Part 5 (1/2)
BURNED ALIVE FOR ADULTERY
In Texarkana, Arkansas, Edward Coy was accused of a.s.saulting a white woman. The press dispatches of February 18, 1892, told in detail how he was tied to a tree, the flesh cut from his body by men and boys, and after coal oil was poured over him, the woman he had a.s.saulted gladly set fire to him, and 15,000 persons saw him burn to death. October 1, the Chicago Inter Ocean contained the following account of that horror from the pen of the ”Bystander” Judge Albion W. Tourgee-as the result of his investigations:
1. The woman who was paraded as victim of violence was of bad character; her husband was a drunkard and a gambler.
2. She was publicly reported and generally known to have been criminally intimate with Coy for more than a year previous.
3. She was compelled by threats, if not by violence, to make the charge against the victim.
4. When she came to apply the match Coy asked her if she would burn him after they had ”been sweethearting” so long.
5. A large majority of the ”superior” white men prominent in the affair are the reputed fathers of mulatto children.
These are not pleasant facts, but they are ill.u.s.trative of the vital phase of the so-called race question, which should properly be designated an earnest inquiry as to the best methods by which religion, science, law and political power may be employed to excuse injustice, barbarity and crime done to a people because of race and color. There can be no possible belief that these people were inspired by any consuming zeal to vindicate G.o.d's law against miscegenationists of the most practical sort. The woman was a willing partner in the victim's guilt, and being of the ”superior” race must naturally have been more guilty.
NOT IDENTIFIED BUT LYNCHED
February 11, 1893, there occurred in Shelby County, Tennessee, the fourth Negro lynching within fifteen months. The three first were lynched in the city of Memphis for firing on white men in self-defense. This Negro, Richard Neal, was lynched a few miles from the city limits, and the following is taken from the Memphis (Tenn.) Scimitar:
As the Scimitar stated on Sat.u.r.day the Negro, Richard Neal, who raped Mrs. Jack White near Forest Hill, in this county, was lynched by a mob of about 200 white citizens of the neighborhood. Sheriff McLendon, accompanied by Deputies Perkins, App and Harvey and a Scimitar reporter, arrived on the scene of the execution about 3:30 in the afternoon. The body was suspended from the first limb of a post oak tree by a new quarter-inch gra.s.s rope. A hangman's knot, evidently tied by an expert, fitted snugly under the left ear of the corpse, and a new hame string pinioned the victim's arms behind him. His legs were not tied. The body was perfectly limber when the Sheriff's posse cut it down and retained enough heat to warm the feet of Deputy Perkins, whose road cart was converted into a hea.r.s.e. On arriving with the body at Forest Hill the Sheriff made a bargain with a stalwart young man with a blonde mustache and deep blue eyes, who told the Scimitar reporter that he was the leader of the mob, to haul the body to Germantown for $3.
When within half-a-mile of Germantown the Sheriff and posse were overtaken by Squire McDonald of Collierville, who had come down to hold the inquest. The Squire had his jury with him, and it was agreed for the convenience of all parties that he should proceed with the corpse to Germantown and conduct the inquiry as to the cause of death. He did so, and a verdict of death from hanging by parties unknown was returned in due form.
The execution of Neal was done deliberately and by the best people of the Collierville, Germantown and Forest Hill neighborhoods, without pa.s.sion or exhibition of anger.
He was arrested on Friday about ten o'clock, by Constable Bob Cash, who carried him before Mrs. White. She said: ”I think he is the man. I am almost certain of it. If he isn't the man he is exactly like him.”
The Negro's coat was torn also, and there were other circ.u.mstances against him. The committee returned and made its report, and the chairman put the question of guilt or innocence to a vote.
All who thought the proof strong enough to warrant execution were invited to cross over to the other side of the road. Everybody but four or five negroes crossed over.
The committee then placed Neal on a mule with his arms tied behind him, and proceeded to the scene of the crime, followed by the mob. The rope, with a noose already prepared, was tied to the limb nearest the spot where the unpardonable sin was committed, and the doomed man's mule was brought to a standstill beneath it.
Then Neal confessed. He said he was the right man, but denied that he used force or threats to accomplish his purpose. It was a matter of purchase, he claimed, and said the price paid was twenty-five cents. He warned the colored men present to beware of white women and resist temptation, for to yield to their blandishments or to the pa.s.sions of men, meant death.
While he was speaking, Mrs. White came from her home and calling Constable Cash to one side, asked if he could not save the Negro's life. The reply was, ”No,” and Mrs. White returned to the house.
When all was in readiness, the husband of Neal's victim leaped upon the mule's back and adjusted the rope around the Negro's neck. No cap was used, and Neal showed no fear, nor did he beg for mercy. The mule was struck with a whip and bounded out from under Neal, leaving him suspended in the air with his feet about three feet from the ground.
DELIVERED TO THE MOB BY THE GOVERNOR OF THE STATE
John Peterson, near Denmark, S.C., was suspected of rape, but escaped, went to Columbia, and placed himself under Gov. Tillman's protection, declaring he too could prove an alibi by white witnesses. A white reporter hearing his declaration volunteered to find these witnesses, and telegraphed the governor that he would be in Columbia with them on Monday. In the meantime the mob at Denmark, learning Peterson's whereabouts, went to the governor and demanded the prisoner. Gov. Tillman, who had during his canva.s.s for reelection the year before, declared that he would lead a mob to lynch a Negro that a.s.saulted a white woman, gave Peterson up to the mob. He was taken back to Denmark, and the white girl in the case as positively declared that he was not the man. But the verdict of the mob was that ”the crime had been committed and somebody had to hang for it, and if he, Peterson, was not guilty of that he was of some other crime,” and he was hung, and his body riddled with 1,000 bullets.
LYNCHED AS A WARNING
Alabama furnishes a case in point. A colored man named Daniel Edwards, lived near Selma, Alabama, and worked for a family of a farmer near that place. This resulted in an intimacy between the young man and a daughter of the householder, which finally developed in the disgrace of the girl. After the birth of the child, the mother disclosed the fact that Edwards was its father. The relations.h.i.+p had been sustained for more than a year, and yet this colored man was apprehended, thrown into jail from whence he was taken by a mob of one hundred neighbors and hung to a tree and his body riddled with bullets. A dispatch which describes the lynching, ends as follows. ”Upon his back was found pinned this morning the following: 'Warning to all Negroes that are too intimate with white girls. This the work of one hundred best citizens of the South Side.'”
There can be no doubt from the announcement made by this ”one hundred best citizens” that they understood full well the character of the relations.h.i.+p which existed between Edwards and the girl, but when the dispatches were sent out, describing the affair, it was claimed that Edwards was lynched for rape.
SUPPRESSING THE TRUTH