attend a conference of governors.

"7f / had gone away" said Rolph's statement,
"someone would have called out the troops on me,
and I promised in Los Angeles I would not do that.
Why should 1 call out the troops to protect those two
fellows?" 2

Why, indeed? It's rather late to be inquiring. Gov-
ernor Rolph has gone to his reward. The alleged
spontaneity of the uprising, the flash of public indig-
nation and outrage, seem to have been phony. It
approaches criminal conspiracy if the Governor's
words are to be taken literally. If he had gone away,
someone would have called out the troops and then
there would have been no lynching.

Earlier, Governor Rolph had said, even while the
bodies of the lynched men were still warm: "This is
the best lesson that California has ever given to the
country."

2 Italics are mine. F. S.

215

JUDGE LYNCH

What is the worst lesson that California ever gave
the country?

Later, when public-spirited Calif ornians spoke of
going over the Governor's head and seeking prosecu-
tion of the lynchers, Rolph came further to the aid
of Judge Lynch: "If anyone is arrested for the good
job, I'll pardon them all."

For several months it was touch-and-go between
the pro-lynch Americans and their fellows opposed
to the decisions of the incompetent judge. The pro-
lynchers filled the columns of the daily papers with
words of praise for the San Jose mob and for Gover-
nor Rolph, contemptuously referring to those who
protested the outrage as "the right-minded." There
was one hopeful sign in the fact there were so many
right-minded, mostly outside California.

During these days while the Judge was traveling
his circuit along the thirty-ninth parallel, the state of
Missouri found another case requiring his attention.
Approximately half way between Maryland and Cal-
ifornia, Missouri's Governor Park's method of han-
dling his affair was approximately half way between
that of Rolph and Ritchie. Park's method was what
may be called the traditional one.

Lloyd Warner, a nineteen-year-old Negro, was

216

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH S CASES

snatched from the county jail at St. Joseph and
lynched on the courthouse lawn. This was the same
jail in which Raymond Gunn had been confined for
safekeeping in 1930; the same jail from which a mob
that had come for Gunn was dispersed by the simple
expedient of aiming an empty machine gun at it. Fur-
ther, it may be recalled that Gunn was later moved
to Kansas City for more safekeeping. Missouri, it
would seem, does not retain very well; mobs learn
from other mobs, but most peace officers apparently
discontinue all mental development after securing
their appointment.

On Tuesday, November 28, while the papers of
the nation were featuring Governor Rolph's defense
of lynching, Warner was arrested, charged with
criminal assault on a twenty-one-year-old white girl
on the previous Sunday night. His victim had been
kicked and beaten and was found in a lonely alley
bound with her own stockings. Only six months be-
fore Warner had narrowly escaped prosecution on a
charge of assaulting a colored woman. When he was
arraigned, he was ready, he said, to plead guilty. The
Judge did not want to rush things and directed the
case not be taken up until the next day.

Early that evening a mob began forming and ex-
pressed its intentions by hurling stones through the
jail windows. Its members evidently had studied the

217

JUDGE LYNCH

San Jose strategy and believed it effective. When
they were repulsed with tear gas, a small detachment
was sent for a five-inch iron pipe. The jail door re-
sisted and, leadership failing to indicate the plan of
attack, the mob retired out of range. Governor Park
had time to order out a unit of the Missouri National
Guard, specifically the Thirty-fifth Tank Company,
with about sixty-five men.

"There appeared not to be time enough," said the
Governor, "to get National Guardsmen from other
towns nearby."

Recalling that a single guardsman with an empty
machine gun had dispersed the Maryville mob, one
might have thought sixty-five men with tanks would
have been enough.

The tanks rolled up to the county jail, and one tank
soldier who had failed to lock himself in wras removed
from the machine by members of the mob and elimi-
nated from further participation. Then state highway
police were ordered to the scene. The mob had by
this time increased to such vast proportions that it
was too powerful. The tear gas bombs proved inef-
fectual, and hundreds of the mob crashed through the
doors of the jail and raced through the corridors. Of-
ficers within the jail hurled gas bombs indiscrimi-
nately, fist fights took place, and shots were fired;
then the forty officers melted before the mob, and the

218

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH S CASES

prisoner was taken. The Negro, Warner, was a pow-
erful man; he fought and kicked, and it took many
members of the mob to quiet him. Subdued and
stripped almost naked, the victim was dragged out by
four young members of the mob, others who were
following kicking and beating him. He was rushed to
a tree about a block away, the mob cheering and
shouting and cursing. Under the tree the Negro at-
tempted to talk, but shouts of "string him up"
drowned out whatever he said. He was pulled about
eight feet into the air as the crowd cheered. Later
the mob raided a nearby filling station, saturated the
body with gasoline, and applied torches. When the
rope by which the Negro was hanging parted, a fire
was built about the body.

Later in Jefferson City, when told of the lynching,
Governor Park said, "I have no comment to make."

However, four arrests were made. Two of the
men were charged with first degree murder, one with
possession of a pistol stolen from a guard on the night
of the lynching, and the fourth with malicious de-
struction of property when the jail was attacked.
There was none charged with simple obstruction of
traffic. The four men were discharged the following
year, after the failure of the jury to convict the one
man against whom the State had the strongest case.

Thus three Governors in widely separated states

219

JUDGE LYNCH

met Judge Lynch's incursions in varying ways; all
of the Governors failed.

On December 5, President Roosevelt, speaking
over a nationwide radio hook-up, condemned lynch-
ing and rebuked Governor Rolph, though he did not
mention the California executive by name:

"This new generation, for example, is not content
with preaching against that vile form of collective
murder, lynch-law, which has broken out in our
midst anew. We know that it is murder, and a delib-
erate and definite disobedience of the commandment,
'Thou shalt not kill.' We do not excuse those in high
places or in low who condone lynch-law."

(H) Those Who Defied the Bosses

The United States, reputedly the most advanced
of industrial nations, is probably the most backward
in its attitude toward labor. Not only are the great
industrialists themselves reactionary to the point of
sheer feudalism, but they are backed up by a body of
public opinion, vocal even if in the minority, that is
ready to go to any lengths to preserve the present
order. The basis of lynching Negroes in the South is
obvious: the law of Judge Lynch is invoked to keep
the black in his economic and cultural place. It is the
unreconstructed South's answer to the Thirteenth
Amendment; the southern Negro today is no less a

220

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCHES CASES

helot than he was a century ago. This cruel weapon
has also been found effective against white working
men who, rising in protest against low wages and vile
working conditions, threaten the profits of the domi-
nant whites. The crack-pots of the Ku Klux Klan,
the apostles of the rope and faggot, are at all times
ready to put the Judge's bosses' edicts into effect.

The South is learning, somewhat belatedly, that it
is a bad way to treat a low-priced labor market.

Short-sighted northern employers have long en-
vied the South its control over its workers. They have
sought to imitate the Klan and the Men of Justice
with similar organizations. The Crusaders and the
Sentinals of the Republic do not get down into the
mud with their victims but they are equally repres-
sive. The Black Legion and the Silver Shirts were
ready to do any dirty work required of them so long
as they could hide behind the flag. Failing to keep
these groups secret, the employers have been com-
pelled to institute their own lynch-law through
company spies and company thugs. Instead of the
death-penalty they use the yellow-dog contract, the
shut-out and the blacklist, the Weir plan and the Mo-
hawk Valley double-cross.

The northern employers have learned that all
these repressive measures are ineffective against in-
dustrially organized workers. It is the workers in the

221

JUDGE LYNCH

jungles of industry, the unorganized and the poorly
organized, those workers in whose minds the neces-
sity for union is becoming apparent, who are the vic-
tims of these repressive measures.

When any of these workers attempt to organize,
to form themselves into unions for collective strength
and open bargaining, to protect their jobs and
secure better working conditions, these underhanded
employer-weapons fall upon them with a form of
lynch-law. There are high motives that send priests
and missionaries into savage lands, and the motives
that take labor organizers into the jungles of industry
are often no less exalted. They are missionaries of a
better world. These missionaries, who seek to preach
a better everyday life, are often met with violence
and death, their temples wrecked, their leaders
mobbed and beaten or jailed. When the police and
laws have failed, when the workers become insistent
upon remedial measures, the embattled industrialist
summons his old ally, Judge Lynch, and his mob
jury. Posters are thrown against walls announcing,
"So and So Is Communistic. Communism Will Not
Be Tolerated. Ku Klux Klan Rides Again."

Although Judge Lynch's white victims are not so
numerous as his black sufferers of the same class, the
whites would make an impressive total if any compu-
tation were possible. In labor wars the remains of the

222

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

lynch-victims are often destroyed by burial in quick-
lime, in phosphate pits, dropped into abandoned
mines, or weighted down and thrown in rivers and
harbors. Only on rare occasions are the bodies left to
be found by the coroner; a lynched working man is
propaganda too powerful for the masters.

Frank Little was lynched. So was Joe Hill, though
the entire state of Utah and the Mormon Church had
to get down in the mud to bring it about. Wesley
Everest was barbarously mutilated before he was
lynched. Frank Norman and Joseph Shoemaker were
lynched. It isn't often that Judge Lynch wastes his
time on cripples; not that he is too gallant to take
advantage of women or the physically handicapped.
Little was a barb in the crop of organized greed even
if he hobbled on crutches.

Butte, Montana, has always been a wide open town
for those with money. The bosses gambled and won
with their profits and the workers lost. Speaking in-
dustrially, it has been called the city of gunmen and
widows, of sweatholes and cemeteries. The sweat-
holes are the mines; they have been on fire for half a
century, and the temperature averages about 1 1 6 de-
grees summer and winter. The fires are, officially, un-
der control; it is only when the flame strikes a pocket
of gas that things get messed up and some miners are
picked up in grilled pieces and sent to their bereaved

223

JUDGE LYNCH

families. The mine jobs are considered risky work,
but there are many men in Butte who are happy to
have the work. Sometimes conditions get so bad that
even the most loyal workers are compelled to rebel.

On June 8, 1917, the aptly named Speculator Mine,
one of Butte's most important, caught fire, and nearly
two hundred miners were burned to death. Investiga-
tion showed that the Montana State Mining Law had
been violated, that almost two hundred lives had been
sacrificed for small profits. The solid concrete bulk-
heads separating the mines did not contain the re-
quired safety manholes. When the flames broke out,
the workers swarmed to the lower levels, trying to
find exits into other mines through the manholes.
They found instead that the mine owners had saved
some money by not putting them in, but the discov-
ery cost them their lives. No mine operator was prose-
cuted for this violation of the law or for the deaths of
the workers.

While the Speculator still stank of burned flesh, the
miners went on strike, demanding not higher pay or
shorter hours, but a higher safety standard. They
didn't want to die while earning their pitiable wages
in the sweatholes. The Industrial Workers of the
World sent in Frank Little, a small, crippled fellow
known from one end of the mining territory to the
other as a capable organizer. Little had been beaten

224

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

and had gone through as much persecution as it is
possible for one man to stand; half -Indian, half -white,
he did not seem to know the meaning of fear. That his
efforts in organizing the miners in their fight for
safety were effective there is no doubt. On the last
day of July, 1917, he hobbled on his crutch to the
cheap lodging house where he lived and went to his
room. It had been a hard day and he discarded only his
outer clothing and went to sleep. Some time during
the night a gang of six men came and took him out,
bound his hands behind his back, tied him to the rear
of their car, and drove off into the night, dragging
him through Butte streets. They literally tore off his
kneecaps.

What happened after that is not known. The next
morning Little's body was found hanging from a rail-
road trestle. It showed evidences of beating and had
been mutilated. There was no police investigation.
Frank Little was only a "wobbly," an enemy to
those who could lose gracefully in Butte's gambling
halls.

Little's case was not an isolated one. Other labor
organizers were informed that they could expect the
same treatment if they did not at once leave the
city. They did not go; the strike continued for five
months, when the workers, defeated by starvation,
were forced back into the sweatholes.

225

JUDGE LYNCH

What the workers in the outposts of industry, in
the woods and mines, suffered during America's par-
ticipation in the World War will never be known.
Under the whiplash of the patriots, driven by the
war-time need for immediate materials and the un-
paralleled opportunity for tremendous profits, many
a rebellious Worker was sent down the trail, la longue
traverse.

The workers, once the Armistice was signed, re-
sumed organizational activities. The patriots were
through with their chauvinistic shouting and fag-
waving; that curse was lifted. If the bosses had har-
bored any idea of recruiting returned veterans for
their subversive tactics, they were sadly disillusioned,
for only in isolated instances did the Legion permit
itself to be used against the workers. The average
Legionnaire soon realized that in any battles at home
he belonged on the side of his fellow workers.

Centralia was an exception.

Calling names never does much harm to either op-
ponent in a quarrel, no matter how apt the epithets
happen to be. When the union lumber-workers re-
ferred to the lumber interests as the "timber beast,"
the beast retaliated with "timber wolves." The appel-
lations were well deserved, and it was only when the

226

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

stronger "beast" began exterminating the "wolves"
that war was declared. And the beast showed how
beastly it could be, and the wolves proved to be only
so many rabbits, though of a lion-hearted variety.

In most of the various warring nations the soldiers
who were fortunate enough to survive returned to
their home towns and became a part of the civilian
population, changing their uniforms for mufti and,
save for a small star in their lapels, becoming indis-
tinguishable from their non-combatant fellows. In
America, the returned veteran, whether he had been
to the battlefields or only to a camp, became a sort
of demigod. His person, his welfare, and his future
became the deep concern of the patriots and of the
Government. Nothing was too good for our brave
heroes. They had founded a veteran-organization be-
fore they left France, and no one protested, though
such an organization might have wielded, under cer-
tain conditions, a greater influence for evil than the
Ku Klux Klan. The veteran-organization prospered
and thrived where labor unions failed. Many towns
and cities gave their units small endowments, rent-
free quarters, and many other considerations.

It was something of a shock to the people who had
so glorified the veterans to learn that on the first anni-
versary of their victory four of them had been shot
down in cold blood by members of a subversive body

227

JUDGE LYNCH

known as the I.W.W. On November n, 1919, the
Legionnaires of Centralia, Washington, had donned
their old uniforms and gone forth to parade the
streets, to celebrate their victory, and to honor the
memory of those fellows-at-arms who had not re-
turned. It was a memorial service that was being re-
peated in every town and city in the land; in the
minds of most Americans the victims might have been
their own boys in their own home town. That was
the way it read in the papers, in the indignant editori-
als and in the letters to the editors.

But the story did not begin and end on that No-
vember n, but went away back to 1912, when the
beasts and the wolves started calling each other names.

Armistice Day parades follow a definite program.
The participants assemble at a predetermined point,
the band strikes up, and the parade moves over a
known route, past a reviewing stand and on to the
dispersal point. In some parades, unloaded or dummy
rifles are carried by all the participants; in others,
only the color guard or the guard of honor carry rifles
loaded with blank cartridges. The parade is a peace-
time demonstration.

In no Armistice Day parades are ropes carried nor
are certain leaders armed with loaded revolvers.

In 1918, the patriots of Centralia, as a war-time
measure, had raided and closed the hall of the local

228

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

Industrial Workers of the World. They were not en-
tirely a destructive mob; they demolished only what
they could not use elsewhere. Desks, chairs, and type-
writers went to true-blue patriots, and the local's
phonograph was auctioned off for the benefit of the
Red Cross. The only Wobbly in sight, a blind news-
paperman, was taken for a ride, tossed out into a
ditch, and warned not to return. The raid was suc-
cessful in a way; the patriots were rid of some of the
wolves, they thought, and in their simple way had
helped make the world safe for democracy. The chief
drawback was that the Wobblies secured more desks,
chairs, and a typewriter and re-opened their head-
quarters almost immediately. Business went on as
usual; the literature put out to incite the wolves only
incited the beast to violence against the union.

In 1919 the I.W.W. had organized a strike in the
short log country of eastern Washington and, in
dread that the strike would spread westward, the
western Washington lumber owners decided that the
unions must be driven out for all time. A meeting,
advertised frankly to achieve this purpose, was held
in the Elks' lodge rooms in Centralia. After eighteen
years, the evidence is practically conclusive that the
Legion, as an organization, was not a party to the plan
but the tool of certain influential citizens, some of
them members of the local post. The 1918 raid had

229

JUDGE LYNCH

been conducted under cover of a Red Cross parade;
the 1919 affair would be covered by the Armistice
Day services. The idea was to "let the men in uniform
do it."

The parade formed and passed down the main
street; it did not stop at the designated dispersal place,
but at the command of armed leaders continued for
several blocks, past the I.W.W. union hall for an-
other block. Then, again defying parade customs, it
turned in its tracks and made its way back to the
union hall. As the Legionnaires of Centralia came
abreast of the building, a leader shouted the usual
command: "Let's go! " and some of the paraders broke
ranks and charged the union headquarters.

The proposed raid was no secret in Centralia. The
Wobblies knew it was coming— had, in fact, secured
legal advice that they would be within their rights
in protecting their property. As the glass of their
windows crashed and armed men began entering their
hall, they let go a burst of gunfire. One of the leaders
of the paraders, Warren Grimm, was shot in the ab-
domen, and before he died, he said: "It serves me
right. I had no business there." Others were wounded,
and during the lull occasioned by the shock, the
Wobblies retreated through back doors and windows.

Many of the Wobblies, it may be remembered,
were veterans themselves. One of these, Wesley Ev-

230

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH S CASES

erest, was armed with a forty -five caliber automatic,
and it is believed that his shots had killed Grimm and
another veteran, Arthur McElfresh. With his pocket
full of cartridges, Everest retreated, shooting. He
would run a hundred yards, followed by the mob,
turn and shoot. The mob would stop with him and
resume running when he ran. He was cornered at a
river bank, made his last stand, and, in self-defense,
shot and killed Dale Hubbard, a nephew of one of
the lumber owners.

"Stand back," he shouted, brandishing his auto-
matic. "If there are any bulls in the crowd, I'll sub-
mit to arrest."

The mob closed in on him, and it was then learned
what the ropes that had been carried in the parade
were for.

"Let's finish the job," said a voice.

"You haven't got guts enough to lynch a man in
the daytime," was Everest's defiant comment.

The rope was placed around his neck, but the cries
to swing him up were interrupted by a woman who
brushed through the crowd and threw the rope from
his neck.

"You are curs and cowards to treat a man like that! "

Everest had been shot in the side; he was taken not
to a hospital but to the city jail, where he was thrown
into the bull pen. There he lay in a wet heap on the

231

JUDGE LYNCH

cement floor, twitching in agony, only an occasional
moan escaping his lips.

That night the lights of Centralia were shut off,
and under cover of darkness members of the mob
went to the jail and took the semi-conscious Wesley
Everest out. They had no trouble finding him; a
guard called through the darkness:

"Don't shoot, men! Here is your man."

Everest knew why the mob had come. He stag-
gered to his feet defiantly and, as the mob dragged
him through the corridor, he shouted:

"Tell the boys I died for my class."

He was thrown into the back of an automobile,
pushed to the floor, and hurried to the Chehalis River
bridge. Before they reached their destination the
hands of his captors were sticky and red, their trou-
sers sodden with the blood of their captive. One had
reached into his pocket, brought out a razor, and for
a moment fumbled over the body on the floor. Sud-
denly there was a piercing scream and Everest cried:

"For Christ's sake, men, shoot me! Don't let me
suffer like this!"

The man with the razor finished his work. The car
sped on to the bridge, where the men hanged him, not
once but three times. As they lowered him over the
side of the bridge, his hands convulsively clutched
the planking, and one stamped on the fingers until

232

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

the hold was broken. Then they hoisted him up and
hanged him again and again. The sadistic affair was
not yet over; flashlights were played upon the hang-
ing body, and volley after volley of bullets was
pumped into it.

The next morning a member of the lynch mob
went among his fellow-lynchers and advised them:

"We've got to get that body or the Wobs will find
it and raise hell over its condition."

The coroner's report on the death of Wesley Ev-
erest was not delivered officially to the people of Cen-
tralia. It was delivered a few nights later at the Elks'
Club.

"Everest," he stated, "broke out of jail, went to
the Chehalis Bridge, and hanged himself. Finding the
rope too short, he climbed back and, fastening on a
longer one, jumped off again."

Whereas the Negro is the chief whipping-boy be-
low Mason and Dixon's Line, the white working
man who has the temerity to stick his neck out is
quite likely to find a noosed rope about it when he
draws it back. There are definite things the dominant
whites cannot tolerate: Negroes who refuse to stay
in the place assigned to them; white workers who
protest the conditions imposed upon them; anyone

233

JUDGE LYNCH

who questions the voice that constantly intones the
chant: "We know how to run this part of the coun-
try."

When they are unable to corrupt their courts of
law, they go to a higher authority. They call in the
Klan. The White Legion. The Men of Justice. Judge
Lynch.

Although workers in any part of these United
States are subject to repressive measures, the chief
centers of repression are in the South. Harlan County,
Kentucky coal mining area, is infamous for its flout-
ing of civil liberties; conditions in eastern Arkansas
among the farm and cotton sharecroppers are a
stench in the nostrils of all Americans; the Vigi-
lantes have spattered the fruit and vegetables of
southern California with the blood of American and
Mexican workers. In Atlanta, Birmingham, and New
Orleans one has only to be denounced as a Red or a
Communist to have a mob of red-baiters on his heels.
Number One sore spot is Tampa, Florida.

Tampa is noted for its cigars, but cigar-making is
the city's third largest industry. It is the center of a
citrus-growing country, and an almost steady stream
of oranges, grapefruit, and sub-tropical vegetables

234

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

passes through the seaport; yet the citrus industry is
not Tampa's greatest. The fifteen- to twenty-million-
dollars-a-year industry, the all-year crop, is gambling.
In Tampa the dominant whites are Klansmen, lead-
ers who use the rank and file of members to hold their
positions. The citizens of Tampa differ not at all from
the citizens of any other American city; they choose
their mayors and city officials by ballot, the police
are appointed and patrol the streets, the tax-gatherers
are just as insistent as anywhere else. Yet the city is
Klan dominated. It is said that it is useless to seek ap-
pointment to the police or fire department unless you
are a Klan member. If a Klan member commits a
crime, it is difficult to secure an arrest, and it is said
that if the Klan does not care for you, your house
may burn for all the fire department cares.

A few citizens, working men for the most part,
deplored the situation and thought that something
should be done to correct it. In 1935, as always, there
was only the dominant Democratic party, and a pro-
fessed Republican was no better than an alien. As a
matter of policy, these protesting citizens decided to
call their new party the Modern Democrats and, be-
cause some of them were former Socialists, the Klan-
dominated opposition charged them as communists.
The Klan did not don their nightshirts and go after

235

JUDGE LYNCH

the Modern Democrats; they were fearless and kept
on their police uniforms and plain clothes and did it
all according to the book.

In a democracy such as ours any individual or
group has a right to fight, obeying all legal rules, any
other individual or group. If the Ku Klux Klan de-
cides to fight communism, it is well within its rights;
it may fight tooth and nail and no holds barred. The
Communist party has a right to battle the Klan and its
fascist implications under the same terms. But the is-
sues and terms should be clearly defined: the Klan
may not pursue its own subversive activities by
merely labeling anything to which it is opposed as
communism. But reason is too rare and beautiful an
impulse to expect from a Klansman.

"All things," says the Klan Kreed, "and matters
which do not exist within this Order or are not au-
thorized by or do not come under its jurisdiction shall
be designated as the 'Alien World.' All persons who
are not members of this Order shall be designated as
'Aliens.' "

The men who organized the Modern Democrats
were anything but communists: a few had been So-
cialists, most were industrious working men, all the
organizers were union members. It is known now that
many of the citizens of Tampa were sympathetic to
their movement, but if they were permitted to con-

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCHES CASES

tinue they would become a menace to the Klan-
machine.

One evening six of them were to meet in execu-
tive session. Seated about the living-room table in the
home of Mrs. A. M. Herald, they were debating the
form their constitution should take and had decided
to pattern it after that of the American Legion. They
were Joseph Shoemaker, chairman, formerly a mem-
ber of the S.P.; Sam Rogers, WPA worker, an M.D.
from Loyola College; Walter Roush, president of the
Sulphur Springs Workers Alliance and a member of
the S.P.; Charles E. Jensen, a member of the S.P.; and
J. A. McCaskill, a Tampa fireman whose father was a
Tampa policeman. The sixth man, who had not yet
appeared, was Eugene F. Poulnot, formerly presi-
dent of the Pressmen's Union, A.F. of L., then a
WPA worker and chairman of the Florida Workers'
Alliance. McCaskill offered to go after him.

As soon as Poulnot stepped inside the house, seven
policemen entered; three came in the front door and
four in the back. Guns were drawn, papers grabbed,
and the men were searched. Six men were arrested,
but only the names of five appeared on the police
blotter; the name of J. A. McCaskill was missing. They
were taken to police headquarters and grilled. Later
they were released, not in a group, but one by one.
As they left headquarters, they were snatched, one

237

JUDGE LYNCH

by one, and shoved into cars and taken to the woods.
When Poulnot struggled and fought against being
taken into the automobile, a crowd gathered. One of
the kidnapers announced:

"We're taking a crazy man to Chattahoochee."

Shoemaker was tumbled in on top of Poulnot and
the car hurried to a point fourteen miles outside
Tampa. Rogers was taken in another car. For some
reason Roush and Jensen were not beaten, but were
permitted to return to their homes. Rogers was
stripped and placed over a log. His hands and feet
were held while he was beaten. Then boiling tar was
applied to his abdomen, sexual organs, and thighs.

Shoemaker and Poulnot suffered even worse. Poul-
not was flogged with a chain and a rawhide, then he
was tarred and feathered. Once, as he revived, one of

his lynchers said: "The is faking. Let's give it

to him!"

The tortures that Shoemaker went through will
never be known. He was too horribly mutilated ever
to tell. That he suffered more than Poulnot is evi-
dent. The boiling tar had been poured over his naked
body and burned into his lacerated flesh. For seven
hours he lay beside the road, unconscious through a
night suddenly turned cold. At the Centro Espanol
Hospital, to which he was taken, it was possible to

238

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

warm him only with hot water bottles. A leading
Tampa surgeon examined him and stated:

"He was horribly mutilated. I wouldn't beat a hog
the way that man was whipped. He was beaten until
he was paralyzed on one side, probably from blows
on the head. He cannot say anything to you; he does
not know what happened. He cannot use one arm,
and I doubt if three square feet would cover the total
area of bloodshot bruises on his body, not counting
the parts injured only by tar."

For days Joseph Shoemaker lingered between life
and death, suffering terrible agonies. In a final, des-
perate attempt to save his life, one of his legs was
amputated. On the ninth day he died.

The people of Tampa were aroused. On December
12, three days after Shoemaker's death, the Tampa
Tribune stated: "The state investigators have found
evidence that leads them to believe Shoemaker and
the others were framed." Such a public admission of
police guilt was unexpected in Tampa. News of the
outrage had spread throughout the country, and the
Klan-police knew they had overshot their mark.
Policemen were warned not to talk. Police Chief
Tittsworth, devoting all his activities to covering up
the evidence of the crime, found himself indicted as
an accessory after the fact. Local public indignation,

239

JUDGE LYNCH

backed by Tampa newspapers, was strong, and in-
dictments followed on charges of kidnaping and mur-
der. How great was the power of the Klan was seen
in the indictments, which were loosely worded and
provided many legal loop-holes. Still the Klan was
thoroughly frightened, how frightened may be
guessed from the fact that the Klan strategists asked
for a change of venue,

It was known that the same men who had beaten
E. F. Poulnot were the murderers of Joseph Shoe-
maker, yet they were placed on trial charged with the
kidnaping only of Poulnot. Governor Dave Sholtz
designated Judge Robert T. Dewell to hear the case,
and the trial was moved to Bartow, in Polk County,
on the ground that the Klansmen-police-defendants
could not hope for a fair hearing in Tampa. The main
defense argument was that the victims were com-
munists and therefore not entitled to the protection
of the law. The trial was marked by the Judge's sym-
pathy for the defendants to such an extent that the
Court rallied to the defense attorney's argument that
unless the sole intent of the kidnaping was to confine
the victim secretly, the jury could not convict. Here
the honorable Judge's own words of instruction to
the jury:

"Even if you are satisfied from the evidence be-

240

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

yond and to the exclusion of every reasonable doubt
that the defendants, without lawful authority, seized
the said E. F. Poulnot and illegally and unlawfully
carried him from the City Hall to the Estuary, and
there turned him over to other persons, who in turn
carried him into the country and flogged the said E. F.
Poulnot, you still could not convict the defendants
unless you believe beyond every reasonable doubt
that it was their intention to secretly confine or im-
prison the said E. F. Poulnot."

But the jury disagreed with His Honor. Made up
of working men, it brought in a verdict of guilty.
The jurors later told newspapermen that they had
been unanimous on the first ballot.

The Klan was not beaten, not yet through. The
convicted Klansmen were given sentences of four
years, though under the law they could have been
condemned to serve ten years. Even at that, they did
not go to jail, but were sent to their homes under
bond, pending disposition of their appeal in the Su-
preme Court of Florida.

The Klan brought their heavy guns into action.
The best lawyers searched the records for precedents,
the finest attorneys sent their briefs to the highest
court in the state and came away with a reversal of
the convictions on the ground that Judge Dewell

241

JUDGE LYNCH

committed an error in permitting the introduction of
evidence concerning a conspiracy on the part of the
defendants to commit the crime of kidnaping.

The new trial was held in October, 1937, almost
two years after the flogging, the criminal assault, if
you insist, and the defendants, again before Judge
Dewell, were acquitted.

Earlier, the Klan decided their members would
not be put on trial for the murder of Joseph Shoe-
maker. When State's Attorney Rex Farrior appeared
before Judge Dewell to have the date fixed for the
murder case, the Court announced that no trial of
the homicide case would be allowed because the state
had jailed to pay Polk County the sum of $531.60,
expenses incurred for bailiff fees and the like in the
foulnot case.

Public-spirited citizens became indignant and has-
tened to contribute the money owed Polk County so
that the eleven men who were indicted for murder
might be brought to trial. Somewhat reluctantly,
Judge Dewell set the murder trial for April 19, 1937,
later removing it from the calendar; he gave as his
reasons the failure, at that time, of the higher court
to pass on the appeal of the five men convicted of kid-
naping. Even to a layman it must be apparent that the
murder of Shoemaker had nothing to do with the
conviction of the men who flogged Poulnot. The

242

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCHES CASES

Klan works in mysterious ways its wonders to per-
form.

The Florida Klan has a better plan than lynching
to be rid of those they label communistic: it is mys-
terious disappearance with no traces left. Frank Nor-
man was an organizer of the United Citrus Workers'
Union and a thorn in the side of the dominant whites.
One of his aims was that blacks and whites should
stick together, each refusing to scab on the other. It
was bad enough to try to organize the white fruit
pickers, but to urge them to stand together with Ne-
groes was too much.

There was a knock on the door of the Lakeland
home of Frank Norman, and he answered it to learn
that three men, calling themselves Sheriff Chase and
two deputies, wanted him to go down the road
toward Haines City to identify a Negro who had
been lynched. They said that Norman's name had
been found in the victim's pocket.

Mrs. Norman wanted to go with him but was dis-
suaded: instead, a friend, Ben Surrency, went with
Norman to the Sheriff's car. Mr. Surrency was the
last friend to see Frank Norman:

"Mr. Norman stepped in the car in the rear seat; I fol-
lowed in the middle. The supposed Mr. Chase got in
with us in the back seat. As we drove off a possible one

243

JUDGE LYNCH

hundred yards from the house, Mr. Norman asked Mr.
Chase to show his authority as he did not know whether
he was the high sheriff or not. The man answered, 'I am
not Sheriff Chase, but a deputive from Highland City. It
doesn't matter; the Negro has a card with your name and
home address on it, and we want you to identify him so
we can take him down for an inquest.' Mr. Norman says,
Will you please stop about one hundred yards farther
down the road so I can pick up another man, as he might
be a help to identify the Negro?' The man says, 'Sure,'
and turned on Ingram Avenue instead of following the
Bartow Road according to Mr. Norman's instructions.
I judge we drove forty yards when the car came to a
sudden stop. The man sitting beside the driver covered
Mr. Norman with a gun. Then he asked me my name. As
I told him my name was Ben Surrency, he said, 'Get out.
I don't want you.' I got out as I was told. Mr. Norman
put up both his hands, asking the man what in the world
does this mean. Mr. Norman was saying other words as
I was rushed out of the car and I could not understand
what he was saying. As I got on the street a gun fired.
And an awful thumping noise was heard in the car. The
supposed-to-be Sheriff Chase took me by the shoulder
and faced me back home and told me not to look. Another
car forty or fifty feet back of the car I just got out of
and facing me stopped with their bright lights on. Both
cars remained still until I had passed the second car some
distance. Then they both sped on."

Frank Norman did not return. Nor has his body
been discovered. It may have been buried in an un-

244

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

known grave, or burned in a mysterious fire that oc-
curred a few days later. It may have been weighted
and sunk in one of the many lakes in the vicinity, or
dropped into one of the flooded phosphate pits
close by.

Frank Norman's fellow-workers know who was
behind his murder and they were not astonished at
the apathetic investigation. No one could expect the
Klan to go around to the courthouse to indict itself.

(/) '937

Politely ignoring the records in a burst of guber-
natorial pride on April 13 of last year, Governor
Hugh White of Mississippi announced in an address
before the Farm Chemurgic Conference at Jackson
that the state had not had a lynching in fifteen months.
The Governor was wrong: the records show that
just four months before his declaration, J. B. Grant,
seventeen-year-old Negro, of Laurel, was shot to
death by a mob. After his body had been riddled with
more than a hundred bullets, it was tied to an auto-
mobile and dragged through the streets, then hanged
to a trestle. Governor White can read the whole story
in the Memphis (Tennessee) Press-Scimitar for De-
cember 5. Even at that, we can forgive the Governor
his moment of pride, for in the year 1935 his state

245

JUDGE LYNCH

had got right down in the mud with a credit of eight
of the total of twenty-five lynchings for the year.

But even as the Governor left the platform he was
given the news that, while he was speaking, two Ne-
groes were being lynched in the state of Mississippi.

Only eight men were lynched in 1937; all were
colored, and only one was accused of a sexual crime.
All the lynchings were confined to what is known as
the lynch-belt, and all followed the constant pattern
of the years. There were two double lynchings, one
while Congress was debating the Gavagan Bill; a
brand new method in torture was introduced; one
Negro lynched was innocent of any crime and was
thrown by the Sheriff as a sop to the mob. One was
lynched by a mob seeking another.

In Alabama, at Abbey ville, on February 2, Wesley
Johnson, twenty-two, was taken from the Henry
County jail by a mob of a hundred men. He was
charged with attempted assault and was taken to the
scene of the alleged crime and riddled with bullets.
Later Attorney-General A. A. Carmichael asserted
he could prove conclusively that Johnson was inno-
cent of the crime, that the Sheriff knew he was in-
nocent, but made the arrest to appease the populace.

246

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCH's CASES

There were no arrests, though impeachment pro-
ceedings against the Sheriff were instituted, and no
convictions.

At Duck Hill, Mississippi, April 13, two Negroes
accused of the murder of a country merchant on De-
cember 30, 1936, were snatched by twelve men from
the Sheriff and two deputies as they were being re-
turned to jail. "Boot Jack" MacDaniels and Roosevelt
Townes, the victims, were hurried to the scene of
their crime, stripped to the waist, and chained to
trees. A member of the mob brought out a gasoline
blow-torch. The torch flames were sprayed on the
Negroes' bared breasts and they were ordered to
confess. MacDaniels was the first to feel the searing
blow-torch and readily confessed that he had robbed
the merchant after Townes had killed him. He was
then riddled with bullets. Townes, the Associated
Press reported, died under the torture of the blow-
torch. Both men in their confessions implicated an-
other man, who was later captured and brought to
the carnival. The third man admitted he had origi-
nally been a party to the conspiracy but insisted he
had withdrawn before the crime. He was severely
beaten and ordered to leave the state. The lynch mob,
assisted by the hundred spectators, piled brush high
about the victims and burned their bodies. Governor

247

JUDGE LYNCH

White was reported "outraged," but even at that
there were no arrests, no indictments, and no con-
victions.

On July 20, Judge Lynch went to Tallahassee,
Florida, and snatched Richard Hawkins and Ernest
Ponder, two young Negroes charged with stabbing
a policeman, from a jail but two blocks away from
the Florida capitol. They were taken three miles over
the Tallahassee-Jacksonville highway and hanged.
There were no investigations, no arrests, no indict-
ments, and no convictions. On August 27, the St. Pe-
tersburg Times commented:

"An investigation into the lynching of two Ne-
groes in Tallahassee got nowhere, just as everyone,
familiar with Florida justice, expected."

Just about the time that Florida's state capital was
enjoying its double lynching, Tennesseeans were
smugly telling themselves that it couldn't happen in
Tennessee. On July 19, Sheriff Vaughan outraced a
mob that had formed to lynch Albert Gooden,
charged with murder, and got his man to Memphis
for safekeeping. The state was getting credit for a
prevented lynching when the Sheriff went to bring
Gooden back to the Marion jail. The Sheriff, it seems,
brought the prisoner direct to the waiting mob and
delivered him without any protest. Something had
happened in the meantime. The Sheriff had been put

248

SOME OF JUDGE LYNCHES CASES

on the spot and did his level best to recapture his pop-
ular standing with the lynch-minded. There were but
six members in the mob that on August 17 took
Gooden away from the peace officer, rushed him to
a railroad trestle near Covington, hanged him, and
riddled his body with bullets. There were no arrests,
no indictments, and, consequently, no convictions.

On September 3, at Mount Vernon, Georgia, a
small mob, engaged in a man-hunt for a Negro ac-
cused of assaulting a white woman, desired to search
the home of Will Kirby, Negro. Kirby resisted and
was shot and killed by the mob. The state of Georgia
indicated by its lack of action in the matter that it
would like to forget the whole affair.

Until October 4, Florida was tied with its old rival,
Mississippi, for the 1937 lynch-dishonors. On that
day a Crestview mob snatched J. C. Evans, charged
with robbery and a "crime against nature" involving
a twelve-year-old boy, from the Sheriff and riddled
his body with buckshot and pistol bullets. In com-
menting on the three lynchings in Florida this year,
the Miami News stated:

"In each case, prisoners have been seized from
what appeared to be careless and inadequately
manned guards. The circumstances in more than one
case even left room for hints of collusion between
mobsters and officers of the law. In each case a 'thor-

249

JUDGE LYNCH

ough' investigation has been promised and in each
case up to the present, the investigators were quite
unable to 'establish the identity' of the murderers."
Score: Florida 3; Mississippi 2; Alabama i; Geor-
gia i; Tennessee i.

The total membership of all lynch mobs for the
year was under five hundred; the number of peace of-
ficers unfaithful to their vows was but seven. This small
number of criminals has put the lynch-curse on the
rest of the one hundred and twenty-five million Amer-
icans and held us up to the contempt and scorn of
all civilized peoples.

250

Chapter Seven

THE REVERSALS OF JUDGE LYNCH

As a nation we have been conditioned to the lynch-
spirit. Throughout our lives we shout our disapproval
of baseball decisions and demand that the umpire be
killed. When we meet with a new type of criminal,
or when one of us proposes a too-radical public
course, we assure one another that the offender should
be taken out and strung up to the nearest telegraph
pole. Lynch-spirit is not the monopoly of the South;
it is firmly fixed in our national psychology. Much of
our collective thinking ends in thoughts of violence.
There is but one effective curb on the activities of
the Hanging Judge, and that is an awakened public
consciousness of the evil. Lynchings do not happen
where the people do not want them. Peace officers
are human; they are politicians dependent upon popu-
lar support for continuance in office; they give their
people what they want. Crime in any form must be
tolerated to exist. As a people, we may not entirely
approve lynch-executions, but we do tolerate them.
An extended educational program might correct this

251

JUDGE LYNCH

fault, but it would be a long and costly process, costly
in the lives that would be destroyed while the program
was being brought to a conclusion.

With public opinion failing to end the lynch-spirit,
dependence must be placed upon better peace officers
and upon the enactment of more stringent laws. Since
the Armistice, twice as many threatened lynchings
have been prevented as have been consummated. But
a frustrated lynch mob is as much an expression of
the lynch-spirit as a successful lynching. Lives have
been saved through the resourcefulness of the peace
officers, and would-be lynchers have been prevented
from becoming actual murderers. That the list of
frustrated lynchings increases annually is a matter for
satisfaction.1

Most lynchings occur either soon after the com-
mission of the crime, when the criminal has been ar-
rested, or later, when he is to be brought before the
court. The earlier mob can usually be handled by
resolute peace officers. It is the later mob, more de-
liberate and better organized, that is the more dan-
gerous. The lynch leaders, having determined upon a
lynching, survey the situation and make their plans

1 1919. ..43

1920. ..84

1921. .108

1922. .114
1923- --56

Source: Negro Year Book, 1937-1938.

252

1924..

.61

1929.

•••34

1934.

•••74

1925..

•53

1930.

...60

1935-

...84

1926. .

.40

1931.

...91

1936.

•••79

1927..

.68

1932.

•••43

1937-

...56

1928..

.40

1933-

...48

THE REVERSALS OF JUDGE LYNCH

strategically. Against such mobs there must be the
use of legal and official strategy. The weapons are
available in almost every state, and the competent
peace officer should know how to use them effec-
tively. The prisoner may be sent to another and
stronger jail for safekeeping; a stronger and more
effective guard accompanies him to and from the
court; the state police and the militia may be called
for further protection of the prisoner. Finally, many
states provide for a change of venue.

Mobs must be broken up by the use of force. Any
sheriff worthy of his office is aware of the awakening
of the mob-spirit, and immediate action can be made
effective. The actual leaders can be determined and
arrested before the lynching. The forces of the law
are and must always be kept stronger than those of
the lawless. In 1934, at Shelbyville, Tennessee, in a
county conditioned to lynching, a lynch mob was
repulsed by state troops who killed three and wounded
twenty mob members. The intended victim was saved,
though the mob did burn the courthouse. In Sherman,
Texas, the lynch-victim could have been saved by a
similar show of force. Had Henry Lowry been con-
ducted to jail as the Governor instructed, he would
have paid the legal penalty for his crime instead of
the lynch-penalty. Dr. Raper reports a Texas case
where the Sheriff sought out the man who was or-

253

JUDGE LYNCH

ganizing a lynching and nipped the affair in the bud
by delivering the leader a hefty blow that knocked
him off his feet.

Most legislation relating to lynching is punitive,
and some of it is prophylactic. The great body of such
laws are designed for the protection of intended
lynch-victims who are already in the hands of the
law. The chief need is for the protection against lynch-
ing of a person not yet arrested.

"Lynching has no technical legal meaning. It is
merely a descriptive phrase used to signify the lawless
acts of persons who violate established law at the
time they commit the acts. . . . The offense of
lynching is unknown to the common law." 2

Some states have defined lynching and made it a
crime: Alabama, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Virginia,
and North Carolina. Georgia has made lynching a
statutory crime, but without defining it. Other states
have defined mob-violence and made it a crime: Il-
linois, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and West Virginia.
Of the ten states having statutory definitions of the
crime of lynching or mob violence, seven have had

2 Corpus Juris, Vol. XXXVIII, 328. Quoted from Chadbourn: Lynch-
ing and the Law.

254

THE REVERSALS OF JUDGE LYNCH

lynchings since the respective enactments: Alabama,
17; Illinois, 8; Kansas, 5; Kentucky, 8; North Carolina,
38; Virginia i; West Virginia, i.

ALABAMA: Any number of persons assembled for
any unlawful purpose and intending to injure any
person by violence and without authority of the law
shall be regarded as a mob, and any act of violence
exercised by such a mob upon the body of any per-
son shall, when such act results in the death of the
injured person, constitute the crime of lynching; and
any person who participates in or actively aids or
abets such lynching shall, on conviction, suffer death
or be imprisoned in the penitentiary for not less than
five years, at the discretion of the jury; and any per-
son, who, being a member of any such mob and
present at any such lynching, shall not actively
participate in the lynching, shall be deemed guilty of
abetting such lynching, and, on conviction, shall be
imprisoned for not less than one year nor more than
twenty-one years, at the discretion of the jury.

Any Sheriff, deputy sheriff, or jailer who negli-
gently or through cowardice, allows a prisoner to
be taken from the jail of his county, or to be taken
from his custody and put to death by violence, or to
receive bodily harm, must, on conviction, be fined
not less than $500 or more than $2,000, and may

255

JUDGE LYNCH

also be sentenced to hard labor for the county for not
more than two years.

No provisions are made for the liability of a city
or county for mob violence causing personal or prop-
erty damages.

ARIZONA: No anti-lynching legislation.

ARKANSAS: No anti-lynching legislation. Change of
venue and special court terms to avoid mob violence
in cases involving rape, murder, etc.

CALIFORNIA: No anti-lynching legislation. Every
county and municipal corporation is responsible for
injury to real or personal property within its cor-
porate limits, done or caused by mobs or riots.

COLORADO: No anti-lynching legislation.

CONNECTICUT: No anti-lynching legislation. City or
borough responsible for all injuries to person and
property, including injuries causing death, when such
injuries are caused by an act of violence of any per-
son or persons while a member of, or acting in con-
cert with, any assembly of persons engaged in dis-
turbing the public peace, provided such city or
borough or the police or other proper authorities
thereof shall not have exercised reasonable care or
diligence in the prevention or suppression of such
mob, riotous assembly, or assembly engaged in dis-
turbing the public peace.

256

THE REVERSALS OF JUDGE LYNCH

DELAWARE: No anti-lynching legislation.

FLORIDA: No anti-lynching legislation. Law pro-
vides for change of venue on the order of the Gov-
ernor.

GEORGIA: "And if the evidence submitted shall
reasonably show that there is probability or danger
of lynching, or other violence, then it shall be manda-
tory on said judge to change the venue to such a
county in the State, as, in his judgment, will avoid
such lynching.

". . . . and any person so engaged in mobbing or
lynching any citizen of this State without due process
shall be punished by imprisonment in the peniten-
tiary for not less than one nor more than twenty years,
and should death result from such mob violence, then
the prisoner causing such death shall be subject to
indictment and trial for the offense of murder."

IDAHO: No anti-lynching legislation. Law provides
for change of jail and employment of a guard.

ILLINOIS: Defines a mob: that any collection of
individuals, five or more in number, assembled for the
unlawful purpose of offering violence to the person
or property of anyone supposed to have been guilty
of a violation of the law, or for the purpose of ex-
ercising correctional powers or regulative powers
over any person or persons by violence, and without

257

JUDGE LYNCH

lawful authority, shall be regarded and designated as
a "mob."

Any person or persons who shall compose a mob,
with the intent to inflict damage or injury to the
person or property of any individual charged with
a crime, or, under the pretense of exercising correc-
tional powers over such person or persons by violence,
and without authority of the law, shall be subject to
a fine of not less than $100 or more than $1,000, and
may be imprisoned in the county jail not less than
thirty days nor to exceed twelve months for each
offense. In case the person or persons composing the
mob commit injury to a person or damage to property
they shall be deemed guilty of a felony and suffer
imprisonment in the penitentiary not exceeding five
years.

In the case of the death of the victim, the surviv-
ing spouse, lineal heirs, or adopted children may re-
cover from such county or city damages for injuries
sustained by reason of the loss of life of such person
a sum not exceeding $5,000. Damage to property by
mobs may be collected from the county or city to
an amount not exceeding $5,000.

The loss by a Sheriff of his prisoner to a lynch mob
is to be considered prima facie evidence of failure to
do his duty, and he may be removed by the Governor.
The law also enables the Sheriff to remove any pris-

258

THE REVERSALS OF JUDGE LYNCH

oner in danger of lynching to another county for
safekeeping.

INDIANA: Lynching and mob clearly defined. Any
number of persons assembled for any unlawful pur-
pose and intending to injure any person by violence
and without authority of the law shall be regarded as
a mob, and any act of violence exercised by such mob
upon the body of a person shall, when such act results
in the death of the injured person, constitute the
crime of lynching; and any person who participates
in or actively aids or abets such lynching shall, on
conviction, suffer death or be imprisoned in the state
prison during life; and any person who, being present
at any such lynching, shall not actively participate
in the lynching shall be deemed guilty of abetting
such lynching, and, on conviction, shall be impris-
oned in the state prison for not less than two years
nor more than twenty-one years.

The law further provides complete protection for
the Sheriff and his prisoner who is threatened with
lynching. The prisoner may be sent to another county,
the Sheriff may "command all bystanders and others
with whom he can directly communicate to aid and
assist in defending such prisoner," and he may appeal
directly to the Governor for further aid by the state's
military forces. Failure to use all the weapons placed
at his command and losing his prisoner to the mob

259

JUDGE LYNCH

shall be considered prima facie evidence of failure of
official duty and result in removal and a fine of not
more than $1,000.

The law, however, makes no provision for liability
of city or county for personal or property damage.

IOWA: No anti-lynching legislation.

KANSAS: Any collection of individuals assembled
for an unlawful purpose, intending to injure any per-
son by violence, and without authority of law, shall
for the purpose of this act be regarded as a "mob,"
and any act of violence exercised by such mob upon
the body of any person shall constitute the crime of
"lynching" when such act or acts of violence result
in death; and any person who participates in or aids
or abets such lynching, upon conviction thereof,
shall be imprisoned in the state prison for not less
than five years or during life, in the discretion of the
jury.

The law further provides that anyone who harbors,
conceals, or assists any lyncher to escape arrest shall
be deemed an accessory after the fact, and upon con-
viction be imprisoned from for two to twenty-one
years. Complete protection for the Sheriff and his
prisoner who is threatened with lynching is part of
the law: the prisoner may be transferred to a state
prison or reformatory, the peace officer may command
all bystanders and others with whom he can directly

260

THE REVERSALS OF JUDGE LYNCH

communicate to aid and assist in defending such
prisoner, and he may call upon the Governor for the
aid of the state's military forces. Failure to use the
legal weapons provided will be considered sufficient
cause for his removal from office by the Governor,
and a Sheriff so renounced shall not be eligible to either
election or appointment to the office. Liability of the
city or county for personal or property damage is
provided.

KENTUCKY: Any number of persons more than
three, assembled for the purpose of doing violence
or injury to, or for lynching, any person in custody
of any peace officer or jailer in this Commonwealth
shall be regarded as a mob. Any person who takes
part in and with any such mob, with the result that
the person in custody meets death at the hands of
any such mob, shall be deemed guilty of lynching;
or if the result be that the person does not meet death,
any person who takes part in or with the mob shall
be guilty of attempted lynching. The penalty for
lynching shall be death or life imprisonment. The
penalty for attempted lynching shall be confinement
in the penitentiary for not less than two years or
more than twenty-one years.

The law provides the peace officer with legal
weapons for the full protection of any prisoner
threatened with lynching and provides for his removal

261

JUDGE LYNCH

from office. Provision is also made for the liability of
the city for property damage if preventable.

LOUISIANA: No anti-lynching legislation. Law pro-
vides that a prisoner may be removed for safekeeping.

MAINE: No anti-lynching legislation. Law provides
that prisoner may be removed when jail is adjudged
unfit or insecure. Liability of town for property
damage limited to three fourths of damage done.

MARYLAND: No anti-lynching legislation. Law
provides for city, town, or county liability for prop-
erty damage if it might have been prevented.

MASSACHUSETTS: No anti-lynching legislation.
Property damage to three fourths of the damage done,
if more than twelve persons are engaged in the riot.

MICHIGAN: No anti-lynching legislation. Law pro-
vides for the transfer of prisoners for safekeeping.

MINNESOTA: Lynching is the killing of a human
being, by the act or procurement of a mob. Whenever
any person shall be lynched, the county in which
said lynching occurred shall be liable in damages to
the dependents of the person lynched in a sum not
exceeding $7,500, to be recovered in a civil action.

The law further provides that any Sheriff, deputy
sheriff, or other officer having custody of any person
whom a mob seeks to take from his custody who shall
fail or neglect to use all lawful means to resist such

262

THE REVERSALS OF JUDGE LYNCH

taking shall be deemed guilty of malfeasance and shall
be removed from office by the Governor.

MISSISSIPPI: No anti-lynching legislation. Prisoners
may be removed to another county for safekeeping,
or the Sheriff may summon a guard sufficient to pro-
tect his prisoner.

MISSOURI: No anti-lynching legislation. Law pro-
vides that the Sheriff may employ sufficient guards to
protect his prisoner or may move that prisoner to a
jail in another county for safekeeping. Liability
limited to property damages.

MONTANA: No anti-lynching legislation. Prisoners
may be removed to jails in contiguous counties, and
cities and towns are liable for property damage done
or caused by mobs or riots within their corporate
limits.

NEBRASKA: A collection of people assembled for
an unlawful purpose and intending to do damage or
injury to anyone, or pretending to exercise correc-
tional power over another person by violence and
without authority of the law, shall be deemed a "mob"
for the purpose of this act. An act of violence result-
ing in the death of the victim by a mob upon the body
of any person shall constitute a "lynching" within
the meaning of this act.

The law makes no provisions for the punishment

263

JUDGE LYNCH

of lynchers or for the removal of officers for mal-
feasance. The legal representative of the victim may
sue the county in which the lynching occurred for
damages.

NEVADA: No anti-lynching legislation. Law pro-
vides for the removal of prisoners upon written ap-
plication by the Sheriff to the Governor.

NEW HAMPSHIRE: No anti-lynching legislation.
Law provides for removal of prisoners "for such im-
perative and extraordinary purpose." Town's liability
for property loss limited to damage done.

NEW JERSEY: Any collection of individuals, five or
more in number, assembled for the unlawful purpose
of offering violence to the person or property of any-
one supposed to have been guilty of a violation of the
law, or for the purpose of exercising correctional
powers or regulative powers over any person or per-
sons by violence, and without lawful authority, shall
be regarded and designated as a "mob."

The penalty for any person or persons who shall
compose a mob as above defined shall be a fine of not
less than $100 or more than $1,000, and he or they
may be imprisoned in the county for a period of not
less than thirty days or to exceed twelve months for
each and every offense. If material damage to the
property or serious injury to the person ensues, the
offender shall be deemed guilty of a felony and shall

264

THE REVERSALS OF JUDGE LYNCH

suffer imprisonment in the penitentiary for not ex-
ceeding five years; and any person so suffering ma-
terial damage to property or injury to person by a
mob shall have an action against the city or county
in which such injury is inflicted, for such damages as
he may sustain, to an amount not exceeding $5,000.
The surviving spouse, lineal heirs, or adopted children
may recover from such county or city damages for
injury sustained by reason of the loss of life of such
person, to a sum not exceeding $5,000.

The law provides for the transfer of prisoners and
the removal of the Sheriff for losing his prisoner to a
mob.

NEW MEXICO: Anti-lynching legislation confined
to assaults on jails. Prisoners may be transferred for
safekeeping. The penalty for assault upon jails is, in
the case of the death of any jailer, guard, or prisoner,
that the offenders upon conviction shall be punished
with death. If any jailer, guard, or prisoner be
wounded or hurt, the offender, upon conviction, shall
be fined in a sum not exceeding $500 or less than $50,
or imprisoned for not more than three years nor less
than six months, at the discretion of the court.

Provisions are made for the Sheriff's summoning
the aid of the people in defending his prisoner and his
jail. Failure to aid the Sheriff is punishable by fine or
imprisonment or both.

265

JUDGE LYNCH

NEW YORK: No anti-lynching legislation. City or
county's liability for property destroyed by mob
violence limited to damage done.

NORTH CAROLINA: Lynching not clearly defined.
Lynching in North Carolina is construed as the illegal
entering of a jail for the purpose of killing or injuring
a prisoner placed by the law in the Sheriff's custody.
The law makes provision for the punishment of wit-
nesses of lynchings who refuse to testify but not for
the punishment of the lyncher. Under certain con-
ditions the heirs of the lynch-victim may sue for
damages the county wherein the lynching was com-
mitted.

NORTH DAKOTA: No anti-lynching legislation.

OHIO: A collection of people assembled for an un-
lawful purpose and intending to do damage or injury
to anyone, or pretending to exercise correctional
power over other persons by violence and without
authority of the law, shall be deemed a "mob" for
the purpose of this chapter. An act of violence by a
mob upon the body of any person shall constitute a
"lynching" within the meaning of this chapter.

The act further provides that any person con-
cerned in such lynching may be prosecuted for homi-
cide or assault, and anyone who breaks or attempts to
break into a jail or prison, or attacks or attempts to
attack an officer with intent to seize a prisoner for

266

THE REVERSALS OF JUDGE LYNCH

the purpose of lynching him, shall be imprisoned in
the penitentiary for not less than one year or more
than ten years.

The legal representative of the victim of the lynch-
ing may recover from the county in which the lynch-
ing occurred a sum not to exceed $5,000.

OKLAHOMA: No anti-lynching legislation. In case
of an emergency, a Sheriff, with the approval of the
county commissioners, may appoint additional jail
guards to protect his prisoner.

OREGON: No anti-lynching legislation.

PENNSYLVANIA: "The putting to death, within any
county, of any person within the jurisdiction of the
county by mob or riotous assemblage of three per-
sons or more, openly acting in concert in violation
of the law, and in default of protection of such per-
son by such county or the officers thereof, shall be
deemed a denial to such person by such county of the
equal protection of the laws, and a violation of the
peace of the Commonwealth and an offense against
the same.

"Every person participating in such mob or riotous
assemblage by which said person is put to death, as
described in the section immediately preceding, shall
be guilty of murder.

"Every county in which such unlawful putting to
death occurs shall be subject to a forfeiture of ten

267

JUDGE LYNCH

thousand dollars, which may be recovered, by action
therefor in the name of the Commonwealth, against
such county for the use of the dependent family, if
any, of the person so put to death, and, if none, for
the use of the Commonwealth. . . ."

The act further debars mob members, pro-lynch-
ing advocates, or anyone who has ever entertained or
expressed any opinions in favor of lynching, from
serving as jurors. Officers who suffer their prisoners
to be taken from them by lynch mobs shall be deemed
guilty of felony, and, upon conviction, shall be
punished by imprisonment for not exceeding five
years, or by a fine not exceeding $5,000, or both.

RHODE ISLAND: No anti-lynching legislation. Law
provides for transfer of prisoners.

SOUTH CAROLINA: The South Carolina code pro-
vides no punishment for lynchers. If a Sheriff, through
negligence, permission, or connivance, permits his
prisoner to be taken from him for purpose of lynch-
ing, he is to be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and,
upon a true bill being found, shall be deposed from
office, and, upon conviction, unless pardoned by the
Governor, be ineligible to hold any office of trust or
profit within this state.

In all cases of lynching when death ensues, the
county where such lynching takes place shall, with-
out regard to the conduct of the officers, be liable

268

THE REVERSALS OF JUDGE LYNCH

in exemplary damages of not less than $2,000, to be
recovered by action instituted in any court of com-
petent jurisdiction by the legal representatives of
the person lynched.

SOUTH DAKOTA: No anti-lynching legislation.

TENNESSEE: No anti-lynching legislation. A Sheriff
who loses his prisoner to a lynch mob through negli-
gence, or by want of proper diligence, firmness, and
promptness shall be guilty of a high misdemeanor in
office, and, upon conviction thereof, shall be fined at
the discretion of the court, forfeit his office, and be
declared forever incapable of holding any office of
trust or profit in the state.

TEXAS: No anti-lynching legislation. The law pro-
vides for the transfer of prisoners to another jail for
safekeeping and the employment of additional guards
to protect prisoners and jails. Change of venue is
provided for in cases of rape.

UTAH: No anti-lynching legislation. The Sheriff
may, with the written assent of the district judge, em-
ploy additional temporary guards.

VERMONT: No anti-lynching legislation. Law pro-
vides for transfer of prisoners for safekeeping.

VIRGINIA: A collection of people, assembled for
the purpose and with the intention of committing an
assault and/or battery upon any person without au-
thority of the law, shall be deemed a "mob" for the

269

JUDGE LYNCH

purpose of this act; and any act of violence by a "mob"
upon the body of any person, which shall result in
the death of such person, shall constitute a "lynch-
ing" within the meaning of this act.

The lynching of any person within this state by a
"mob" shall be deemed murder, and any and every
person composing a "mob" and any and every ac-
cessory thereto, by which any person is lynched, shall
be guilty of murder, and, upon conviction, shall be
punished as provided in chapter 178 of the Code of
Virginia.3 It shall be the duty of the attorney, for the
Commonwealth, of any county or city in which a
"lynching" may occur, to promptly and diligently
endeavor to ascertain the identity of the persons who
in any way participated therein, or who composed
the "mob" that perpetrated the same, and have them
apprehended, and to promptly proceed with the
prosecution of any and all persons so found; and to
the end that such offenders may not escape proper
punishment, such attorney for the Commonwealth
may be assisted in all such endeavors and prosecu-
tions, by the Attorney General, or other prosecutors
designated by the Governor for the purpose; and the
Governor shall have full authority to spend such
sums as he may deem necessary for the purpose of

8 Death.

270

THE REVERSALS OF JUDGE LYNCH

seeking out the identity and apprehending the mem-
bers of such guilty "mob."

Nothing herein contained shall be construed to
relieve any member of any such mob from civil
liability to the personal representative of the victim
of such lynching.

The law makes no provision for the punishment of
peace officers who release their prisoners to lynch
mobs.

WASHINGTON: No anti-lynching legislation.

WEST VIRGINIA: ( i ) Any collection of individuals,
five or more in number, assembled for the unlawful
purpose of offering violence to the person or property
of anyone supposed to have been guilty of a viola-
tion of the law, or for the purpose of exercising cor-
rectional powers or regulative powers over any
person or persons by violence, and without lawful au-
thority, shall be regarded and designated as a "mob"
or "riotous assemblage." (3) The putting to death of
any person within this state by a mob or riotous as-
semblage shall be murder, and every person partici-
pating in such mob or riotous assemblage by which a
person is put to death shall be guilty of murder, and,
upon conviction thereof, shall be punished as provided
by chapter 144 of Hogg's Code of West Virginia.4

4 Death.

271

JUDGE LYNCH

(6) The county in which such person charged
with a crime and within which such person has been
taken from a state, county, or municipal officer and
lynched and put to death shall be subject to forfeiture
of $5,000, which may be recovered by appropriate
action therefor, in the name of the personal represen-
tative of the person put to death, for the use of his
dependent family or the state. Such action may be
brought in any state court.

The law makes no provision for the punishment of
peace officers who release their prisoners to lynch
mobs.

WISCONSIN: No anti-lynching legislation. The
county shall be liable for injury to person or property
by a mob or riot therein, except that within cities the
city shall be liable. This section shall not apply to
property damages to houses of ill-fame when the
owner has notice that they are used as such.

WYOMING: No anti-lynching legislation.

272

Appendix

LYNCH-EXECUTIONS IN THE
UNITED STATES

1882-1937
Year Total Blacks Whites

i882

114

1883

134

1884

211

1885

184

1886

I38

1887

122

1888

142

1889

I76

1890

128

1891

195

1892

235

1893

200

1894

197

1895

1 80

1896

I3l

1897

165

1898

127

1899

107

1900

115

273

APPENDIX

1901

'35

1902

97

I9°31

104

3337

2060

1277

1904

86

79

7

1905

65

60

5

1906

68

64

4

1907

62

59

3

1908

IOO

92

8

1909

89

75

14

1910

90

80

10

1911

80

72

8

1912

89

86

3

1913

86

85

i

1914

74

69

5

1915

J45

99

46

1916

72

65

7

1917

54

52

2

1918

67

63

4

1919

83

79

4

1920

65

57

8

1921

64

58

6

1922

61

54

7

1923

28

26

2

1924

16

16

0

J925

18

18

0

1926

34

29

5

1 Estimates to 1903
National Association

from Cutler: Lynch-Laiv. After
for the Advancement of Colored

1904 from the
People.

274

APPENDIX

1927

18

16

2

1928

ii

10

I

1929

12

8

4

1930

25

24

i

1931

14

13

i

1932

10

8

2

'933

28

24

4

'934

16

16

o

'935

25

23

2

1936

12

10

2

'937

8

8

O

5112 3657 1455

275

Bibliography

Books and Pamphlets

ADAMIC, Louis. Dynamite: the Story of Class Violence in
America. Revised Edition. New York: 1934.

An American Lynching. Being the Burning at the Stake of
Henry Lowry at Nodena, Arkansas, January 26, 1921,
as Told in American Newspapers. The National Asso-
ciation for the Advancement of Colored People. New
York: n.d.

BANCROFT, HUBERT HOWE. "Popular Tribunals," The Works
of Hubert Howe Bancroft, XXXVI and XXXVII. San
Francisco: 1887.

BISHOP, CHARLES M. "The Causes, Consequences and Cure
of Mob Violence," Democracy in Earnest. Washing-
ton: 1918.

BRAWLEY, BENJAMIN. A Social History of the American
Negro. New York: 1921.

CHADBOURN, JAMES HARMON. Lynching and the Law. Chapel
Hill: 1933.

CHAPLIN, RALPH. The Centralia Conspiracy. The Truth
About the Armistice Day Tragedy. General Defense
Committee, Chicago: 1924.

COATES, ROBERT M. The Outlaw Years. The History of the
Land Pirates of the Natchez Trace. New York: 1930.

COLLINS, WINFIELD H. The Truth About Lynching and the
Negro in the South. New York: 1918.

CUTLER, JAMES ELBERT. Lynch-Law: an Investigation into
the History of Lynching in the United States. New
York: 1905.

276

BIBLIOGRAPHY

DELANEY, ED., AND RICE, M. T. The Bloodstained Trail. The
Industrial Workers of the World, n.p. n.d.

HAYWOOD, HARRY, AND HOWARD, MILTON. Lynching: a
Weapon of National Oppression. Labor Research Asso-
ciation Pamphlet #25. New York: 1932.

HEADLEY, J. T. Pen and Pencil Sketches of the Great Riots.
New York: n.d. (c. 1881).

Lynching of Claude Neal, The. Report of the National As-
sociation for the Advancement of Colored People. New
York: n.d.

MCMASTER, JOHN BACH. A History of the People of the
United States from the Revolution to the Civil War.
8 v. New York: 1883-1913.

A History of the People of the United States

During Lincoln's Administration. New York: 1927.

NATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF COLORED
PEOPLE. Thirty Years of Lynching in the United States,
1889-1918.

Annual Reports, 1919-1936.

RAPER, ARTHUR F. The Tragedy of Lynching. Chapel Hill:

'933-
SHINN, C. H. Mining Camps: a Study of American Frontier

Government. New York: 1885.
SPIVAK, JOHN L. Georgia. Nigger. New York: 1932.
THOMAS, JULIAN B. "A True Story of How the Avenging

of the Murder of Chief of Police David C. Hennessey

of New Orleans Wiped Out the Mafia in the Crescent

City." Unpublished Manuscript.
VICTOR, ORVILLE J. History of American Conspiracies: a

Record of Treason, Insurrection, Rebellion, etc. in the

United States of America, from 1760 to 1860. New

York: n.d. (c. 1863).

277

BIBLIOGRAPHY

WHITE, WALTER. Rope and Faggot. A Biography of Judge

Lynch. New York: 1929.
WORK, MONROE N., Editor. The Negro Year Book, 1937-

1938. Tuskegee: 1937.

Magazine References

Frank Case, the Leo: "Mob Law In Georgia," Literary Di-
gest, August 28, 1915; "The Case of Leo M. Frank,"
Outlook, May 26, 1915; "An Outlaw State," Outlook,
August 25, 1915; "Georgia's Shame," Independent,
August 30, 1915; "A Georgian Investigation," Harpers
Weekly, October 2, 1915.

NEA, F. M. "Southern Lynchings," Nation, LVI, 407.

"A Double Lynching in Virginia," Independent, LII, 783.

POE, C. H. "Lynching: A Southern View," Atlantic, XCIII,

'55-

"Anarchy in Delaware," Outlook, LXXIV, 543.

"Somerville: Some Cooperating Causes of Negro Lynching."
North American Review, CLXXVII, 506.

TABER, S. R. "A Remedy for Lynching," Nation, LXXV,
478.

"The Rev. Q. Ewing on Lynching," Independent, VIII, 2059.

McSwAiN. "What Shall Be Done With Mobs?" Central Law
Journal, LXVII, 375.

"The Cause of Lynching," Nation, LXL, 463.

WELL-BARNETT. "Lynch Law in America," Arena, XXIII, 15.

GOEBEL, JULIUS. "The International Responsibility of States
for Injuries Sustained by Aliens on Account of Mob
Violence, Insurrections and Civil War," American Jour-
nal of International Law, VIII, 851.

"A Mexican Boycott," Independent, LXIX, mi.

278

BIBLIOGRAPHY

"Lynching: An American Kultur," New Republic, XIV,
311.

"Lynching, a National Evil," Outlook, CXXXII, 596.

NASH, ROY. "Lynching of Anthony Crawford," Independ-
ent, LXXXVIII, 456.

DYER. "The Constitutionality of a Federal Anti-Lynching
Law," St. Louis Law Review, XIII, 186.

"Lynching and Federal Law," Chautauquan, XL, 408.

"New Phases of the Fight Against Lynching," Current Opin-
z072, LXVII, 45.

MATTHEWS, ALBERT. "The Term Lynch Law," Modern
Philology, II, 2.

TYREE. "The Origin of Lynching," Green Bag, XXV, 393.

"An Inquiry Regarding Lynchings," South Atlantic Quar-
terly, I, 4.

"Lynchings and International Peace," Outlook, C, 554.

RANDOLPH, THOMAS. "The Governor and the Mob," Inde-
pendent, LXXXIX, 347.

"The Leaven worth Lynching," Review of Reviews, XXIII,
262.

YOUNG, EARL F. "The Relation of Lynching to the Size of
Political Areas," Sociology and Social Research, XII, 348.

"Rewards to Catch Lynchers," Nation, CVII, 218.

"Lynchings and Southern Sentiment," Outlook, LXII, 200.

POLL. "The Prevention of Lynch-Law Epidemics," Review
of Reviews, XVII, 321.

"The Kentucky Cure for Lynching," Literary Digest, LXIV,
20.

"How Tampa Treats Lynchers," Literary Digest, XCIII, 12.

"The Urbana Lynching," Public Opinion, XXII, 741.

"The March of Anarchy," The New England Magazine,
VII (November, 1834), 409.
279

BIBLIOGRAPHY

"Lynching and Mobs," American Journal of Social Sciences,

XXXII (November, 1894), 67.
"Negro Outrage no Excuse for Lynching," Forum, XVI

(November, 1893), 3°°-
PAGE, WALTER H. "The Last Hold of the Southern Bully,"

Forum,XVI (November, 1893), 3°3-
"The Epidemic of Savagery," Outlook, September 7, 1901.
PAGE, THOMAS NELSON. "The Lynching of Negroes," North

American Review, January, 1904.

PELL, E. LEIGH. "Prevention of Lynch Law Epidemics," Re-
view of Reviews, March, 1898.
LEVELL, WILLIAM HAYNE. "On Lynching in the South."

Outlook, November 16, 1901.
"Lynching," Outlook, XCIII, 637.
"Lynchers Triumphant," Nation, XCIII, 386.
BAKER, RAY STANNARD. "What is Lynching? A Study of

Mob Justice," McClure's, XXIV, 300.
"The Shame of Pennsylvania," Independent, LXXI, 437.
"The Practice of Lynching," Century, CXV, 65.
"Lynching," American Law Review, XLIV, 202.
CLARK, WALTER. "The True Remedy for Lynch Law,"

American Law Review, XXVIII, 802.

Files

The Liberator, edited by William Lloyd Garrison. Boston:

1831-1865.
Niles Weekly Register, edited by H. Niles. Baltimore: 1811-

1849.

The Crisis. Volumes i to 44; New York: 1910-1937.
The New York Times.
The New York Herald-Tribune.

280

Index

Abbeville, South Carolina, lynch-
ing at, 135-136

Abbeyville, Alabama, lynching at,
246-247

Adams, District Attorney, Lionel,
163

Aiken, South Carolina, lynchings
at, 135, 136-137

Alabama: Lynchings: recorded
total, 122, of Negroes, 122, be-
tween 1871-73, 74, multiple,
122, since Armistice, 122, at
Mobile, 53, of Negro veterans,
82, at Emelle, 122-125, at Ab-
beyville, 246-247; Anti-lynch-
ing legislation, 255

Alipas, Antonio, lynched, 64

Allen, T. A., lynched, 105

Allen, Thomas, lynched, 112

Alton, Illinois: Murder of Love-
joy, 56-59

American Anti-Slavery Society,
46, 63

American Civil Liberties Union,
10

Anti-lynching legislation, 254-
272

Arizona: Lynchings: recorded
total, 145, at Lonely Gulch, 69;
Anti-lynching legislation, 256

Arkansas: Lynchings: recorded
total, 126, of Negroes, 126, of
women, 126, multiple, 126, of
Negro veterans, 82, for desper-
adism, 69, since Armistice, 126,
at Little River, 126, at St.
Charles, 126, at Hot Springs,
Little Rock, Arkansas City,
126, of Henry Lowry, 93, 168-
178; Anti-lynching legislation,
256

Arkansas City, Arkansas, lynch-
ings at, 126

Arthur, Mrs. T., lynched, 142
Atlanta, Georgia: Trial of Leo
Frank, 153-161

Bages, Val, 119-120

Bancroft, Maine, lynching at, 151

Bannon, Charles, lynched, 145

Barnwell, South Carolina, lynch-
ings at, 135

Baton Rouge, Louisiana, lynchings
at, 119

Bell, William, lynched, 145

Birmingham, Alabama, lynchings
at, 122

Black Legion, 148

Blackwood, Sheriff Dwight H.,
172, 177

Blaine, James G., Secretary of
State, 167-168

Bluefield, West Virginia, lynch-
ing at, 143

Bowling Green, Kentucky, lynch-
ings at, 134

Brand, Judge, 113

Brill, Dr. A. A., 8

Brookhaven, Miss., lynching at,
105-106

Brown, Will, lynched, 142

Butte, Montana, lynching at, 223-
225

Caddo Parish, La., lynching at,

82-83, 121

California: Lynchings: recorded
total, 144, between 1871-73, 74,
of Negroes, 144, multiple, 144,
since Armistice, 144, at San
Diego, 64, at Los Angeles, 64-
65, of Thomas Thurmond and

28l

INDEX

John Holmes, 144, 212-216;
Anti-lynching legislation, 256

Cannidy, Lola, killed by Claude
Neal, 179-181

Carr, John, killed, 104

Castlegate, Utah, lynching near,
150

Cato, Will, lynched, 1 10

Centralia, Washington, lynching
at, 146, 226-233

Chadbourn, James Harnon, 10

Chambliss, Sheriff W. F., Claude
Neal case, 181

Chattanooga, Tennessee, lynch-
ings at, 130

Chicago, Illinois, lynching at, 145

Clark, Andrew, lynched, 102-103

Clark, Major, lynched, 102-103

Clarksdale, Tenn., lynching at, 83

Coatesville, Pennsylvania, lynch-
ing at, 149

Coleman, Silas, lynched, 148

Colorado: Lynchings: recorded
total, 141, between 1871-73, 75,
of Negroes, 141, since Armis-
tice, 141; Anti-lynching legis-
lation, 256

Colorado, Texas, lynching at, 53

Columbia, South Carolina, lynch-
ings at, 135

Connecticut: Lynching of a
white, 150; Anti-lynching leg-
islation, 256

Crawford, Anthony, lynched, 135-
136

Crestview, Florida, lynching at,
249

Crisis, The, 116, 132, 138

Cutler, James Elbert, 9, 10, 60, 61,
74-75. 92

Davis, Dan, lynched, 116
Delaware: Lynching of a Negro,
151; Anti-lynching legislation,

257

Dennis, Bert, lynched, 128-129
Dennis, James, shot by mob, 128

282

Dennis, Mary, lynched, 129
Dewell, Judge Robert T., 240-242
Dial, Viola, shot, 124
Doddsville, Miss., lynching at,

103-104
Dothan, Alabama, radio station,

183
Duck Hill, Mississippi, lynchings

at, 247-248
Duluth, Minnesota, lynching at,

149

Eastland, James, killed, 104
Effinger, Virgil F., 148
Ellisville, Miss.: Lynching of

John Hartfield, 93
Emancipator, The, 47
Emelle, Alabama, lynchings at, 122
Estill Springs, Florida, lynching

at, 132

Evans, J. C., lynched, 249
Everest, Wesley, lynching of, 146,

223, 226-233

Farrior, State's Attorney Rex, of
Florida, 242

Florida: Lynchings: early, 60-6 1,
recorded total, 127, of Negroes,
127, of women, 127, multiple,
127-128, since Armistice, 128, of
Jack West, 78, of Negro vet-
erans, 82, at Ocala, Lake City,
128-129, of James Dennis, Bert
Dennis, Andrew McHenry,
Mary Dennis, Stella Long, Josh
Haskins, 128-129, of Claude
Neal, 93, 178-187, at Tampa,
234-243, at Lakeland, 243-245;
Anti-lynching legislation, 257

Frank, Leo, lynched, in, 153-161

Frankfort, Kentucky, lynchings
at, 134

Gabriel, 33-35, 37

Garrison, William Lloyd, 33, 44-

45, 46, 47, 63
Georgia: Lynchings: recorded to-

INDEX

tal, 107, of Negroes, 107, of
women, 107, multiple, 108, of
Negro veterans, 82, at Ocilla,
96, at Salt City, 107, of Paul
Reed and Will Cato, no, of
Albert Roger, no, of Sebastian
McBride, no, at Statesboro,
no, in, of Gilbert Thompson,
in, of Sidney Johnson, Will
Head, Will Thompson, Chime
Riley, Eugene Rice, Simon
Shuman, Hayes Turner, Mary
Turner, 111-112, of Thomas
Allen and Foster Watts, 112-
113, of T. J. Thomas, 113, of
Richard Marshall, 113, of Leo
Frank, in, 153-161, of Will
Kirby, 249; Anti-lynching leg-
islation, 257

Gervasio, lynched, 64-65

Gordon, William, lynched, 121

Grant, J. B., lynched, 245

Green River, Wyoming, lynch-
ing at, 144

Greene, Deputy Sheriff S. Paul,
183-184

Gunn, Raymond, lynched, 92, 94,
96, 187-197

Hackensack, New Jersey, lynch-
ing at, 150

Hart, Brooke, kidnaped and mur-
dered, 144, 212

Hartfield, John, lynched, 93

Haskins, Josh, lynched, 1 29

Hastings, John, lynched, 119

Hawkins, Richard, lynched, 248

Head, Will, lynched, 1 1 1

Hennessey, David C., murdered,
162-163

Hernando, Miss., lynching at, 105,
lynching prevented, 106

Hill, Joe, executed, 223

Hoar, Samuel, 37

Holbert, Luther, lynched, 103-104

Holmes, John, lynched, 144, 212-
216

Hose, Samuel, lynched, 108-109
Hot Springs, Arkansas, lynchings

at, 126

Howse, Alma, lynched, 102-103
Howse, Maggie, lynched, 102-103
Hughes, George, lynched, 98, 118,

197-206

Idaho: Total recorded lynchings,
147; Anti-lynching legislation,

257

Illinois: Lynchings: recorded to-
tal, 145, of Negroes, 145, since
Armistice, 145, of Elijah Love-
joy, 56-59, of William Bell, 145;
Anti-lynching legislation, 257-
259

Indiana: Lynchings: recorded to-
tal, 143, between 1871-73, 75, of
Negroes, 143, at Marion, 143-
144; Anti-lynching legislation,

259

Industrial Workers of the World,
10, 224, 228, 229, 230

International Labor Defense, 10

Iowa: Lynchings: recorded total,
147, of Negroes, 147; Anti-
lynching legislation, 260

Ivy, Jim, lynched, 103

Jackson, Andrew, 30
Jackson, Miss., lynchings at, 101
Johnson, Robert, lynched, 142
Johnson, Sidney, lynched, 111-112
Johnson, Wesley, lynched, 246-

247

Johnston, Dr. E. L., murdered, 102
Jones, Reverend Captain, lynched,

114-115

Kansas: Lynchings: recorded to-
tal, 142, between 1871-73, 75,
of Negroes, 142, multiple, 142,
since Armistice, 142; Anti-
lynching legislation, 260-261

Kentucky: Lynchings: recorded
total, 133, between 1871-73, 74,

283

INDEX

of Negroes, 133, of women, 133,
multiple, 133, since Armistice,
134, at Shelbyville, 134; Anti-
lynching legislation, 261-262

Kirby, Will, lynched, 249

Knoxville, Tennessee, lynchings
at, 130-131

Ku Klux Klan, 17, 72-75, 87, 136-
137, 222, 226, 235-245

Kuykendall, Judge, 106

Lake City, Florida, lynchings at,

128-130
Lakeland, Florida, lynching at,

243-245

Lampson, E. P., lynched, 141
Lawless, Judge, 54-56
Lee, Newt, 153, 154
Lexington, Miss., lynching at, 48,

49
Liberator, The, 33, 44-45, 53, 62,

63
Lincoln, Abraham, 58, 59

Lindsay, Louisiana, lynching at,

119-120

Little, Frank, lynched, 141, 223
Little River, Arkansas, lynching

at, 126
Little Rock, Arkansas, lynching

at, 126
Lonely Gulch, Arizona, lynching

at, 69

Long, Boisey, 128-129
Long, Stella, lynched, 129
Louisiana: Lynchings: early, 60,
recorded total, 119, of Negroes,
119, between 1871-73, 74, of
women, 119, 121, multiple, 119,
at Caddo Parish, 82-83, of John
Hastings, his son and daughter,
119, of a lunatic, 119-120, at
Sylvester Station, 120-121, of
William Gordon, 121, of Laura
Porter, 121, Mafia case, 161-168;
Anti-lynching legislation, 262
Lovejoy, Reverend Elijah F., 56-
59

Lowman, Bertha, lynched, 136-

*37
Lowman, Demon, lynched, 136-

137

Lowman, Sam, 136
Lowry, Henry, lynched, 93, 168-

178

Lynch, Colonel Charles, 15, 20-26
Lynch, G. W., lynched, 132
Lynch's Law, 20, 24-25
Lynching defined, 7-10, 254-272

MacDaniels, "Boat Jack," lynched,

247

Mafia, in New Orleans, 161-168

Maine: One lynching, 150; Anti-
lynching legislation, 262

Malfeasance of Law Officers, 87-
88, 93, 94, 117, 118, 136-137, 149,
153-161, 170-178, 182-184, 191-
197, 211-214, 239, 248, 249-250

Marianna, Florida, lynching of
Claude Neal, 93, 178-187

Marietta, Georgia, lynching of
Leo Frank, 153-161

Marion, Indiana, lynching at, 143-
144

Marshall, Richard, lynched, 113

Marshall, Robert, lynched, 150

Maryland: Total recorded lynch-
ings, 146: of Negroes, 146, be-
tween 1871-73, 75, of Matt
Williams, 94, 146, of George
Arm wood, 146-147, 207; Anti-
lynching legislation, 262

Maryville, Missouri, lynching at,

92> 94
Massachusetts: No lynchings, 100;

Anti-lynching legislation, 262
McBride, Sebastian, lynched, no
Mclllherron, Jim, lynched, 132-

133

Mclntosh, lynched, 54-56
McRae, Governor of Arkansas,

170-178
Memphis, Tennessee, lynchings

at, 93, 130, 131

284

INDEX

Michigan: Total recorded lynch-
ings, 148: of Negroes, 148, be-
tween 1871-73, 75, of Silas Cole-
man, 148, of Charles A. Poole,
148, of Roy Pidcock, 148; Anti-
lynching legislation, 262

Minnesota: Lynchings: recorded
total, 148, of Negroes, 148, at
Duluth, 149; Anti-lynching leg-
islation, 262-263

Mississippi: Lynchings: early, 48,
49, recorded total, 49, 101, of
Negroes, 101, of women, 101,
multiple, 10 1, of Negro veter-
ans, 82, of John Hartfield, 93,
of Al Young, 94, at Vicksburg,
10 1, at Jackson, 101, at Yazoo
City, 101, at Rocky Ford, 103,
of Luther Holbert, 103-104, of
R. J. Tyronne, 105, of T. A.
Allen, 105, of Bearden brothers,
105-106, of J. B. Grant, 245, at
Duck Hill, 247-248; Anti-
lynching legislation, 263

Missouri: Lynchings: early, 60,
recorded total, 139, between
1871-73, 74, of Negroes, 139,
of women, 139, multiple, 139,
since Armistice, 139, at St.
Louis, 54-56, of Raymond
Gunn, 92, 94, 96, 187-197, of
Lloyd Warner, 216-219; Anti-
lynching legislation, 263

Mobile, Alabama, lynching at, 53

Mobs, how formed, 86-91

Modern Democrats, 235-237

Monasterio, Pietro, lynched, 163-
168

Monroe, Georgia, lynchings at,
112-113

Montana: Lynchings: recorded
total, 141, between 1871-73, 74,
of Negroes, 141, of Frank Little,
141, 223-225, of E. P. Lampson;
Anti-lynching legislation, 263

Montgomery, Alabama, lynchings
at, 122

Moody, Governor of Texas, 202
Moses, Law of, 23
Mount Vernon, Georgia, lynch-
ing at, 249
Multiple lynchings, 101, 108, 114,

115, 119, I20-I2I, 122, 125, 126,

127-128, 130, 131, 133, 135, 138,
139, 140, 142, 144

Murray, Luke, lynched, 147

Nashville, Tennessee, lynching at,

*v

National Association for the Ad-
vancement of Colored People,
10, 103, 106

Neal, Claude, lynched, 61, 93, 97,
178-187

Nebraska: Lynchings: recorded
total, 141-142, between 1871-
73, 75, of Negroes, 142, since
Armistice, 142; Anti-lynching
legislation, 263-264

Negroes as lynchers, 82-83

Nelson, Laura, lynched, 138

Nevada: Lynchings: recorded to-
tal, 150, between 1871-73, 75;
Anti-lynching legislation, 264

Newberry, Florida, lynching at,
128

New Hampshire: No lynchings,
100; Anti-lynching legislation,
264

New Jersey: One lynching, 150;
Anti-lynching legislation, 264-

265

New Mexico: Lynchings: re-
corded total, 144, of Negroes,
144; Anti-lynching legislation,
265

New Orleans, Louisiana: Lynch-
ings at, 119; Mafia case, 161-168

Newton, Georgia, lynching at,

"3

New York: Lynchings: recorded
total, 150; Anti-lynching legis-
lation, 266

285

INDEX

Niles Weekly Register, 51-53, 60,

61
Nodena, Arkansas, lynching of

Henry Lowry, 168-178
Norman, Frank, lynched, 223,

243-245

North Carolina: Lynchings: re-
corded total, 140, of Negroes,
140, of women, 140, multiple,
140, since Armistice, 140; Anti-
lynching legislation, 266

North and South Dakota: Lynch-
ings: recorded total, 145, of
Negroes, 145, since Armistice,
145, of Charles Bannon, 145;
Anti-lynching legislation, 266,
269

Ocala, Florida, lynchings at, 128

Offenses for which people are
lynched, 77-83

Ohio: Lynchings: recorded total,
147, between 1871-73, 75, of
Negroes, 147, since Armistice,
147, of Luke Murray, 147; Anti-
lynching legislation, 266-267

Okemah, Oklahoma, lynching at,
138

Oklahoma: Lynchings: recorded
total, 137, of Negroes, 137, of
women, 137, multiple, 138, since
Armistice, 138; Anti-lynching
legislation, 267

Omaha, Nebraska, lynching at,
142

Oregon: Lynchings: recorded to-
tal, 147, of Negroes, 147; Anti-
lynching legislation, 267

Paducah, Kentucky, lynchings at,

134

Page, Grafton, lynched, 82-83, 121
Page, Thomas Walker, 20
Paris, Texas, lynchings at, 92, 114
Park, Governor of Missouri, 216-

Parker, John M., 164, 165

Pennsylvania: Lynchings: re-
corded total, 149, of Negroes,
149, of Zachariah Walker, 149;
Anti-lynching legislation, 267-
268

Person, Ell, lynched, 93, 131-132
Pettigrew, Ben, lynched, 131
Phagan, Mary, murdered, 153-161
Phoenix, South Carolina, lynch-
ings at, 135

Pidcock, Roger, lynched, 148
Pinckney, Michigan, lynching at,

148
Pine Bluff, Arkansas, lynchings

at, 126

Pine Level, North Carolina, lynch-
ing at, 82

Ponder, Ernest, lynched, 248
Poole, Charles A., lynched, 148
Portal, Georgia, lynching at, 1 10
Porter, Laura, lynched, 121
Poulnot, Eugene F., 237-242
Poyas, Peter, 35-36
Princess Anne, Maryland, lynch-
ing at, 146-147
Prosser, Thomas, 33

Romon, Judge, 163, 164
Rape, lynchings for, 8
Raper, Arthur F., 10
Rebellions, alone, 33-45
Recapitulation by States, 151-152
Reed, Paul, lynched, no
Rhode Island: No lynchings, 100;

Anti-lynching legislation, 268
Rice, Eugene, lynched, 1 1 1
Riley, Chime, lynched, 1 1 1
Ripley, Tennessee, lynchings at,

J31

Ritchie, Governor Albert M. of

Maryland, 207-211
Robinson, Esau, lynched, 122-124
Rocky Ford, Miss., lynching at,

103

Roddy, Ralph, reporter, 175-177
Roger, Albert, lynched, no
Rogers, Sam, 237

286

INDEX

Rolph, Governor James of Cali-
fornia, 215-216, 219
Rome, Tennessee, lynching at, 131
Roosevelt, Franklin D., 220
Rosario, Maria del, lynched, 64-65

St. Charles, Arkansas, lynchings

at, 126
St. Joseph, Missouri, lynching at,

216-219

St. Louis, Mo., lynching at, 54-56
Salisbury, Maryland, lynching of

Matt Williams, 94, 146
Salt City, Georgia, lynching at,

107
San Benito, Texas, lynchings at,

"5

San Diego, California, lynching at,
64

San Jose, California, lynching at,
144

Scott, Marie, lynched, 138

Scottsboro Case, 125

Shelbyville, Kentucky, lynchings
at, 134

Shelbyville, Tennessee, mob re-
pulsed, burns courthouse down,

*33
Sherman, Texas, lynching at, 117-

n 8, 197-206

Shoemaker, Joseph, 223-243
Sholtz, Governor Dave, of Flor-
ida, 240
Shreveport, Louisiana, lynchings

at, 119

Shuman, Simon, lynched, in
Slaton, Governor of Georgia, 157,

158

Smith, Henry, lynched, 92
South Carolina: Lynchings: re-
corded total, 135, between
1871-73, 74, of Negroes, 135, of
women, 135, multiple, 135, since
Armistice, 135; Anti-lynching
legislation, 268-269
South Dakota: See North and
South Dakota

287

South Point, Ohio, lynching at,

i47
South Sulphur, Texas, lynching at,

60

Southampton massacre, 33, 37-45
Southern Commission on the

Study of Lynching, 10
Squire Birch, 1 8, 19, 51, 52
Statesboro, Georgia, lynchings at,

no, in
Sylvester Station, Louisiana,

lynching at, 120-121

Tallahassee, Florida, lynchings at,
248

Talullah, Louisiana, lynchings at,
119

Tampa, Florida, lynchings at, 128,
234-245

Tennessee: Lynchings: early, 61,
recorded total, 130, between
1871-73, 74, of Negroes, 130,
of women, 130, multiple, 130,
since Armistice, 130, at Clarks-
dale, 83, of Ell Person, 93, 130-
131, at Tiptonville, Memphis,
Chattanooga, Nashville, Knox-
ville, Ripley, Rome, 130-131, of
Ben Pettigrew, 131, of Jim Mc-
Illherron, 132-133, of Albert
Gooden, 248-249; Anti-lynch-
ing legislation, 269

Texas: Lynchings: early, 53, re-
corded total, 114, of Negroes,
114, of women, 114, multiple,
114, at South Sulphur, 60, at
San Benito, 69, at Paris, 92, of
Reverend Captain Jones, 114,
of Dan Davis, 116, of Jesse
Washington, 116-117, of two
Negro minors, 117, of George
Hughes, 98, 118, 197-206; Anti-
lynching legislation, 269

Thomas, T. J., lynched, 113

Thompson, Gilbert, lynched, 1 1 1

Thompson, Will, lynched, 1 1 1

INDEX

Thurmond, Thomas H., lynched,

144, 212-216
Tiptonville, Tennessee, lynchings

at, 130
Torture, 94-98, 103, 104, 108-109,

no, iu-112, 116, 117, 118, 120-

121, 131-133, i42» J49> I75~l7*i

184-185, 196-197, 201-203, 225,

231-233, 238, 239, 247
Townes, Roosevelt, lynched, 247
Turner, Hayes, lynched, 1 1 1
Turner, Mary, lynched, 107, m-

112

Turner, Nat, 37-43
Tuskegee, Department of Records

and Research, 10
Tyler, Texas, lynching at, 116
Tyronne, R. J., lynched, 105

United Citrus Workers' Union,

243

Utah: Lynchings: recorded total,
150, of Negroes, 150, of Robert
Marshall, 150, of Joe Hill, 223;
Anti-lynching legislation, 269

Vaughan, Sheriff, delivered Al-
bert Gooden to mob, 248-249
Vehmgerichte of Westphalia, 16,

17

Vermont: No lynchings, 100;
Anjri-lynching legislation, 269

Vesey, Denmark, 35-37

Vicksburg, Miss., lynchings at,
49-51, 101

Vigilantes, 17, 65-69, 141-142

Virginia: Lynchings: recorded
total, 139, between 1871-73, 74,
of Negroes, 139, of women, 139,
multiple, 139, since Armistice,
140; Anti-lynching legislation,
269-270

Walker, Zachariah, lynched, 149

Warner, Lloyd, lynched, 216-219

Washington: Lynchings: re-
corded total, 146, of Negroes,
146, since Armistice, 146, of
Wesley Everest, 146, 226-233;
Anti-lynching legislation, 271

Washington, Jesse, lynched, 116-
117

Watson, Thomas E., 154, 158-159

Watts, Foster, lynched, 112

West, Jack, lynched, 78

West Virginia: Lynchings: re-
corded total, 142-143, of Ne-
groes, 142, of women, 142, since
Armistice, 143, of Mrs. T. Ar-
thur, 142, of Robert Johnson,
143; Anti-lynr^T legislation,
271-272

White, Govc nor Hugh of Mis-
sissippi, 245, 247-248

White, Walter, 10, 127

Williams, Matt, lynched, 94, 146

Wilmington, Delaware, lynching
near, 151

Wilson, T. W., District Attorney
addresses mob, 93

Wisconsin: Lynchings: recorded
total, 150, between 1871-73, 75;
Anti-lynching legislation, 272

Women, lynching of, 65, 98, 102-
103, 104, 107, in-112, 114, 119,
124, 126, 127, 129, 130, 131, 133,
135, 136-137, 138, 139, 140, 142

Woodson, Edward, lynched, 144

Work, Monroe N., 10

Workers' Defense League, 10

Wyoming: Lynchings: recorded
total, 144, of Negroes, 144, since
Armistice, 144, of Edward
Woodson, 144; Anti-lynching
legislation, 272

Waco, Texas, lynching at, 116- Yazoo City, Miss., lynchings at,

117 101

Walker, David, 31, 32 Young, Ab, lynched, 93

288