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THE MOST THRILLING EXPOSE OF SOUTH¬
ERN LAWLESSNESS EVER PRESENTED TO
THE AMERICAN PEOPLE, AND SHOWING
THE METHODS OF THE LYNCHERS J-J-J-J-
pipsf JMafiopal ©apk
OF OLEAN, NEW YORK.
©capital, $ 100,000.00. <§>Urplu^ $100,000.00.
O F<F<I C B RS.
J. E. DUSENBURY, President. W. E. WHEELER, Vice-Pres.
A. T. EATON, Cashier. C. D. JUDD, Ass't Cashier.
DIRBCTORS.
*
J. E. DUSENBURY, E. G. DUSENBURY, E. M.JOHNSON,
W. E. WHEELER, J. F. JOHNSON.
Transacts a General Banking Business. Sells Drafts on and Ocean Tickets to and ft 1
Europe. Interest allowed on time deposits. Prompt attention is given to the business''of'
customers and every facility consistent with the principles of sound banking freely extend TH
YOUR PATRONAGE RESPECTFULLY SOLICITED.
The Black Man's Burden
Or The Horrors of Southern Lynchings
THE MOST THRILLING EXPOSE OF SOUTH¬
ERN LAWLESSNESS EVER PRESENTED TO
THE AMERICAN PEOPLE
THE METHODS OF THE LYNCHERS.
The frightful experience of
JULIUS GARDNER, OF ARKANSAS,
A MAN WHO WAS ACTUALLY LYNCHED.
MR. GARDNER IS THE ONLY COLORED MAN WHO,
HAVING BEEN ACCUSED OF CRIME AND ARRESTED
BY A SOUTHERN MOB, HAS LIVED TO
RELATE HIS EXPERIENCE.
By IRENAS J. PALMER, Olean, N. Y.
OLEAN, N. Y.
OLEAN EVENING HERALD PRINT.
1902.
Copyrighted 1902
By IKENIAjS J. PlALMMR.
THE CONKLIN.
A GENUINE EASTERN WAGON.
We have made V/agons for over Forty Years, and our
Work speaks for itself.
The above is a cut of FARM AND ROAD WAGONS
manufactured by us. We do not deem it necessary to say any¬
thing in behalf of the merit of our work, but let it speak for itself
«
The same standard will be maintained, and it will be our con¬
stant effort, with the aid of improved machines and long experi¬
ence, to keep our wagon at the front.
We have been manufacturing wagons for over forty years,
and, among all the novelties in the wagon line, none for all pur¬
poses have excelled the common wagon when properly constructed.
Correspondence solicited.
New Conklin Wagon Co.,
OLEAN, N. Y.
PREFACE.
Fifty years ago it was not an uncommon occurrence to
see in the newspapers in certain sections off our country, the
picture of a colored man with a stick across his shoulder to
which a bundle was attached. Below the picture would be an
advertisement offering a reward for the capture and return of
a runaway slave. Nor was it ,an uncommon 'Occurrence to see
in the papers a few days later, the account of where a fugitive
slave had been overtaken, but who, having retreated into the
bogs and mire of a swamp beyond the reach of the pursuing
blood hounds, and refusing to surrender and return to his pur¬
suers, had been shot dead in his tracks. Even in these latitudes
the affair would create but a temporary sensation, which would
disappear in a few days.
There were then men who denounced these outrages and
who appealed to the law-making powers for relief, but no re¬
lief was afforded. The people off this country stood before the
world, darkened by the shadows of injustice and crime, that
pictured them as a cruel and half-civilized race.
But down in the hearts of the American people there were
justice and mercy. There were the underlying principles of
humanity which needed but the awakening touch, to arise with
irresistible force and right the wrongs of centuries.
It is said that history repeats itself. To-day we read the
accounts of where 'colored men are shot, hanged of 'burned to
death, and to-morrow it is forgotten. These outrages have
been denounced, and the law-making powers have been ap¬
pealed to for relief, but no relief has been afforded. We stand
before the world .as a heartless people, who permit the perpe¬
tration of cruel and fiendish crimes against iman. The charge
is true.
But down in the souls of the people to-day are the princi¬
ples of justice, humanity and civilization, that will some day be
awakened ito action and these wrongs will be righted. 'To this
end the following pages are submitted.
Olean, N. Y., February 20, 1902.
F. W. HIGGINS & CO.
GROCERS
FOUR STORES:
Masonic Temple, 120 Union Street,
925, 927 Buffalo Street,
North Olean and East Olean.
The Black Man's Burden.
IPPLING'S celebrated poem, which appeared in the rnag-
ll\ zz'mas some time agio, entitled "The White Man's Bur¬
den," has "suggested "The Black 'Man's Burden" as Ithe
title of my 'discourse on this occasion.
Kippling says in hlis vetse that the white nations |Of the
world are engaged in the (thankless and fruitless task of forcing
civilization upon the savages. My rerrjarks are not designed,
(however, as a criticism of Kippling's production.
My mission is tio call attention .to Ithat gory trail of lynch
law that hangs out in hideou's belts across every Southern State
of the American republic; and which from Its ulcerous and un-
cleansed source, lis slowily eating its way into other parts of our
country; and to do .the little I can 'towards awakening in the
hearts and minds of the American people a sense of the tow¬
ering injustice they are permitting; .and "to present the appeal
of ten million colored American citizens for relief from the
scourge of lawlessness, savagery .and fiendishness that distresses
them, Which has never before been equalled in a civilized coun¬
try since Nero lighted his gardens with human torches and fed
Christians to lions in "the arenas of Rome.
First let us see what the colored man has done thjat enti¬
tles him to your consideration.
"One who selects ithe colored man as (the subject Of his dis¬
course, necessarily enters upon a broad field, and upon one
whose boundaries are not well established, and whose nionu-
inents jand terminals are dimmed or obscured by the corrosions
of time and neglect.
The colored man, however, has been much discussed in this
country. His cause has been the .theme Ithat has attracted the
8
THE BLAOK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
attention of our thinking men from the earlieslt inception of this
government. No greater questions were encountered by the
framers of our national constitution than those affecting the col¬
ored man, and none were more thoroughly debated or required
greater diplomacy to present in an acceptable shape.
There were (twenty-four sections in our constitution when it
was adopted. Three of these sections relate to the President of
the United 'St(ates—his powers, privileges and 'duties, and three
iof t'hem relate to the colored man. Fifteen sections have been
added to our constitution. One of these relates to' the President
and three of them relate to the colored man.
During the first century of the existence of the United
States government, the history of the colored man was the
greater part of the political history of the country. He was
the prolific source from which questions arose that bften de¬
cided the fate of national and international affairs; that elected
men to office or consigned them to political sepulchres; that
raised men from obscurity to lofty official pinnacles, while it
barred. the paths along which 'Olay, Calhpun and Webster
spught to reach the highest office within the gift of the Ameri¬
can people. The extent to which the colored man has influenced
the affairs of this country is enormous—much greater than you
would imagine unless you took pains to look the matter up.
The colored rman was the 'cause of the Missouri compro¬
mise, the Mexican wiar, the fugitive slave law, the Dred Scott
decision, the Kansas and Nebraska struggles, and many other
measures that violently agitated this dountry, and attracted
marked attention throughout the civilized world. Laws
passed by Congress affecting the colored man have been openly
and defiantly nullified by the acts of State Legislatures. In
proof of this statement I will present the following:
The State of South Carolina withdrew from the Union,
as far as she had the power, on December 20, i860. In her
ordinance of secession she set fjorth as the principal reas'on for
that action the following complaint: "An increasing hostility
on the part of the free States to the institution of slavery has
led to ;a disregard pf their obligations and the laws of the gen¬
eral government have ceased to effect the 'objects Of the consti¬
tution. The States of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Mas¬
sachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, Pennsyl¬
vania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Ibw(a, Wisconsin, and Michigan,
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS. 9
»
have enacted laws which either nullify the acts of Congress
or render useless any attempt to execute them . In ..any of these
States the fugitive 'is discharged from the labor claimed, and
in none of 'them lhas the State government Complied wi'th the
constitutional stipulations concerning fugitive slaves."
There was a good deal of truth in (the complaint of South
Carolina. At ithait time, in many ,of the States named, you
could ge't a larger appropriation for the "underground railroad"
than you could to enforce the provisions of the fugitive slave
law. The underground railro.ad is a name that was then given
to the system that facilitated the escape of men from slavery.
The colored man was the recipient of a good deal of atten¬
tion in these times, but this is not all. Three of the most im¬
portant amendments to the national constitution have been
made in the Negro's interest. The 'proclamation of emanci¬
pation—properly and justly termed the peer of the Declara¬
tion of Independence—struck the fetters from four million
colored bondmen; while one of the most gigantic wars of his¬
tory, which drenched our land in hfood and tears for four years,
enfroced the decree that the blighting curse of African slavery
should no longer be sheltered 'by the American flag. The col¬
ored man is a very important factor in the affairs of our coun¬
try 'to-day, as I shall show, I trust, before I get through.
From the foregoing it would seem that information relating
to the career and attitude of colored men during important
periods of American history would be in abundance and easy to
reach. But such is not the case.
The opportunities for c'olbred men to distinguish themselves
have always 'been limited by reasons of caste prejudice. And
while in face o'f all obstacles, especially in times o'f war, they have
performed deeds that have won for them the admiration of
their countrymen—'deeds that have refused to' be buried or to
disown their authors—yet they have many times deserved credit
which they have not justly received. Their 'commendable deeds
have not generally been conspicuous'ly marked or correctly
credited by the historian or biographer, and especially is this
true in the periods previous' to the war of the Rebellion.
W. H. Day, in his time ai strong friend of the colored
man, said, way back in 1852, "Of the sufferings and services of
the colored soldiers during the war of the Revolution, no at¬
tempt has, to our knowledge, been made to preserve a record.
10
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
Their history is not written. It lies on the soil watered in
their blood, or resits with thieir bones in the charnel house."
Joseph T. Wilson, the gifted author .of the war reoord enti¬
tled "The Black Phalanx," isays in his opening chapters:
"The history of the patriotic colored Americans who swelled
the ranks of the colonial and continental armies has never
been written; nor was any attempt made by the historians of .that
day to record the deeds of -the colored men who dared to face
death for the independence .of the American colonies."
Mr. Wilson encountered many difficulties in his efforts to
•trace the career of colored men through our country's wars.
His search extended over a vast field and required the diligent
labor of years. Not in the archives of the government did he
find all that he required. Not in the histories of States, the
records of battles, the correspondence of generals, or the writ¬
ings and speeches of statesmen. But from all of these, and from
many other isolated and 'disconnected sources did he gather the
material for the book entidled "The Black Phalanx," to which,
perhaps, more than to any other single publication, we are in¬
debted for a connected account of the deeds' of colored men
throughout our country's wars.
But despite the apathy, indifference .or studied neglect of
the Antebellum historians, there are marked deeds of loyalty,
courage and intelligence, performed by colored men, that stand
out prominently through the records of events, like beacon
lights on a dreary coast. Deeds, as I have .said, that have re¬
fused to be buried or to disown their authors—deeds that show
that the colored "man is ever on the side of his country, and
that he-freely assumes his .share of the burdens essential to our
country's greatness and our country's perpetuity.
In the remarks which I shall offer on this occasion I make
no attempt to present anything new. I have drawn upon 'the
labors of others for the facts which support my discourse. I
shall be contented if I succed in sp presenting these facts as to
furnish additional testimony that the colored iman has won all
the rights he enjoys, has compelled all the recognition he re¬
ceives, and that he is entitled to the rights, privileges and pro¬
tection which his labor has helped to secure.
The first of these facts with which we shall deal may fairly
be termed thie beginning of the struggle for American independ¬
ence.
HUE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHING®. 11
On tHe fifth !of March, 1770, more than one hundred and
thirty years ago, and six years before the Declaration of Inde¬
pendence, a company of 'British soldiers, under the command
of a Capt. Preston, were parading the streets of Boston; Mass.
These troops were a part of the forces sent here by 'Great Brit¬
ain to enforce upon the American colonies the odious and op¬
pressive adts of the British parliament.
The. presence of these troops was strongly resented by the
people of this country, and every peaceful method "was being
employed to get rid of them. Petitions, protests, and remon¬
strances had been tried and 'had failed. Arguments and
threats were of no avail. The supplications for the redress of
grievances which had been poured in upon the British throne
had been answered by the relentless hand of force seeking to
stamp out the spirit of human liberty which was born to this
country on the free sun rays of heaven.
Though the colonies were yet under the parent rule, the
camp-fires of freedom were brightly burning. The spirit of lib¬
erty was surging in every patriot's breast and the Declaration
of Independence was rapidly materializing. There was a grave
crisis upon the country. A resort to arms to throw off the
oppressive yoke of the mjother country was all 'that there was
left, and the sturdy old patriots of that period were rapidly
reaching that conclusion.
The situation' was intense. It needed but a spark to fire
the train. Who should apply ft? Captain Preston defiantly
maneuvered his trjoops upon the streets of Boston. Who should
press the button that should start in motion determined re¬
sistance to these armed intruders?
No blood had been shed in defense of American liberties
up to this time. War had reared his grim-visaged head, but his
gory trail had not then started, across our land. Which side
should begin? Who on our side should strike the 'first blow?
The man for the hour was there and he struck the blow
that thundered around the world—that was heard in every capi¬
tal—and that is still reverberating down the centuries. The
man who struck that blow was Crispus Attucks, a Negro slave.
In that supreme moment, when patriotic indignation had
thoroughly stirred the populace, Crispus Attucks, imbued with
the spirit of the hour, and1 'towering above his fellow-men in
his grasp of the most effective methods, cut the Gordian knot
12
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
of the dilemma, and led a host (of >the freedom-loving citizens of
Boston upon the red-coated soldiery commanded by Captain
Preston, and precipitated the Conflict in which the first 'blood
for American independence was shed, and the first sacrifices
were laid upon the altars }of our country's liberties.
The die was cast. The Boston harbor tea 'party, Lexington,
Bunker Hill, the Declaration of Independence, each great and
significant in itself, were logical results of a heaven-born pur¬
pose, of which the conflict on (the fifth pf March, 1770, was the
prelude.
'Crispus Aftucks fell, and with him the white comrades,
Gray, Cadlwell, Carr and Maverick. As these heroes lay there
bathed in their life's Mood, the recording angel noted the birth
of a new emipire and the dawn of an era of progress, liberty
and civilization, then unknown to the annals of history and unre-
vealed to' the dreams of man.
The conflict was to come anyway. The spirit of liberty
had become tdo thoroughly intrenched in the breasts of the
patriotic colonists to be stamped out by the measures which
Great Britain was relentlessly pursuing; but years might have
elapsed before the initial stroke which electrified the country,
which rekindled the fires of liberty that were slumbering and
added fuel to those that were burning, would have been delivered
by another hand and • in another way, and our independence
might have been deferred for a decade or a generation.
It required a daring and patriotic spirit to prompt the
initial stroke. This spirit was found in the person of Attueks,
the slave. Perhaps it was fitting that he, who had been enslaved
by his countrymen, should be the first to strike for the liberty
of all.
For years afterwards the anniversary of this event was pub¬
licly commemorated by orations and other exercises. It was,
in fact, treated as our national birthday till our independence
was secured, when the fourth of July was substituted for the
fifth of March, as a mpre proper day for general celebration.
A writer of the times says, concerning the conflict on the
fifth of March:
"Thus the first blood for liberty which was shed in the col¬
onies was that of a colored man, and it places him on our
country's side at the very beginning of the struggle. Soon in
every town and village meetings were held in which the colon-
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINOS. 13
ists were urged to resist the 'oppressive and aggressive meas¬
ures which the British parliament had passed, and for the en-
forecement of which British soldiers had drawn on the streets
the patriotic blood of Boston citizens."
The feeding engendered is well shown by a speech delivered
by John Hancock, of colonial fame. It was he who was first to
sign the Declaration of Independence. He wrote his name be¬
neath that document in letters two inches long, that the British
and the Tories might be able to easily spell it and would have
no doubts about its being there.
The speech was delivered on the spot where Attacks fell.
It was on the fourth anniversary of that event. Among other
things the fiery and soaring Hancock said:
"Tell one, ye bloody butchers, ye villains high and low,
you wretches who contrived as well as you who executed the
inhuman deed. Do ypu not feel the goads and stings of con¬
scious guilt pierce through your savage bosoms ? Though some
o'f you imay think yourselves exalted to a height that bids de¬
fiance to human justice, and others shroud yourselves beneath
the mask of hypocrisy and build your hopes of safety on the
low arts of cunning, chicanery and. falsehood, yet do you not
sometimes feel the gnawings of that worm that never dies? Do
not the injured shades of Attacks, Gray, Cadwell, Carr and
Marverick attend you in your solitary walks, arrest you in your
debauches and fill even your dreams with terror?"
Daniel Webster, in his Bunker Hill oration, referring to
the massacre on the fifth of March, said:
"The thirst for freedom was 'universal among the people
of New England. With them liberty was not circumscribed
by condition. And now, since the slave Attacks had struck the
first blow for America's independence, thereby electrifying the
colonies and putting quite a different phase upon their griev¬
ances, the people were called to witness a real slave struggling
with the oppressors for his freedom. It touched 'the people of
the qolonies as they had never been touched before, and they
arrayed themselves for true freedom."*
John Adams, Historian Bancroft, Dr. Joseph Warren, and
other prominent men, have written or spoken of the deed per¬
formed by Attucks, but we need not quote them. The orators
and writers of that time turned their eloquence upon this deed
14
THE BLACK MAN'S BURiDIEN, OB
of blood and used it as a (powerful and successful argument to
justify and bring about the Declaration of Independence.
There ,were (other colored (heroes than Attucks who helped
to achieve American independence. A few remarks concerning
the valor and intelligence of Peter Salem, another Negro slave,
who was the acknowledged hero of Bunker Hill, will be pre¬
sented.
The battle Of Bunker Hill was clearly an American victory,
though our forces were driven from the field. The British
outnumbered us three to one, and besides they had the assistance
of several warships and a battery of heavy field artillery whose
guns commanded the American position.
The British loss an this engagement nearly equalled the
whole number of thpse who' fought against them. The fact was
there clearly demonstrated that the undisciplined Yankee was a
full match for the well-drilled and well-equipped Red Coat.
The British assaulted the American position three times.
They were driven back twice with great loss. Their success
on the third assault was due to the fact that the continental
troops had run out tdf amunition. The history of the affair
says:
"When the British soldiers came up for the third time, the
American troops had been reduced to four rounds of ammuni¬
tion apiece. This they reserved until the enemy iwere within a few
rods, when it was used With great effect. The contest now,
however, was too unequal to last long. The enemy soon gained
the parapets. A column led by Major Piteairn was .the first to
break through. This impetuous officer, shouting that the day
was won, rapidly began to move his followers into such posi¬
tions as would cut off the retreat ,of the Americans. There
was necessarily disorder and confusion, but the victorious
Britons, pouring .over the breastworks of the outnumbered and
ammunitionless.Yankees, were led by trained officers who knew
how to make victory -complete. Major Piteairn was cool, and
he was rapidly taking advantage of the situation, when he was
struck down. The hand 'that struck him down was that of
Peter Salem, a Negro slave. The loss of Piteairn confused the
enemy and created the -delay that enabled our forces to escape
from the field."
THE HORRORS 0E SOUTHERN LYNCHINOiS. 15
Peter Salem's ;timely act had mucih to with averting the dis¬
aster thait threatened our forces at Bunker Hill
It is not my design to idwell upon the deeds of daring and
valor performed 'by colored soldiers during the struggle for this
country's liberty. .There were many of them—enough to fill
volumes With their accounts. I have presented the above we'll
authenticated instances to show Where qolored men stood at the
very beginning (of the contest for American freedom. Crispus
Attucks, Peter Salem, Ebenezer Hill, Samuel Slater, Daniel
Warner, John Fruman, are the names of a few of the many
colored soldiers, who in the face of prejudice and other obsta¬
cles, and without the incentive of promotion or other reward,
earned marked distinction for deeds .of gallantry and valor in
•the wars that gave us the American Republic.
Colored soldiers under Gates, under Lafayette, under Wash¬
ington, and other leaders in the revolution; colored soldiers at
Bennington, Saratoga, Valley Forge, and York Town; colored
soldiers in the army and navy, contributed their full share
of the courage and the sufferings that were necessary to win
in the struggle that was started on the streets of Boston on the
memorable fifth of March, 1770.
The dusky arms that struck sp valiantly for the Union
cause deserved better treatment than they received at the hands
of the dominant classes When our independence was secured.
The constitution, Which Was adopted iby this country, had no
reward for the black man. It secuerd no rights of citizenship
to the colored soldier who fought, or to the descendants of him
who died upon the battle-fields of the revolution. But the con¬
stitution said that the African ,slave trade should be protected
by law for a third of a century after the Declaration of Independ¬
ence. It said that the poor colored man, guilty of no offense
whatever, should be a hunted outlaw and legitimate prey for the
blood-hound and the rifle of his pursuer, and that the whole
country must organize to hunt him down. It said that the
black man had no rights which a white man is bound to respect,
except the right to be counted at the ballot box, while somebody
else cast the ballot. Such is the organic law with Which the
white man burdened this country at its .start, and under Which
it grew during the first eighty years of its existence. Such is
the gratitude manifested towards a weak and scanty people for
16
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OB
their courage and suffering during eight years of sanguinary
struggle, to establish the principle, that all men are created equal
with the inalienable rights ;of life, liberty and the pursuit of
happiness.
Is it any wonder that a day of reckoning came ? Is it any
wonder that a million graves and billions of dollars was the price
demanded for this terrible blunder? But retribution was sure
then and it is now. The injustices and outrages that go unpun¬
ished to-day 'will yield their legitimate fruit, and somewhere
along the line the account must be settled.
'Colored men took a hand in the war of 1812. One of the
events that brought on that war was 'the forcible taking of some
colored men from an American vessel by a British cruiser, and
impressing them into the British service.
'Great Britain claimed the right to searcih American ves¬
sels for alleged British deserters. The young republic would
rather fight than suffer such indignities. Great Britain disre¬
garded our ultimatum and the second war followed.
But colored men were not received into the Union armies
at the beginning of the struggle. I can safely say that on the
other side of the battle of Appomattox this country has never
squarely received the services of colored soldiers 'till driven to it
by absolute necessity.
When the war of 1812 began this was a white mjan's govern¬
ment and that was a white man's War. fit Was not long, how¬
ever, before the government began to modify that attitude.
When the commonwealth of Maine had been wrested from our
control; when 'the national capital had been burned; when our
forces were threatened with annihilation, a change came over
the spirit of their dreams. The country called on the colored
man for help. The State of New York and other States author¬
ized the arming of Negro troops, and General Jackson made a
strong appeal to the colored men of Louisiana to arise and to
assist him to rppel the invasion of Packenham and his army
of Wellington's trained veterans. And from every side the col¬
ored man responded with patriotic alacrity.
Colored soldiers constituted more than one-eighth of the
forces 'that enabled General Jackson to win the decisive battle
of New Orleans, 'the last struggle of the White man's government
in the white man's war of 1812.
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS. 17
How well the colored, soldier deported 'himself in that con¬
flict is shown by General Jackson's proclamation of thanks.
This proclamation can be found in the national library, Niles
Register, Volume II. I quote from it as follows:
"Proclamation. To the men of color; Soldiers, from the
shores of 'Mobile: I collected you to arms. I invited you to
share in the perils and divide the glory of your white country¬
men. I expected much from you for I was aware that you pos¬
sessed qualities that render you formidable ,to an invading foe.
I knew that you could endure hunger and thirst, and all of the
hardships of war. I knew you loved the land of your nativity,
and like ourselves had to defend all that is most dear to man.
But you have surpassed my expectations. I have found in you
united to these qualities that noble enthusiasm that impels to
great deeds. Soldiers, the President pf the United States shall
be informed of your conduct on this occasion, and the voice
of the representatives of the American nation shall alpplaud
your valor as your General now praises your ardor."
The above proclamation is pretty good evidence that col¬
ored men were then doing something for this country and its
institutions.
Colored men fought in other battles than that of New
Orleans, and very remarkably so in Commodore Perry's battles
on Lake Erie. But I shall not dWell on these, and I shall pass
the Mexican war without remark. I will now come down to
more recent times and review sqme of the events that are still
fresh in the memory of thousands yet living.
The year 186.3, the third year of the rebellion, was ushered
in amid grave misgivings. The stoutest patriot shuddered as
he contemplated the probable destruction of the American Un¬
ion. War had spread his blighting effects far and wide and had
stationed his grim spectre at almost every fireside. The poetry
of battle had vanished; its horrors and sufferings were invading
every household.
Reverses had fallen upon our armies; the national credit
was low down in the scale of quotations; there were the
croakings of copperheads and the exultations of enemies. The
dismal clouds of doubt and distress hung like a Juneral pall
across American skies. The citizen, the soldier, the statesman,
were conscious of our peril.
18
THE BLAOK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
England, France, Europe, hovered in the distan'ce like vul¬
tures awaiting (their prey. The world stood in suspense as the
cause of liberty and progress and the life of this great nation
trembled im the 'balance.
In that hour of dark forebodings, when hope drooped from
her pinnacle; when the fruitless struggle of An'tietam followed
by the terrible reverse at Fredericksburg, had discouraged en¬
listments in the Northern armies, and had made conscription
unpopular to the extent of open resistance; in that dark hour
the white man's cry went up, "Oh Lord! our burden is greater
than we can bear." (In that terrible hour the national cry went
out to the colored man, "Take up the white man's burden, res¬
cue the American flag from dishonor and destruction and pre¬
serve the integrity of the American Union."' What was the an¬
swer?
The cry was heard and answered; and in twelve months
two hundred thousand colored men sprang to its response,
turned defeat into victory, and saved intact the flag that shelters
you and him to-day.
It is a good deal to say—a good deal to claim for our peo¬
ple, that with the American eagle driven from his perch a fugi-
itve in hiding; that with the glorious old banner being robbed
of its stripes and being despoiled of Its stars, the great govern¬
ment of the United States, on the verge of destruction, turned
to its colored patriots with a prayer for the help that it might
not die.
But it did; and despite ,the wrongs and prejudices we had
suffered; despite the fact that colored soldiers were at first paid
much less than their white comrades and barred from all lines
of promotion; despite the crowning infamy of two hundred and
fifty years of slavery 'which was actually sustained by the Union
soldiers restoring to their masters the escaped slave, the colored
men responded. And in loyal throngs, from every corner of
the land, faster than the government could arm and equip, they
flocked to the Union standard, singing that patriotic refrain,
"We are coming, Father Abraham, three hundred thousand
more."
And from the red soil of Virginia; from the contested hills
of Tennessee; from the victorious fields of Georgia, they sent up
that detrmined cry that was wafted on the winds of Heaven to
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS. 19
every corner of the globe; that echoed and re-echoed its warning
notes through the halls and corridors of the Courts of St.
James and the Courts of Paris; that shouted 'consternation to
treason; sang the dirge of rebellion and sounded the death knell
of African slavery; that welcomed—that world-awakening mes¬
sage, "We will stand by the American flag though a million of
us fall in its defense."
And they stood there. In that needed—that indispensable
hour the colored man came, and bared his breast to cruel war.
And striking for the Union, for our country, and the flag; amid
the terrible storms of fire and iron hail he sank torn and bleeding
on many of our country's blood-drenched battle fields, with his
eyes towards heaven and his feet to the foe.
It is a good deal to say, I repeat, that in that dark hour
the life of this great nation hung on the thread of the 'colored
man's valor and the colored man's loyalty, but the cold facts are
there; they have been stamped upon the historic page of our
country by the indelible hand of war.
The historian shall yet write that but for courage and valor
of colored men during the war of the rebellion, the Star Span¬
gled Banner could not to-day float unchallenged from the
Lakes to the Gulf, from the Atlantic to the Pacific; from the
tropical waters of the Rio Grande to the ice-clad peaks of Alaska.
Could no.t float from the summits of Porto Rico and usher God's
free sun rays upon the eastern shores of the western world;
could not from the mountain tops of the Philippines herald the
dawn of day to the sleeping millions of the Orient; could not
set in the skies of the globe that never-ending, nevernfading -and
ever-visible rainbow, composed of thirteen bands and forty-five
stars, Carrying courage to the weak; carrying civilization into
darkness, and shedding gold and silver tints upon the dismal
clouds that overhang the oppresed.
From 1.776 to the battle of Appomattox the government
of the United States was an experiment. On the ninth of April,
1865, the American Republic graduated. She placed her name
in the roll book of nations; cast her banner upon the tidal wave
of progress, and firmly put her shoulder to the burdens of civil¬
ization. Call it the white man's burden if you 'will, but Appo¬
mattox was not 'wholly a white man's triumph.
When the experiment of colored troops 'had been tried
20
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
and had proven successful; when confidence in the eventual suc¬
cess of the Union forces had regained its hold in 'the minds of
the people; when the victorious shouts of our advancing armies
had restored hope to loyal hearts, President Lincoln, looking
over the results of an experiment which he had entered upon
with doubts and reluctance, spoke as follows to Judge Mills of
Wisconsin, a pro-slavery advocate, Who- had come to remon¬
strate against the employment of colored troops. Mr. Lin¬
coln said:
"The slightest knowledge of figures will prove to any one
•that the rebel armies cannot be destroyed by democratic strategy.
It would sacrifice all of the white men of the North to do it.
There are now in the service of the United States near two hun¬
dred thousand colored men—the most of them under arms de¬
fending and acquiring Union territory. The democratic strat¬
egy demands that these forces 'be disbanded, and 'that the mas¬
ters be conciliated by returning those that were slaves to bond¬
age. The black men who now assist Union prisoners to escape
are to be converted into our enemies in the vain hope of gaining
the good will of their masters. We shall have to fight two na¬
tions instead of one. You cannot conciliate the South if you
guarantee them ultimate success, and the experience of the pres¬
ent struggle proves that their success is inevitable if you force
millions of colored men on to their side of the fight. Will you
give our enemies such advantages as insures success, and then
depend on coaxing and flattery and concessions to get them back
into the Union ? If we abandon all of the posts now garrisoned
by colored troops, and take two hundred thousand men from
our side and put them into the battlefield or cornfield against
us, we would be compelled to abandon the war in three
•months."
No stronger testimony is needed to conclusively prove how
indispensable the colored soldier was to the preservation of the
Union. There is no better authority than that of President Lin¬
coln. But I will give more of that interview. Mr. Lincoln con¬
tinued :
"We have to hold 'territory in sickly and inclement places.
Where are the democrats to do it? It was a free fight and the
field was open to the war democrats to put down this rebellion
•by fighting against both master and slave long before the pres-
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS. 21
ent policy was inaugurated. There have been men base enough
to ask me to return to slavery the black warriors of Olustee
and Port Hudson, and thus win the respect of the masters they
fought. Should I >dfo so I should deserve to be damned in
time and eternity. Gome what will, I will keep my faith with
friend and foe. My enemies pretend that I am now carrying
on this war for the purpose of abolition. So long as I am Pres¬
ident it shall be carried on for 'the sole purpose of restoring the
Union. But no human power can subdue the rebellion without
the use of the present .policy."
There is the testimony of the foremost man on the globe
at that time. There are thousands that know that it is the exact
truth.
The fact is not disputed that the tide of war in the most
critical period of the re'belion was turned in favor of the Union
cause by the solid, loyal front of American colored men.
By their voice all over the land; by their votes where they
could vote; on the Union fortifications; on the plantation giv¬
ing aid to escaping Union prisoners or furnishing information
to Union generals; or in the field firmly facing the terrors of
war, they were ever found on the right side, on the side of our
country and the flag, and they were there when a supreme crisis
demanded their help.
I shall make no attempt to recite the deeds of heroism per¬
formed by colored soldiers during the war of the rebellion.
Olustee, Port Hudson, Wilderness, Petersburg, and many other
historic battles, are still fresh in the memory of thousands yet
living. No braver men ever laid down their lives in their coun¬
try's defense than were numbered among the colored slain on
those hotly contested fields.
We do not tdaim that the colored soldier "did all of the'
fighting, or the most of the fighting, or the best of the fighting,
But we do claim, and we have shown beyond successful contra¬
diction, that the colored soldier was a necessary auxiliary to the
Union forces, and that he freely threw his weight into the bal¬
ance, when his weight was a necessity to insure the success of
the Union cause.
There were white men and colored men who were at that
time bearing the burden in Kippling's picture; but there were
only white men fighting against them.
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
Now there are other contests than those of war. We come
up against grave emergencies in which 'courage and intelligence
are needed on other lines than those of physical force. Govern¬
ments are often menaced by other enemies than those of armed
foes within or without.
The problem of successful government requires the highest
order of intelligence for its solution. Especially is this true of
republics where the rulers come fresh from the people every few
years, and the policies of the government are affirmed or con¬
demned by.the voice of the masses quite as often.
In this country we frequently see remarkable and quite
contradictory changes of policy, directed by the people, in com¬
paratively short periods of time. By way of illustration, I pre¬
sent the following:
In 1890 this country was in favor of a protective tariff.
It was also in favor of purchasing seven tons of silver every
day in the year to be coined into money. In 1892, by unmistak¬
able majorities, we voted for free trade. In 1893 we condemned
and repealed the silver policy of three years before. In 1894, by
phenomenal majorities, we condemned the free trade policy
which had just seen the light. In 1896 we restored the protect¬
ive tariff. And so on and so on.
In 1896 we were confronted with another question, freighted
with an importance which will be thoroughly comprehended
only in the years to come. The grave question was presented,
should this country keep on the high and progressive plain, with
reference to sound money, which 'has become one of its time-
honored traditions; or should we start on the retrograde path
and lower our standard to the level of Mexico, China and
Tripoli—a level which even the civilization of Peru and Japan
are climbing above.
The question was decided, and the victory that was achieved
was second only to York Town in the revolution, and Appo¬
mattox in the rebellion.
How did the colored man deport himself in this conflict?
The great presidential election of 1896 was decided by the
colored voters of this country. A pretty big statement, but I
will show you that it is true.
The case is well outlined by an artfcle which appeared in the
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHING®. »
Washing-ton Post a few weeks after the election of 1896. The
Post said:
"Ait every stage of his personal fight, Mr. McKinley has
been indebted to the Negro. It was the Negro contingent at
St. Louis that made his nomination certain. It was the colored
delegates' firm stand for gold that forced the sound money issue
upon the convention. It was the Negro vote in many States
that made Republican victory possible. We all know now that
Mr. McKinley would have had next to no chance at all had not
the St. Louis convention declared emphatically and unequivo¬
cally (for the gold standard. It was the solid sound-money
front presented by the colored delegates that compelled the adop¬
tion of the gold ^clause in the platform and furnished Mr. McKin¬
ley with the issues upon which he rallied to his 'banner the mer¬
chant, the manufacturer and the great business interests
throughout''the land. Mr. McKinley could not have been elected
but for the course pursued by the Negroes before, during and
after the assembling of the St. Louis convention."
In support of the Post's statement, I will quote a few fig¬
ures of the returns of 'the election in 1896. My figures are from
the World Almanac of 1897.
"President McKinley's majority in the electoral college
•of 1897 was ninety-five. The States of California, Delaware,
Indiana, Maryland, Ohio, Oregon, Kentucky and West Virginia
were carried for Mr. McKinley by the colored voters. A ma¬
jority of the white voters in every one of these States went for
Mr. Bryan, but the colored voters were numerous enough to
carry them the other way. These eight States sent eighty elect¬
ors to the electoral college. Seventy-eight of these electors
voted for Mr-. McKinley. Had only thirty-two of them voted
for him he would have been defeated.
The popular and electoral vote for the presidential elec¬
tion of 1896 can be found on page 423, World Almanac, of 1897,
and on page 376 can be found the colored male population of
voting age in the several States. With this data you can easily
verify the figures which I here submit.
"A change of 1400 votes in California would have given
that State to Mr. Bryan. A small part of her colored voters
could have caused the change. One-third of Delaware's 8,000
colored voters could easily 'have destroyed Mr. McKinley's plur-
2t THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
ality of 3,600 in that State. A change of 9,100 votes in Indiana
would have placed that State in the Bryan column. Indiana
has over 13,000 colored voters. Kentucky's 60,000 colored
voters are clearly responsible for Mr. McKinley's small plural¬
ity there in 1896. The great State of Ohio could have been car¬
ried the other way in Mr. McKinley's first election by less than
24,000 of her voters. Thirty-one thousand colored men vote in
Ohio. In the same election 17,000 voters could have changed
the result in Maryland, but 50,000 colored men cast their ballots
there on that occasion. Ten thousand colored voters in Oregon;
2,000 plurality for sound money. West Virginia has over 10,000
colored voters. Had 6,000 of them voted for Mr. Bryan he
would have carried that State in 1896."
Such is the record made by the colored men in 1896 on
the great question of sound money. We submit it for criticism
and for history. We fully appreciate the substantial endorse¬
ment which this attitude has received at the hands of the Amer¬
ican voter after considering this question for four years.
The instances to which I have called your attention, while
perhaps among the more important, are but ,a few of the many
where the colored man has shown his devotion to his country
in its hour of trial. It is one of the characteristics of the race.
Whatever may be said about their intellectual inferiority, or
about the degenerating influences of two hundred and fifty years
of slavery; no colored American needs to peruse, iwith chagrin,
the record made by his people when our country's interest has
been at stake, and when prompt and intelligent action has been
needed in our most critical periods.
Such loyalty—such devotion cannot go unrewarded. It
is not consistent with the practice and teachings of a 'Christian
age.
As we look back a'cross the stretch of time and draw com¬
parisons, we shall see that the colored man is getting his reward
though it be in the shape of tardy and only partial justice.
Less than one hundred years ago our laws tolerated the
African slave trade. That was stopped. The fighters for the
rights of man were gaining ground. The Missouri compromise
of more than three-quarters of a century ago was but a partial
lull in the irrepressible conflict. The fugitive slaye law and the
Dred Scott decision were but idle commands for the sea of
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS. 25
events to turn back. The world was advancing along the lines
of civilization; and progress and light could form no partner¬
ship with that relic of barbarism, African slavery.
The slave po'wer correctly read the handwriting on the
wall. Its logical deductions were that the infernal institution
was doomed; but like all expiring monsters it struck out wildly,
and in its ravings it demanded and obtained of a cringing and
intimidated constituency the fugitive slave law, the Dred Scott
decision, and the acts of secession.
The turning 'point was inevitable, and it came. The election
of Abraham Lincoln, the conflict of i860, the proclamation of
emancipation, the amendments to the constitution, the acts of
reconstruction, all followd in rapid succession. The frantic ef¬
forts of the slave power to perpetuate its existence had failed.
A century has made a great change in this country. In
1807 our flag sheltered the African slave trade. In 1807 the
slaver, flaunting at its mast-head the Stars and Stripes, rode the
waters of the Potomac; and anchoring in the shadows of the
national capital, discharged its cargo of manacled human-be¬
ings who had been torn from their native shores by pirates bear¬
ing a legal commission from the government of the United
States.
In 1805 Thomas Jefferson was inaugurated President of
the United States. He took the oath of office in the National
capital, but within sight of the slave pen and the auction block,
and within hearing of the crack of the 'driver's whip, the baying
of the blood hounds, the clinking of the handcuffs and the
groans of the victims.
No free colored man witnessed the inaugural ceremonies
on that occasion. No colored man dared to stand up and assert
his manhood, and demand the rights which God had designed
for him. Few were the white men who dared to plead the black
man's cause under the dome of the National Capitol.
We need not go back to 1805. We need go back only half
of that distance. There are men living to-day who have seen
the slave catcher; who have sheltered the fugitive; who have
been agents of the underground railroad. There are men yet
living who have seen the poor Negro, guilty of no offense what¬
ever, torn by the merciless jaws of the blood hound, or fall a
victim to the deadly rifle of his pursuer. There are men vet liv-
2« THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
ing who have' heard from the steps of the National Capitol, the
hoarse 'callings of the auctioneer, as he sold human beings into
slavery, mingling his tones with1 the speeches of congressmen
who were enacting laws for the land of the free and the home
of the brave. Inside of fifty years have all these things taken
place. But I go back to 1805, because, when at the inauguration
in that year, the Chief Justice of the United States administered
the oath of office to Thomas Jefferson, the President swore tO'
enforce the statutes that made it lawful for piratical crafts to
sieze colored men on the coast of Africa and bring them to this
country, consigned to cruel and life-long slavery.
The colored men did not have many rights then. No one
boasted of the sacrifices he had made in their behalf. But a cen¬
tury has made a great change in their condition in this country.
In 1896 a citizen of the United States is elected to the office
of President. In 1897 he is inaugurated. He is placed at the
head of the greatest nation on earth and is inducted to the great¬
est office mortal can enter.
As he takes the oath of office no bondman's moan dis¬
tresses the occasion; but thousands of colored American citizens
witness the impressive ceremonies.
Colored citizens, colored office-holders, colored legislators,
colored congressmen, assist in the proceedings, and the multi¬
tude look upon a'president who was nominated by colored dele¬
gates, elected by colored voters, inaugurated by the help of col¬
ored citizens, and who swore to defend the constitution of a free
people upon a Bible presented for the occasion by the colored
Christians of the country.
Surely the colored man's cause is advancing. From out of
the depths of a cruel and oppressive past he is slowly but surely
stepping into the sunlight of God's freedom.
But even now as we review the picture—this tribute to the
civilization of the Western Hemisphere—this vast improvement
upon a condition that has existed—we shudder as we contem¬
plate the lawlessness, the savagery, the fiendishness, ithat stalks
abroad unchallenged in a vast portion of the American Republic
to-day. We are filled with horror as we hear the anguishing
cries that come up from more than fifty thousand graves, filled
with the bodies of colored victims who 'have fallen at the hands-
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS. 27
of Southern law-breakers since the close of the war of the re¬
bellion.
And then we are told that the great government of the
United States, able and willing to stretch forth its strong arm in
defense of Cuba; ready to sally forth like the Kni'ghts of old
in quest of the grievances of others to redress; sending vast
armies .across twelve thousand miles of ocean in the interest of
law, order and civilization; is powerless to stay the hand of the
Southern desperado, who, with impunity, shoots, hangs or burns
innocent .and defenseless colored men, in the light of the noon-
diy sun, and under the very domes of the court houses. Unable
to arrest that fiendishness, never equalled in the darkest 'hour
of the Spanish occupation of the .new world, and absolutely re¬
volting to the lowest savages of the (Philippine group.
The government that promptly pays indemnity when Ital¬
ians or Chinamen are murdered here, cannot even protest against
the illegal and unconcealed killing of its own citizens.
And this is our government to-day. Fifty thousand victims
of cold blooded murder and no redress. The ghastly work going
steadily on, and no signs of redress. If this is our government,
in God's name let us seek to make it better. Let us take up the
black man's burden. Let us send forth from the colored press
the colored pulpit, the colored rostrum; yes, from the housetops
and'the ballot box, a .continuous and vigorous torrent of protests,
remonstrances .and b'oycots, till "we arouse to action that <sense
of justice that ever permeates the American people; and till we
start coursing through the veins of the nation the /progressive
currents of law, justice and civilization.
Let us seek to rescue our country from a 'condition found
nowhere else on the globe. Not in Spain, not in Turkey, not
in China; not even in the savage tribes of Africa or America
do people commit isuch revolting murder, in open day, without
hindrance or without inquiry. Of all organized governments
the United States is the only one where ruthless savages may
mutilate, may .shoot, 'may hang, may burn to death its citizens
without fear 'of punishment.
The black man's burden is unceasing effort for the suppres¬
sion of this monumental iniquity.
We are told that punishing the crime of murder is a State
affair, and that the general government has nothing to do with
28
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
it. Such is not the case. There are ample powers in Congress
delegated .to it .by the constitution, to deal with this question.
Time |will not jpertnit me to more than glance at this
■subject.
The fifth amendemen't to the Constitution prescribes that
no person shall be 'deprived of life without due process of law.
The sole object of this clause is to protect the lives of the people.
A due process of law is, among other things, a sufficient
inquiry, before or after, to clearly show |the cause of .every death
of an inhabitant with a view of reducing these causes to a mini¬
mum.
If a man dies ,of disease, a doctor's certificate presumes
the .inquiry has been made. If aman is killed in an accident,
the coroner's inquest is generally sufficient. If a man is .mur¬
dered, the coroner's inques't is the inquiry; but .the due process
of law demands the existence of .la'w for ^the punishment, of
murder .and a reasonable effort to enforce it.
That .article of the (constitution to which I have called
your attention, clearly includes all of the above cases, as well
•as the cases where men are deprived of life by direction of the
law. The difference is thaf the first named cases are pjost .mor¬
tem processes, while the last named case is an ante-mortem
process.
If a man, without a legal trial, be put to death by the direc¬
tion of a Governor of a State in his official capacity, it is*clear¬
ly a case of depriving a man of life without due process .of law.
We can hardly deny the right of the general government to in¬
vestigate such cases, and to make such Jaws as will tend to pre¬
vent the recurrence of such .affairs.
But it is (said that men .are no't killed that way. This is gen¬
erally true. But if a man is murdered and neither the Governor
nor any of his subordinates take any steps to .apprehend and
punish the criminal, how do. we know that these officers did not
aid or abet the commission of the crime, and how .can we know
without an investigation, .and who but the general government
is to investigate?
If a man is -murdered, and nefther the Governor, the sher¬
iff, nor the district .attorney, take any .steps to catch -and punish
the offender's, these officers are .accessory to the crime. Ac¬
cessory .after the fact, perhaps, and pos!sibly only to the extent
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS.
29
of neglecting their duty, but accessories just the same, and it is
•the duty of the general government to investigate and to ascer¬
tain to what ex'terit they are accessories, and to pass the laws
that will best remedy the ;evil.
If a .man is lynched by a mob of criminals who are not all
residents of the same state, it becomes an interstate affair; and
it is not disputed 'that the general government has jurisdiction.
But how are we to know when these desperadoes cross State
lines on their murderous mission ? Only by a national law that
shall direct the government officers !to investigate any case of
lynching, to ascertain where the law-breakers live, for the pur¬
pose of deciding '£he question of jurisdiction.
When the 'time comes that the officers of the government
shall go down and investigate 'jthese deeds of murder, and com¬
pel the members off the chivalrous mob, flushed with the glory
of having just burned a poor defenseless 'colored man at the
stake, to furnish satisfactory evidence that they are all resi¬
dents of the same State, a great deal will have been done to¬
wards eradicating the blackest stain that besmears our civiliza¬
tion to-day. There^s a;way to reach this evil. There are ample
powers in Congress to deal with this question.
The fifth amendment to (the constitution prescribes that no
person shall be deprived of life without due process of law.
The same amendment also prescribes that private property shall
not be taken for public use without just compensation. The
same amendment prescribes that no person islhall be compelled
to be a witness against himself. It further prescribes that no
person shall be tried for crime except upon an indictment. This
same amendment also prescribes that no pers'on shall be twice
put in jeopardy of life or limb for the same offense.
Every one of the abpve provisions, except the firtet named,
is duly respected, and is -enforced by laws passed by Congress.
What argument can be advanced tiha't Will exce'pt the first
named provision from the same treatment?
Let us glance at the .Post Office department and see what
Congress can do iunder .very limited instructions from the con¬
stitution.
"The Congress shall have power to establish post offices
.and post routes."
This is all there is in the constitution about our complex
3t THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
postal system. Twelve words cover the whole ground. Bur
twelve volumes would not contain the laws that 'have been cre¬
ated and that maintain the ipostoffice department of the United
States.
Congress has taken hold of this matter. It has passed the
laws that make the transmission and distribution of the mails
as secure and effective in Louisiana or Texas, as they are in
New York or Massachusetts.
If a man obstructs the 'transmission of the mails in Arkan¬
sas, the government officers promptly hunt up the obstructor
and punish him. If a man robs 'the mail -in Georgia, he is arrest¬
ed -and sent to /prison by :tihe government. ■ If you send obs'cene
or profane matter through the mails, you are arrested by govern¬
ment officers and .are tried in government courts.
And /all of this power is derived from the twelve-warded
article—The Congress shall have power to establish post offices
and* post routes.
If you send .an obscene letter to your neighbor, the govern¬
ment officers will pounce dloWn upon you and .take you to jail;
but i'f you go over and kill that neighbor, the general govern¬
ment is powerless to interfere, though no person shall be de¬
prived of life without due process of law, is the plain command
of the constitution.
Tht? remedy for this deplorable and incongruous state (of
affairs lies wholly with Congress. Thial body has legislated '
for the postoffice and the post route; but it has signally failed
to develop Ithe .germs of our organic \aw /that are designed .to
protect 'the lives of the people.
We come to Congress with the burden of our complaint.
We ask that body to pass the laws that effect the objects of the
constitution. We know it will invite criticism, opposition and
denunciation. We know th'alt a wave ,of howls will roll across
certain sections of our land. But the issue is to be met—the
battle is to be fought—and justice and -mercy are opposed to
delay.
And when Richard Roe, who represents a law-abiding con¬
stituency, gets up in his place in Gongr-ess 'and introduces such
a measure; and when he points out that it is designed to stay
the red hand of assassination; 'to dtop the frightful slaughter
of colored people, already exceeding fifty thousand victims;
THE HORR/ORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS. 31
to arrest the revolting (practice pf burning human beings at the
stake, making the occasion a holiday, with excursions on the
railroads; I want to hear the member who sets up the howl
thhit the general government is invading the sacred prerogatives
of the great State of Texas.
When Ridha'rd Roe further paints out that armed packs
of cowards, numbering from fifty to five hundred; not one of
whom would dare to meet a colored man in equal combat, as¬
semble in the stealth of night, and sneak down upon an un¬
armed and solitary colored family; and set fire to the house;
and when the .father, .aroused from his midnight slumbers by
the kissing tongues of flame, the crackling of burning walls,
the screeches of wilfe and children, catches his dear ones in his
arms and rushes from the crumbling structure; he and his chil¬
dren go down to dealth beneath the deadly vollley of a hundred
coWardly shot guns. And while the (widowed, the .wounded,
the bereaved wife, surrounded b'y a pack of bowling, blasphe¬
ming brute's, kneels in the flickering lights of .her destroyed
home, and raises both hands aloft and prays, "Oh, ipi'tying Fath¬
er in Heaven, Sjave my husband, save my children," the leader
of that mob rushes vupon /that frail, defenseless, pleading form,
,and with an inhuman Mow hurts her, stunned and bleeding
to the earth, by the side of her dead husband and dying chil¬
dren. A half hour 'later she recovers. And amid the terrible
solitude of her de'solate surroundings, she presses the pold hand
of her assassinated husband, and the cold 'cheeks of her mur¬
dered children; and then she swoons and sinks again to the
ground, reddened by the blood of all On ,earth that is dear to
'her.
This is no overdrawn picture. No jpen—no tongue can
fully portray these horrors. Baker, /the colored mtan, while
escaping 'from his burning home, at midnight, with his children
in his arms, went down to death in the iway I have described,
His sole offense was. daring to receive the commission from
the President of 'the United 'States to be postmaster in a South
Carolina town. ■
The perpetrators of this terrible deed, (though known, and
known to be guilty, were never punished. There was a trial,
and so clelarly was guillt established ,that not even all of that
South Carolina jury could be intimidated to the extent of vot-
32
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
ing an acquittal. The jury disagreed. It was then within^the
province <of 't'h'e general government—(the prosecutor —to bring
another trial; |and if needed, in; (another section of the country.
But i't Was ino't done. The one grand (opportunity to place the
nation's stamp of condemnation upon the horrible crimes of the
lynchers wjas not embraced. The story of this urirebuked out¬
rage, like thousands of others, went forth on its fiendish mission
to encourage other murders; and to contribute its hellish quota
to that dastardly deed which, o>n the 6th of Sephember, 1901,
spread a cloud of grief, misery and mourning over ;a nation of
eighty million souls.
The anarchist and the lyncher are of the same genus. Both,
are foes of law and order. Both are human fiends. But they
are of different species. The [anarchist treats the law with con¬
tempt. He strikes at tlhose in high places .and commits his
diabolical crimes ;with a fanatical courage (that makes no at¬
tempt to escape the results.
The lyncher, in his cowardice, jaljtacks only 'the weak and
defenseless; 'and builds his hopes of e*sc!ape up,on concealment,
perjury and .intimidation, and the helpless condition of the class
from which he 'selects his victims.
In this country it is unsafe to be black or be President.
In this great country they burn colored men at the stake,
and one-third of its Presidents 'are .murdered by assassins. No
other country on the globe can present such :a showing.
There is something to be done here. We have got to put
our foot down upon murder in all of its shapes. We must stamp
(out the ^anarchist and we must |stamp out the lyncher. The
conditions under which /one can flourish will foster and de¬
velop ;the other.
We must have |aws that will stay the hiand of the treacher¬
ous anarchist who seeks the life of the head of the nation, and
we must have Ijaws that will suppress "the lawless (mob that (ap¬
plies the midnight torch :tp the unsuspecting residence .of 'a col¬
ored family, and then cowardly shoots 40wn the occupants as
they rush from the blazing home,
When Richard Roe points .out the horrors that his bill .is
designed to suppress, I iWant to .hear the member who defends
these Cowardly mobs, who extols 'their courage ,and praises ;their
chivalry; and who shrieks forth the warning notes that the
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS.
33
•centralizing 'tendencies of the general government tare menacing
the cherished State rights of Sou'tih Carolina.
It is claimed, and there is still a remnant of the vanishing
belief, that there is a measure of justification for many of the
.outrages tof .which icolore^d people are the victims. I will spare
your patience by dealing with this part of my subject briefly.
Before the war the colored man was all right. During the
war while ^the white men were away in ,armie's of Lee and John-
-son, no charges were brought against ,the Negroes; but directly
after <the war the frightful slaughter /of colored people began—
the penalty of loyalty and liberty. (
And when the wo'rld demanded an explanation, they said
it was the result of race riots and Negro insurrections. But no
Negro rioter was ever apprehended, and onily colored men were
killed in the insurrections. The white men always .escaped un¬
harmed.
The race riot excuse demanded and obtained thousands
of victims, but at length it wore itself ou't. The outrages in¬
creased however.
Negro domination was the next excuse; and if or' more than
a decade this legend was painted upon the sanguinary banners
of Southern savages with 'the innocent .blood of thousands «of
colored people. The world fat length learned that 'this excuse
was an imposture and it was abandoned.
Assault upon white women was nex,'t invented. Humanity
abhors the assailant of womanhood, and this charge .upon ,the
negro at once placed ;him beyond the /pale of human sympathy.
But the charge was jand is false, apd the Southern chivalry,
know it. The southern Negro is r\o worse mow in this respect
than he was in the days of slavery and in the days of the war.
He is no worse in this respect than 'is the northern Negro, or
the nor^herft or southern white man; buit it has required a long
and gory campaign of imob law and (assassination, istretching
across nearly two decades, ,to convince the thinking people of
the .Christian world that this charge /is > false.
This excuse is about worn out. To-day the southern mur¬
derer does not always trouble himself to offer any excuse for
his crimes. He don't have to. He just 'kills a colored person—
man, woman or child—whenever he tgets ready, and that is
.all there is about it.
34 THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
The fact is well established that there is now or has
been no measure of justification for the long and ghastly career
of the dirk, the halter, the stake and the shotgun, that dis¬
figures with its hideous blotches the civilization o'f the West¬
ern Republic.
Yet reeking with slaughter, infamous with assassination^
this ghastly parade passes steadily in review, before the eyes of
the government and (the nation; keeping time to the anguishing:
cries that come up from fifty thousand graves, whose victims-
have 'been fed to the insatiable monster of Southern lawlessness^
without so much as a vigorous protest from the general govern¬
ment, or even the promise of a vigorous protest.
This terribly diseased condition demands attention and
remedy, and we come tO' Congress as the proper physician to-
prescribe for the malady.
Not every colored man i,s a good man. There are black
men as 'low, as brutish, as fiendish, as it is possible for human,
beings to be. Black men have committed crimes for which
there is no adequate physical punishment. The same is equally
true of white men, and of every other race of people on ther
globe.
Lynch law is the poorest kind of remedy for this disease.
Lynch law is a trace of barbarism, an inspiration of cowardice y
and it punishes without investigation, without evidence and
without guilt. Lynch law teaches and inspires savagery and
disregard of law; it encourages brutality and violence, and
marks the retrograde of civilization.
That terrible spectacle of chaining a human being to an
iron stake, and then saturating his clothing and his person with
inflammable oil, and then piling combustible materials about his;
feet. Then a dissolute, brazen-faced female, falsely posing as an
assaulted victim, with perjury and murder in her beart; with
one hand clutching the thirty pieces of blood money, with the
other she applies the fatal match that envelopes a human being"
in the terrible agonies of smoke, fire and death. This has been
done in !the land of the Southern chivalry.
If the chivalry can show by the records of legal courts, that"
a fraction of what they charge against the colored man is true,.,
.the whole country will j oin them in ithe hue and cry agains t such
monsters. Bu't they will not attempt such a showing. Thev
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS. 36
■don't want the light of investigation turned upon their methods
of iniquity. They don't want the world to know how many
of (their [assaulted /white women ,are willing parties to the name¬
less deed.
I will ,quoite a .single instance /by w,ay iof illustration:
"In Texarkana, Ark., Edward Coy was accused of assault¬
ing /a white woman. The presls disipatches ,of Feb. 18, .1892, told
in detail how he w,as .tied to a tree, the .flesh cuit from His body
by men and boys, and after oil was poured over him, the woman
he had assaulted applied the .match. Fifteen thousand persons
saw 'him burn to death. On the 1st of October, 1893, the Chi¬
cago Inter-Ocean contained the following account of the hor¬
ror, from the pen pf Judge Albion W. Tourgee, as the .result ,of
his investigation:
1st. The woman who was paraded as the victim of violence
was of bad character. Her husband was a drunkard and a gam¬
bler. ,
2d. She was publicly reported and generally known to
have been criminally intimate with Coy for more than a year.
3d. She w'as compelled by threats, if not by violence, to
make the charges against the victim.
4th. When she came to apply Ithe match Coy asked her if
she would burn him after the'y had been sweet-hearting s,o long.
5th. A large majority of the white men prominent in the
.affair are the reputed fathers of mulatto children.
The members of the Southern chivalry .cannot prove the
charges they make against colored men. They know they are
false. They know th,at nine-tenths <of the Southern lynchings
.are due to jealousy, race hatred, prejudice 'and 'Lawlessness.
One of the glittering exponents of Southern chivalry, whose
innate anarchism and seething lynching proclivities and brazen
boasts of wanton murder are his sole claims to notice from the
American people, has recently sent out the worfd that a thousand
more colored people are to be lynched—a thousand more hu¬
man beings are to-be shot, Hanged or burned to death by South¬
ern mobs, solely because the President of the United States
-entertained Booker T. Washington as a guest alt the White
House.
This work has already begun. In South Carolina the chiv¬
alry has already commenced. According to recent press dis-
36
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
patches,white men,'blacked up arid otherwise disguised as colored
men, commit crimes which ithe lynchers speedily avenge upon
. the colored men whom the chivalry has marked as their victims.
The Southern lynchers stand ready to c,arry out ith'is bloody
decree, and a thousand more ready-made and shelf-worn cases
of heinous crimes committed (by colored men, >are 'to be un¬
packed and distributed /through the land :to excuse this slaugh¬
ter of a thosand people.
A -thousand taore mobs are to assemble with ropes and shot
guns and iron stakes ,and chains and kerosene oil; and a thous¬
and more victims are to be tortured to dealth with a fiendishness
which the devil h'imself would denounce as atrpcious.
Some may be guilty, but many will be innocent. Some will
be accused; some will not even be charged with crimes. There
will be no trial, no investigation, no evidence. A mob, a victim,
and a savage murder in every instance. That is all.
There will come a change. When or in what way no one,
now, may be able to say; but it wi'll surely come.
The mills of God grindly slowly, but they grind exceedingly
bne.
There will come a time when the laws will convict and
when the laws will punish; when the laws will convict and pun¬
ish all alike. When this time comes ,the great Negro problem
is settled, and /it 'is not settled till (then.
•There is no excuse for these dastardly deeds of Southern
lynchers. The laws are made an,d executed by the white men,
and ldt them be stringent and be promptly and vigorously en¬
forced. We ask fo'r no mqasure that will shield crime or delay
the execution of justice.
There is not much danger that a colored man in the South
will escape deserved punishment at the hands of judges and
juries made up of a people who encourage mob violence,
condone assassins an,d ^palliate the lynching of colored American
citizens.
No greater questions than these demand the attention of
our national legislature, arid we call upon that body to act.
Congress has been appealed to before. Petitions have been
sent in. Delegations have waited upon the committees and
members. The President of the United States has called atten¬
tion to this subject in his messages to Congress. The gory pic-
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNGHTNGS. • 37
ture of this crying evil has repeatedly 'been placed before the
legislative eye of the nation. But Congress has not acted—has
not exercised its prerogative—has not discharged its plain duty.
That body needs ,a lilttle 'more pressure from behind, and it
is pant of the black man's burden )to turn the presstfre on.
When a (people ask for the redress of grievance, the value
of the demand is usually measured by -the for,ce that is behind it.
The families of the Italians who were murdered in New Orleans
a few years ago, placed '.their ease in the hands -of the government
of Italy. The Unilted States promptly paid the indemnity de¬
manded. This country Ipa^i'd over one hundred thousand dollars
to the heirs of some Chinamen who were murdered in a Western
town a number of years ago.
We come to the American people with a prayer for relief.
We ask for fthe redress of grievances. We a;sk at the hands
of 'the American government that same measure of protection
that is accorded the Italian, the Chinaman or the other stranger
within its gates.
'In making this request let us tabulate some of the forces
that are behind our demand, then follow -them up with persistent
demonstration till our needed redresses are granted.
In the .elections of 1896, the colored voter held the balance
of power and decided the political complexion of eight great
States of the American Union. (
These States sent eighty electors !to the electoral college,,
who decided Ithe Presidential contest of that year. These States
are represented in Congress by eighty members—a number suf¬
ficient to decide the 'fate of any measure .thalt comes before that
body. *
These States are Maryland and Delaware on the Atlantic;
California and Oregon on the Pacific; Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky
and West Virginia in the interior. To jth'is list have been added
Ithe States of Kansas and Nebraska by Ithe elections of 1900.
This ;grand loyal belt, anchored on both oceans and span¬
ning the continent, consists rof over 250,000 colored voters, who
ask for the re'dress of ou'r ^grievances. Besides this, there are in
other parts of Ithe country over thirty congressional districts
which the organized colored vote can control. Besides this
there are in the rest of the Union over 1,500,000 colored voters
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
more, making a total of 2,000,000 .voters representing 10,000,000
citizens.
All of this vast moral and material 'force asks for the re¬
dress of our grievances. These redresses must come. No peo¬
ple can Jong 'be the .capricious victims of lynch law whose votes
decide the issue when a national ruler is elected.
Either the example set by South Carolina and several other
Southern States, in disfranchising (the colored man because his
grandfather was not a voter, shall prevail all over this land;
either the constitution shall be defiantly set aside or the fifteenth
.amendment stricken from fts sections; '-either the threat made
by Robert Toombs, way back in i860, 'that he would call the
roll of his 'slaves at the base of Bunker Hill monument -shall be
verified by his descendenits killing colored men with impunity
.in any part of this country; or the colored man must receive the
benefits of law, justice and protection, in the north, in the south,
in the east and in the west. One way or the other this 'thing
must go. This country can't be part law and part mob rule.
It must be all one or the other.
In the early ipant ,of my remarks I called your attention to
the complaint of South Carolina in i860. In her ordinance of
secession, South Carolina arraigned the .North for disregarding
laws of Congress, made especially to rivet the bonds of 'human
slavery upon the American Republic.
South Carolina complained because a 'freedom-loving peo¬
ple had not yielded full compliance to the odious demands of the
fugitive slave law; had not, as directed by this law, freely joined
the pack to hunt down the poor Negro who, galled and exasper¬
ated by the grinding chains of slavery, had asserted his man¬
hood to the extent of abandoning his master's oppressive yoke.
And because Northern freemen had refused to stultify their con¬
science—had hesitated to bow to the arrogant demands of the
insolent slave power, South Carolina and other States severed
their connection with the republic, and tried to destroy the gov¬
ernment of the United States, with the avowed purpose of erect¬
ing upon its ruins a government whose corner stone should be
human chattel slavery.
To-day the situation is somewhat reversed. To-day the
North .arraigns the .South f,or disregarding the laws of Congress
made in the interest of protection, progress and liberty.
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNOHINGS. 3ff
Tt arraigns the States of South Carolina, North Carolina,
Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and other Southern States,
for violating the thirteenth amendment to the constitution and'
the laws of Congress made in pursuance thereof, iby their hein¬
ous convict lease system. It arraigns these States for violating"
the fourteenth amendment by retaining taxation and representa¬
tion without franchise. It arraigns these States for violating"
the (fifteenth amendment by their efforts to disfranchise the col¬
ored man. It arraigns these States for violating the fifth amend¬
ment to the constitution for not suppressing that devastating"
torrent of arson, rapine, carnage and agony, that trails its paths
of desolation across the distressed lands of darkest America.
To-day the North arraigns (these States for .these offenses;
but with no> threat of secession, no threat to disrupt the-
Union, to narrow its domain, to wrench stars from its banner
cr tear stripes from its flag.
But we arraign (these States with the glorious promise,-
sacredly registered in the breasts of a sufficient number of pa¬
triotic Americans; to launch the Star spangled banner, with-
numbers accumulating to its Stars, and weight gathering to
its stripes, upon the breezes of eternity, as an enduring emblem
of freedom, greatness and civilization; and justice and equal'
rights to all.
We.come to the American people with a prayer for relief.
We ask for the redress of grievances. We .ask that there shall
be better evidence of the guilt of ,our people charged with ,these
heinous crimes, than the unsupported statements of the lyncher,,
whose hands are dripping (wi'th the "blood of his victim. We .ask
*he Northern newspaper, in its glaring head-lines, to .report the
lynched Negro as (only charged with the crime till some evidence-
of his guilt is furnished; and not copy verbatim the false and
damaging message from the lynchers who, at best, are cold¬
blooded, cowardly murderers.
A little ,while >ago- they lynched a colored man dbwn in
Georgia by their chivalrous process of burning at the stake,
and then cutting the victim's body up .into small pieces and
passing them among the lynchers as souvenirs. One ,of the-
participators in this .affair, with tone of these ghastly and revolt-
40
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
in'g .mementoes in his pocket, sent* out word thait was tele¬
graphed all over the North, that ,a colored man had murdered
a white man who was .defending the honor of his home; and
then, before the victim was dead, 'had outrageously assaulted
the wife in ;the dying man's presence.
This statement was false, but it was accepted by the North¬
ern press and the Northern pulpi't ,as literally true. No effort
was made ;to ascertain the faclts. No reporters were sent by
our great newspapers to get the correct news. But the lynch¬
ers' statement went far and wide, and with it the howls of indig¬
nation from the press and pulpit against colored men that en¬
couraged and justified just such deeds as that Georgia mob
had committed.
The vast machinery of the press and the telegraph exerted
itsellf to circulate the false statements of a red-handed murderer,
but it took no steps to corredtly present a matter tha't affected
the moral standing of ten million American citizens.
The Afro-American Council of Chicago took hold of the
matter. Its members did not believe that the facts relating to
the Georgia lynching had been published. They came together
and raised the money, .and employed the jbest detective of the
Pinkerton agency to be had' And ithey sen;t him down (to
Georgia to get the facts. He was down there a number of days,
upon the very ground where the outilage had been committed,
passing as a vender of -hog cholera medicine. ■
The facts are that the white man who was killed was try¬
ing ito defraud ;the colored man oiit of his wages. The colored
man wanted the money he had earned. The white man re¬
fused to pay the money he owed. The ;two were quarreling
about the matter.
The quarrel became hot; and to end it the white man got
hold of his loaded shot gun. The colored man got hold of an
ax. Just as the white man was about to pull the trigger the
colored man hurled ithe ax with fatal aim. He then immediately
fled from the vicinity. He offered no violence to the white
woman whatever.
Whatever view is 'taken of the colored man's act, it cer¬
tainly bore no resemblance to (the revolting picture which the
lyncher sent forth ir<to the willing ears of the Northern press
and the Northern pulpi't, and missionary work upon this same
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS. 41
press and this same pulpit, is a legitimate portion of the black
man's burden.
We come to the American people 'with a prayer for relief.
We ask for the redress of grievances. We ask to have removed
that terrible nightmare of lynch law, mob violence and assassin¬
ation, that darkens with its miasmatic denseness, the valley and
the plain, reduced to civilization by the toil of the black man.
We ask for that protection which the American flag prom¬
ised us at ,Yoirk Town and at Appomattox. We ask /for a na¬
tional law t'hiat shall cause lynchings to be investigated -and (the
offenders punished. We ask for such national laws as will arrest
that terrible trail of fire, blood, steel and tears that stretches
its ghastly length along the sunniest belts of the American Re¬
public.
We ask these at the hands of the National Legislature,
and if they are not lawful let the courts proclaim .to the world
(that the United States Government cannot protect its citizens
from ftorjture (and murder.
We ask these in the 7name of humanity ,and civilization;
in the name of two million voters and ten million citizens; in
the name of the great American Republic; and we ask these
in |the name of the Great God of the Universe.
THE FRIGHTFUL EXPERIENCE
OF
JULIUS GARDNER
OF ARKANSAS.
AN ARKANSAS LYNCHING,
As related toy'Mr. Gardner.
In giving the following (account of part of my experience-
during ;a residence of a lew years in the Souith, I have attempted
to adhere strictly to the truth, and to state the facts concisely,,
unencumbered by sentiment or my opinions. There .is much
more that I could say in connection with this subject, but noth¬
ing perhaps has been omitted that is essential to convey an in¬
sight into that phase of Southern lawlessness with which I had
an experience.
I «am in possession of evidence which will strongly corrob¬
orate my statements, and I can furnish the address of several
respectable white people, who reside in the locality where the
events I relate transpired, whose testimony will substantiate-
my narrative.
The name of Landen Morgan is assumed for relations
sake, but many persons who lived along the Little Red River
of Arkansas during the .nineties, will ibe able to identify the-
person whom I designate by 'that name.
My name is Julius Gardner. I was born in Franklin, Pa.
In 1893 I went South. I was in Kentucky, Tennessee and Ar¬
kansas. I was in BardWell, Kentucky, on July 8th, 1893. It was
the day after C. J. Miller was lynched there. I will speak of
that lynching later on.
In the $ame month I went to Arkansas. There I leased a
little farm of about twen-ty acres, situated on a creek that empt¬
ies into the Little Red River. My farm was a triangular shaped
44
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
piece, with fone poirnt running down into the impassable part
of a swamp.
My lqase was for five years, and it gave me the privilege to
purchase, which I intended to do.
Land en Morgan was my nearest neighbor. He was a white
man and was reputed to be wealthy. His farm of many acres
bounded my land on one side while the swa'mp bounded the
other two .sides.
Mr. Morgan w,as not at home much. He was interested
in racing horses.
My first interview with him toiok place after I had been
about a month in Arkansas. I disliked and distrusted him
from the start; and it was clear that I did not impress him fav¬
orably. He was accustomed to treat colored imen with insolence
and he expected them Ito be cringing and subservient. I put
up with his overbearing ways, but 'I could not, had I tried, have
assumed the servile attitude which he expected.
It was not long before I began to realize that Morgan was
my enemy. He began to make thikigs very unpleasant for me.
Difficulties arose over Ithe line between our farms, and we dis¬
agreed about the only road leading ito m'y premises, and there
were other disputed points. I put up with his unjust treatment
and did all that I could not ito'aggravate the situation.
My lease, as I have mentioned, gave me the right to pur¬
chase the land I occupied. I had intended to settle dlown in
•that locality and it became reported around that I had purchased
the place >and paid for it. Most of the people there believed
such to be the oase. Morgan was among that number, for on
one occasion he made a proposition (to buy my 'place. His price
was so low that I could not entertain it, though the situation
had already reached the stage where II Wjas willing to make
some sacrifices. lit w,as not long after this before I learned
that Morgan had declared that he would drive me out of the
country.
Morgan had been sheriff of that county and he aspired
to go to the legislature. He and I were of opposite political par¬
ties. I seldom took any hand ip politics beyond going to the
polls to vote and advising my neighbors to bo the same; but
on one occasion; when Morgan was canvassing for the nomina-
ation, I made the remark that I hoped that he would be nomina-
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS. 45
ted as I considered him ,an easy man' to heat. That was the
whole extent of my electioneering in that campaign.
My remark was repeated ito Mr. Morgan; and when he
failed to get the nomination from the convention of his party,
he ascribed his defeat to ,my 'influence and intensified his hate
against me.
He sought, on several occasions, to get me into a quarrel,
'but he always selected opportunities when the advantages were
in his favor. With much inconvenience I avoided him. I al¬
ways welcomed the arrival ,of the djates when he departed upon
his career of horse racing and ga,mlbling.
A crisis in our relations was inevitable, however, and it
icame. But I packed 'the mentail equipment to comprehend that
it was coming.
One afternoon in the summer of 1896, I had been out hunt¬
ing and was returning home. As I was passing along the road
I heard the screams lOf <a female near by, and I went through the
dense growth of bushes that skirted the highway, over into the
adjoining field to investigate. 'Inhere I came upon Morgan,
Who was seeking jto take advantage of a little colored girl—a
fourteen year old daughter of one Of my neighbors.
It was not Morgan's first offense of that character. He was
a source of terror to the colored maidens of t|hat section.
As soon ,as I discovered that Morgan was not armed I con¬
cealed my rifle in the bushes. There was a prospeqt of a physical
encounter. Bu't an armed colored man in conflict with an un¬
armed white man is the exa'ct reverse of the prevailing code in
the South—a code wjhich no* ordinary circumstance would in¬
duce me to disregard.
I interfered in the girl's behalf. Morgan became irriate
and blasphemous. He made threats and used Vile language,
but lat length he departed to his home, which was not far away.
I started with the girl towards her home, which was about
a mile distant. She had been oult picking berries. She hud seen
Morgan riding by, but did not think she had been seen by
him. A half hour later he had surprised her (by stepping sudden¬
ly from a clump of bushes jand grasping her by the arm.
We had not traveled half the distance .to the girl's home
when we heard the approach of a horseman. Looking back I
saw Morgan riding rapidly towards us with a revolver in his
46
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
hand. Morgan 'did not know that I was armed. He had re¬
turned to 'his home and procured (the revolver, and was .now in
pursuit, with an intention whidh I instantly discovered. He
would shoot jme down without :a moment's hesitation. He was
that kind of a man.
Had I been alone I might have avoided him without diffi¬
culty ; but I was encumbered 'by the frightened little girl whom
I would mot desert. As soon as I discerned Morgan's intentions
I put a cartridge in my rifle and faced him. My opponent saw
(the movement, but he continued to advance. When I thought
he was near enough, I took aim and eommahded ,him to halt
or put up ihis revolver.
He returned the weapon to the holster and rode past us
uttering a volley of threats and curses. '
"I'll see whether or not a peaceable citizen can ride along
the highway without being halted by an armed nigger," was his
parting ejaculation.
I stood well with a number of influential white men in that
vicinity, and I had always endeavored to attend strictly to my
own business. I was aware of the fact that colored men were
frequently lynched in the South, simiply ibecause 'they were ob¬
jectionable to some one, and on 'other frivolous pretexts, but I
did not fully realize the situation. Morgan's (last words kept
ringing in my ears, but they failed to impress me with their ter¬
rible import.
I did not know the South then as I do now. The section
in which I lived had not .then been visited Iby tJhe lynching
scourge. After my affair with Morgan, I decided to leave the
country. I did not apprehend any immediate harm, 'bu't I was
becoming (tired of the disagreeable .relations with my neighbor,
and I began to adjuslt my business interests with the view of
moving ,away.
During -the following two or three weeks, things moved
along about as usual, with two notable exceptions! Two events
transpired which Iclearlly Were warnings lof what was being at¬
tempted ; but I failed at the time to correctly interpret their
meaning, especially the first one.
Early one morning, a party of five white men, equipped for
a hunting trip, came ,to my house and engaged me «to pilot them
•through the swamp. They desired to reach ,the hunting grounds
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS. 47
"Sbeyond, and I was familiar with the only route fhey could safely
iliake. The parity was composed of wealthy Southerners. One
of them was the son of a prominent Arkansas statesman. I ac¬
companied the party. We were gone until the next day. The
hunters, on their return, passed rny (house. 'It was about five
o'clock ;in the afternoon when we arrived there.
Just before reaching my blouse we encountered seven white
anen gathered by the road side. One of them had a coat in his
hand, and as I came up he said:
"Is that your coalt?"
I answered in the affirmative, after examining the garment.
"Then you are the man we want."
"May I ask what you want of,me?"
"You'll find out soon enough."
Just then (two of the men came u(p with ropes to bind me.
One of the hunters Ithen asiked for an explanation of the
jproceedings.
It w^s given. The man iwhta held the coat said that a white
■svoman had been assaulted by a Negro who Was wearing that
♦coat at the time, land whose description itallied with my appear¬
ance.
"When did this happen?" asked ;the hunter, who, by the
way, was the son of the Arkansas statesman.
"A little before noon," was the answer.
"Where did it happen?"
"A little ways down the ibad."
"How did you ge|t ;the coat?"
"The fellow vgas {being pursued and he threw it away, either
because it encumbered him or ,to escape identification. John
came upon him in time to save the 'girl."
John was pointed out to the hunter.
John's story ,was that he was passing along the mad when
be heard screams. He hurried ,along and soon came upon ithe
iNegro, who was 'dragging a white girl to the side of the road.
.As soon as Jdhn appeared upon the iscene, the Negro fled. John
^pursued, but the Negro escaped. In his flight he threw his coat
away.
I had been made to understand that the hunters were my
/friends and that they would establish my inn'ocence.
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
"Where is t'he injured gM?" was the hunter's nexit ques¬
tion.
"She was taken over to Morgan's house," was the answer
■by the man who' held the coat.
John was interrogated. He was very sure that I was the
assailant. He was at one time within fifty feet of thlat person.
He could swear that the assailant had on the same pants that I
then had on. I had got another coat and had changed hats he
admitted.
After some further conversation 'we all adjourned to Mor¬
gan's house. I was taken there to be identified 'by the girl.
The girl was not quite sure that I was the man who at¬
tacked her. I resembled him strongly.
Mtorgan was acquainted with the statesman'^ son. After
greetings and some common place conversation, attention was
directed to me.
Morgan s'ought (to persuade the girl to declare that I .was
actually the,assailant". She finally stated that she was very much
frightened and did not notice closely, but as near as she could
(tell I was the miscreant.
This seemed to satisfy Morgan. He stated that the sheriff
had been sent for to' take me tio jail to await trial. He believed
that the facts in the case, as they appeared, warranted such a
•course. He turned to the hunters for their opinion.
The statesman's son answered:
"E,arly yesterday morning this .man started with us on a
journey across the swamp. He was with us all day yesterday,
all last night, and all day to-day up till now. When the girl
was attacked he was with us on the other side of the swamp.
We know that he is riot guilty."
I could see that Morgan was surprised and chagrinned. He
controlled himself, however, and after a moment replied
That puts an entirely different phase upon the case. I have
known Mr. Gardner for several years, .and I was loth to believe
that he would be guilty of such a deed." Then to the men who
were to take (me in custody, .he added:
"It will no.t be necessary to detain your prisoner (any lon¬
ger. You should be able, however, to hunt out the guilty
person."
With .this I wias dismissed. I returned to ,my home, and in
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS. 49
my heart, thanking (the (hunters who had saved me a period in
jail, and the trouble o'f establishing my .innocence.
I;t was |a week later when /the knowledge came to me that
I .would never have reached (the jail. A party of lynchers were
■jto intercept (the sheriff and m'kae short work of his prisoner.
I never learned who the girl was that was attacked, or how
.she come to be in that vicinity alone, but iit was reported to me
that the girl had stated that she knew the person who attacked
her was a White man blacked up.
The coat.wh.ieh the assailant was wearing when he encoun¬
tered the young woman, wa's a discarded garment that had been
hanging in :an open shed in the rea^r of my dwelling.
I think the girl was actually attacked, and at the time I
believed that suspicion had been directed to me, solely because
the miscreant was wearing my purloined co,at. But as I re¬
volved the matter ,in my mind the truth began to gradually dawn
upon me. I was marked for the victim of a conspiracy.
I became very guarded in my movements and devoted my
time to arranging (.to leave the country.
One night, four or five days after I had accompanied the
hunters, I heard an unusual stamping noise in the rear of my
house. It appeared to be in the building I used as a stable,
but no animal was in (there—my horse was running loose in the
fields.
I arose and cautiously proceeded to (the outbuildings.
There I found a strange horse hitched to the. manger with one
of my halters. The animal was muddy and had been .ridden some
■distance. I was able to determine that the horse had been in
the stable less than an hour.
It was a great mystery to me how the horse had got there
or why he had been left there and fastened with my halter.
Then it occurred to me like a flash that k was a^plot to make me
appear as a horse thief.
I immediately released (the horse and started him out upon
the -road. For 'the remainder of the night I fwatched my premi¬
ses, but nothing unusual happened.
My conjecture was ri^ht. The horse had been left in ,mv
stable with the deliberate .intention of making it appear .that I
had stolen it. The men wh'o were to surprise me with rthe horse
in my possession were on the road for that purpose when I
50
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
iturned the animal loose. They were ito awaken a white man,
who worked for Morgan, .and were to 'bring him jalong to estab¬
lish my -guilt. They !were defeated in their plot by meeting their
horse loose 'in the road, over two im,iles (from >where I lived. ,
These facts came to me i,n a way that I knew they were
correct. I wjas aroused to an 'understanding of the situation.
I realized that I was in great danger. I had active enemies
•who were conspiring to encompass ,my destruction. Their
first step was to get me into custody of an officer—a mob of
lynchers was to do the rest.
The second attempt to make me /the victim of a (Conspiracy
had failed; but'my enemies were persistent, and their third
attempt, notwithstanding 'the ^warnings I had received, found
me an easy victim.
One afternoon, (three or four days later, a man and a wo¬
man drove up to my abode. The woman wanted to purchase
my farm. She said s,he had timber interests in the swamp which
were to be developed, and that it would facilitate her business
to occupy my premises. I stated the najture of my claim and
the price for the improvements J had made. She considered my
terms reasonable. She was then in a 'hurry but would call the
next day to complete the bargain.
It was understood in that vicinity that a widow woman
owned a largei tract of land, Including the swamp adjoining my
premises, and the visit of this woman looked to me then as a
proper business step. Then, tor reasons already stated, I was
anxious to realize upon my interests in thajt locality. Actuated
by this anxiety I walked readily into the trap set for me.
The next day the woman came as agreed, but on foot and
alone. She explained that an accident had happened to their
conveyance which would delay her male escort for perhaps an
hour. In ithe meantime I could show her Where the line that
separated my premises 'from Morgan's, intercepted the highway.
She would have occasion to show this point to the man Who
was managing her lumber fnteresfs. *
Everything appeared proper to me, and we started out for
the purpose indicated. After walking along the road for !a, few
minutes—she on one side a,nd J on the other—she stopped sud¬
denly and gazed intently 'upon the ground, at the tsame time
calling me to her. I crossed the road, and as soOn as I got
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS. 51
near enough, she threw her arms about my peck and shouted,
"Murder! Murder! Take him away!"
I thought the woman was crazy; and as she began to sink
to the ground, J caught her to support ''her. Just then three
white men stepped from the 'bushes into the road and came up
to us. ■ Two of (the men (were uniknown to me. The other
worked for Morgan. As they came u'p (the womahi accused me
of assault, 'and the .men strongly corroborated her 'assertion.
The men took 'charge of ime. Two |of jthem held pistols to
•my head, while the other bound me hand and foot. In ,al little
while the woman's escort drove up and with her drove away.
The three men started with me 'towards the swamp. We
had gone but a shlort distance when five or six more white men
appeared upon the scene. We were in a sparsely settled coun¬
try. There were not half a dozen white families withiln a radius
of (four mile's. But within an .hour 'from the time of my arrest
I was surrounded by more than thirty white /men, all armed,
and in a country where it would have taken at least ten hours
to assemble that number. There were not imore than 'two or
three of them whom I had ever met (before.
As the crowd kept increasing the situation was explained
to each fresh arrival, by accusing me of a dastardly crime; by
stating that my victim was barely alive and lthat a carriage had
to be procured to carry her ad way. Downright falsehoods and
distortions of -the truth wdre used in profusion.
It did me no good /to declare my innocence; for me to de¬
clare ith'at the worpan had not been injured in 'the least, and that
she had gone away in the same carriage that had brought her.
It did me no good to challenge them to produce the1 injured •
woman, or to give me the benefits of an investigation. I
charged them wi'th (Conspiracy. I accused them of having
planned the outrage at least ten hours before I was arrested.
I pointed out the fact that so many men could not possibly
have been assembled in the hour and a half that had passed since
I was walking along the road with the woman, unless the af¬
fair /had been, pre-arranged. But all that I could say did no
good. The answers I got were curses and blows.
There was, however, one just man In that gathering. He
knew that I was inno'cent. But for his presence my name
would have been one .more to add (to the list of thousands of in-
52
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
nocent victims of Southern lawlessness. He was an entire
■stranger to me then. I afterwards learned that he was a gov¬
ernment officer, and that he was then engaged in trailing down
a gang of illicit whiskey manufacturers who were operating in
that county.
It was near night-fall when we reached the edge of the
swamp. I was not ignorant of the fate intended for me. I was
to he lynched. The mob was now about fifty strong. They
were debating the question whether I should 'be lynched by
hanging or burning. Those who came latest favored burning;
but some of those who knew I wias entirely innocent would have
been contented with hanging.
While the question was being debated, three men came
up to me—>one of them had a rope. He instructed the other two
to stand back and catch the end of the riope as he threw it over
a limb. After this was accomplished he proceeded to fasten
Ithe rope -about my neck.
His language was insulting, and his actions were threaten¬
ing toward me. While he was fastening the rope he caught
hold of me and wrenched me around with a force that nearly
threw me to the ground. While he was doing this, he managed
to say to me in a whisper:
"I will free your hands and give you at (knife. Don't move
until I am away from you, then get a gun and scoot."
With this he freed my handis, leaving a knife In my posses¬
sion. He accomplished this without being observed by any of
the gathering. Then he finished tying one end of the rope
about my necik, and addressing the men who held the other end,
said:
"Just 'keep a .hand -{here yboys, an' when yer git the signal,
just .haul (that nigger up like yer meant business."
His frontier dialect was assumed. His whispers to tnewere
in good English.
He then went over to where most of the men were gath¬
ered, discussing the method of Lynching.
My attention was directed to this man when he first came
upon the scene. Aboult a ,dozen men bad gathered before he
arrived. He took a hand in the direction (of affairs at once,
but every act and word of his showed that he had an intense
hatred for colored people. It was he who caused my captors to
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS.
53:
'halt at a cross-road Iftor .twenty minultes to receive a delegation
that did not come. It was he who first suggested 'burning as
the punishment I should receive. He succeeded in delaying the
executiqp. for nearly an hour in order to procure a chain and
a can of oil. He was responsible for other delays. It was all
plain to me now. He was maneuvering for time and the ap¬
proach of night to facilitate my escape.
He was 'closely watching the impulses that controlled the-
situation. He knew just where to yield to those who were in
favor of hanging, and at just fhe right moment he picked up
the rope and came up to me, saying:
"I kinder think burnin' is the proper medicine, but if its
to 'be hangin', let's be ready. We'll first git the rope fixed an*
then I want to say a dozen words, an' then I'm ready fer the
vote."
He had volunteered to' fasten the rope about my neck, os¬
tensibly to show that he was (with the majority, but iin reality
because it gave him the opportunity to start me on the path of
escape.
The revulsion o'f feelings, consequent upon the promise
of escape which had come to me so unexpectedly, nearly unman¬
ned me. It was several seconds before I felt, myself under con¬
trol. I might have used more time in steadying myself, but
the debate as to the method of lynching had come to a sudden
close, and the lyn'chers, impatient of delay, had started for the
rope.
I had no time to lo4se. My first ac,t was to cut the conds
that bound my ankles. This movement was noticed and the
alarm was given. Instantly the men surged upon the rope and
I was swung into midair.
In the same breath in which the alarm was given, I seized
the rope above my 'head with my left hand. I was raised three-
or four feet from the ground before I could cut it (with my other
hand. As I dropped to the ground I caught up a shot gun that
leaned against the tree tihaf was to do duty as a stake or a gal¬
lows, and sprang to the cover of a thicket three or four rods
away. The shot gun had a belt fastened to it filled with car¬
tridges. It had been designedly left there, as I learned la.ter on.
I was out of sight before any of the lynchers could turn
their guns on me, and had turned sharply to one side in time to
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
avoid the shots that were poured into the .thicket at .the point
where I had disappeared.
The enemy did not evince any disposition to follow me in¬
to the thicket. As soon ias they could realize the situation they
.began ito seek cover. I bould easily have inflic.ted injury upon
some of them, 'but I had already decided to' doi no more than
would be needed to insure my escape.
The gathering darkness was in my favor. It lent a gloom
to the vicinity a s'hort distance from the pine knot fire, which
was to illuminate a burning or a 'hanging, tha.t did not invite
rash pursuit of a fugitive, equipped with a gun and ammunition,
and the resolution to use them if the situation demanded it.
The lynchers were without blood hounds, otherwise I should
have been speedily recaptured. I knew ,that it would require
several 'hours to procure the animals.
The natural impulse of a man, just escaped frOm my pre¬
dicament, would be to put distance between himself and his ene¬
mies as rapidly as possible; and this is just what my foes deci¬
ded that I would do. But to do this would be to plunge into the
.impassable bogs and /mire of the swamp, and invite certain re¬
capture. I was thoroughly familiar with the country. My path
of escape lay close to1 a line which I knew my enemies would
instantly guard. I debided on this course and it proved my sal¬
vation.
I iwas none too soon, either. While traversing this path I
came close to two or three of the lynchers who had evidently
kept in the background. Morgain was one of the number. He
had just been informed of. my escape. He did not believe that
I had retreated into the swamp, and he gave directions to have
men stationed in a position, Which, if it had been adopted in
time, would 'have cut off my escape. I succeeded in eluding
them, however, and hurried towards my home. A few minutes
later I was arrested by the question:
"Did you get the gun and scoot?"
At the same time imy benefactor stepped from the bushes
in front of me. I recojgnized him at once.
In reply to his questions I told him that it was a mile and
a half to my house and that I de,sired to go there to get money -
and weapons, and that I had decided to Heave the couPtry imme¬
diately.
THE HORRORS OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS. 5o
"Your plan is all right except going to your home. There
will be men there to receive you. I twill get your money and
your weapons and will meet you at $andy Ford as soon as you
•can get t!here."
Three-quarters of an hour later I met the government offi¬
cer at Sandy Ford. We 'had a conversation lasting nearly an
hour. • He explained Why he had exerted himself to save my
'life. First, 'because it was an act of humanity. Second, I knew
that Morgan was interested in the illegal imaunfacture of whis¬
key, and Morgan knew that I knew it. The officer while shad¬
owing the whiskey men had overheard the plot to get rid of me
because I 'knew 'too .much .about the illegal whiskey business.
There was a possibility that my evidence would be needed in
the government courts on this account.
After parting with the officer, I crossed the river. I suc¬
ceeded in making my way to 'Chicago. I abandoned what inter¬
est I had in the Arkansas property, aind have never been South,
since.
Since that time I have investigated the lynching scourge
to some extent, and I am actually horrified at its extent and its
fiendishness, and the absence of justification. My Information
has been derived largely from the published reports, and I shall
not consume much of your time in rehearsing the accounts of
'outrages, that have from time to time been laid before the Amer¬
ican people in the public prints.
Colored people are lynched in the South for the follow¬
ing crimes and offenses : Rape, alleged rape, and suspected rape.
For murder, alleged murder, or suspected murder. For lar¬
ceny, alleged or suspected. For arson, actual, alleged or sus¬
pected. For poisoning stock or wells, or being ac'oused of such
crime. For self defense, for insulting whites, and for turning
State's evidence. „For being related to a criminal or to a person
charged with crime, and for refusing to disclose the whereabouts
of a criminal. For wilfe-beatiing; for being acquitted by a white
jury; for race prejudice, and for no offense at all. A colored
man is guilty of a crime, so far as lynching purposes are re¬
quired, by simply being accused by, any white man; a colored
person's testimony is always sufficient Ito convict a colored man,,
though it is valueless in all other respects. No other evidence
is needed to encompass the death of a colored person, in the-
.56
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
South, than to ibe accused of crime iby a white man, and the
report always goes out and is accepted, that the victim was
guilty as charged.
I will recite the accounts of two or three cases of Southern
iynchings, which have been proven by the testimony of some of
the best White people living in tihe vicinity where the outrages
occurred.
The fourteen year old daughter and the sixteen year old
son of a /man named Hastings were 'hanged, and their bodies
riddled with bullets, because their father had been accused of
murdering a white man. The father was afterwards lynched.
This was in November, 1892, at Jonesville, Louisiana.
Five persons, Benjamin Jackson, his wife, his mother-in-law,
Louis Carter and Rufus Bi'gley, were lynched near Quincy,
Miss., in September, 1892. The charge was well-poisoning.
A family named Woodruff was taken ill, and it was surmised
that the illness was caused by poison that had been put in their
well. It was never shown that this was the cause of the sickness
and it was never shown that any poison had been put in the
well. It was surmised that Benjamin Jaeksqn had put poison
in the well. He was arrested, and without any investigation
whatever, with the other- four persons named, was lynched.
John Peterson, near Denmark, South Carolina, was sus¬
pected of rape. He escaped from his captors, and he had an
excellent opportunity to escape from tihe country. But he was
.an innocent man, and he felt that he would receive fair treat¬
ment by surrendering to the highest authorities in the State.
He surrendered to Governor Tillman and couted the strictest in¬
vestigation. He asserted that all he asked was an opportunity
to prove a complete alibi by white -witnesses. A white reporter,
hearing the declarations, volunteered to find these witnesses.
He informed the Governor that he would have them at the ex¬
ecutive mansion in twenty-four hours. This respite was not
granted by Governor Tillmain. He freely surrendered Jhe pris¬
oner to the Denmark mob. The prisoner was taken black for
identification. The injured girl positively declared that Peter¬
son was not the guilty man. It did no good. Peterson was
hanged and his bo.dy riddled with bullets. Another report went
out Of the lynching of a black fiend.
I have no taste for these recitals, I assure you. They are
THE HORRORS#' OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS. 57.
presented for the sole purpose of arraying the truth before the
American people. I have not selected exceptional cases. My
recitals refer to average samples. Press reports of Southern,
lynchings always emanate from the lyncher or his sympathizer;
but even these reports are damnable enough.
In a county in Mississippi, during the imont'h of July, 1892,.
the Associated Press despatches reported that a big black burly
brute had .assaulted .the eight year old daughter of the sheriff
and that the brute had been promptly lynched. The facts, which,
have since been investigated, show that the girl was most twenty
years old, and that the "brute" was .a year younger and was a
servant in the family. The girl was discovered by her father in
the young man's room, where she had been a clandestine visitor
for more than a year.
A Negro boy was lynched in Tuscumbia, Alabama, the
same year, and on the same charge. It was shown that he .and
the girl had been meeting in the woods by appointment for sev¬
eral months.
There is a young mulatto in one of the State prisons of
the 'South, to-day, who is there by the charge of a young white-
girl to screen herself. He is a college graduate and had been,
corresponding with and clandestinely visiting her until he was-
surprised and run out of her room en dishabille by her father.
He would have been promptly 'lynched, but he threatened to-
•show the letters which the young woman had written him. To-
escape lynching he plead guilty and was sent to priso,n.
One more case will close my accounts of Southern lawless¬
ness. *
Wednesday, July 5th, 1893, a terrible crime was committed
a short distance from Wickliff, Kentucky. Two girls, Mary and
Ruby Ray, were found murdered a short distance from their
homes. The news of the crime spread like wild fire, and search¬
ing parties were speedily organized to hupt down the villain
Who had committed the dastardly deed. Some one saw a white
man fleeing from t!he vicinity of the outrage, but he escaped.
The search continued all day, but without results. A blood
hound was brought from the penitentiary and put upon the trail
which he followed to the river and into the boat of a fisherman.
The fisherman stated that he had ferlried only one man across
the river on July 5th, an'd that was a white man. The hound
"58
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
was taken across the river, and struck the trail again at Bird's
Point, on the 'Missouri side, and ran about three 'hundred yards
to the house of a white man. The animal then refused to go
farther.
The next day a bra'keman on a freight train going out of
Sikeston, Mo., had a fight with a negro who was stealing a ride.
The Negro was arrested. The Sikeston authorities jumped to
the conclusion that they (had captured the murderer of the two
.girls, and they sent word to the Bardlwell authorities to that
effect. The same day the authorities of Sikeston, Mo., turned
the prisoner over tor a Kentucky mob and he was taken to Bard-
well. A funeral pyre 'had -been erected in the middle of the vil¬
lage, and while the crowd was clamoring for the prisoner's life,
he stepped forward and said:
"My name is C. J. Miller. I live at No. 716 N. 2d street,
Springfield, Illinois. I aim not guilty jo(f this bri'me. I was never
in the State of Kentucky till you brought me here. When the
girls were killed I was on the cars riding from Memphis to
Jonesborough. I can prove this 'by the conductor of that
train."
A telegram was sent to the chief of police of Springfield,
asking if one C. J. Miller lived there. An affirmative answer
was received, but it came after the victim had been lynched.
The father of the murdered girls was satisfied that the mur¬
derer was a white man. There was not one particle of evidence
—even circumstantial evidence—pointing to; Miller's guilt. All
the evidence pointed to a white man as the villain.
But it made no difference. Miller was dragged through the
streets of Bardwell with an iron chain around his neck, and was
hanged to a telegraph pole. His body was afterwards burned on
the spot.
I was in Bardwell the day after the lynching. The chain
still hung from the cross-arm of the telegraph pole, and the
ashes of the cremation still littered the streets. I was told that
a black desperado, who had murdered two white girls, 'had been
lynched. 'Had I been put in possession of the facts of the case,
my stay in the South would 'have ended there and then.
It is not claimed that no. colored men are guilty of the
crimes charged against them, but the records show that reasona¬
ble proof of guilt has been established against less than twelve
THE HORRORS}/ OF SOUTHERN LYNCHINGS. 59
out of a hundred olf thoise who have (been murdered. Colored
men have committed crimes tlhat deserve the severest punish¬
ment. No country has ten million inhabitants without some
of them being criminals.
The Negro of the South sees the womanhood of his race
assailed by white men with impunity. He sees Colored men
deprived of life, liberty and property, without due process of
law. He sees colored men hung, shot or burned to death, when
he knows the victims are innocent. He realizes that there is no-
premium on innocence; that the innocent suffer and the guilty
escape. An honest, upright colored man and a scoundrel are
equally exposed to the fatal accusation of a white man.
How far a spirit of retaliation, or contempt for abortive
law, is responsible for the criminal deeds of colored men, must,,
however, remain a matter of speculation.
There is no excuse for lynch law In the South. The judges,,
the juries, the courts, the officers, are white men. The whole
machinery of the law and the government is in the hands of
white men. The jurors and the officers are selected from the
same class that furnish the men who tie the halter, draw t'he shot
gun, or apply the match. No guilty colored man can possibly
escape the verdict of a Southern court. The miserable subter¬
fuge that legal trials are dispensed with only in cases of assault,
and then because it would wound the feelings of the injured,
female to appear in court as a witness, betrays its hollowness-
when it is shown that only about thirty-eight out of every four
hundred colored men lynched in the South, are even charged
with the crime of rape. The other excuse offered, that lynchings
mostly occur in the. sparsely settled districts, where the ma¬
chinery of the law is not in effective operation, is flatly contra-1
dieted by the records, which show that eight 'out of ten of all
the lynchings occur in or near the cities or organized towns,,
and that they are generally witnessed by thousands of spec¬
tators.
There is a remedy, of course, for this deplorable condition
of things. It is a well established principle tlhat every wrong
has a remedy. But the South will never evolve it. The remedy
will be applied, however, but it must be by the progressive and
order-respecting forces of the nation. I will offer, in closing,,
just one suggestion, which, when adopted, will do much towards-
■60
THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN, OR
removing tfhe scourge which darkens the South and smirches
the nation.
Let the law-respecting element of the country condemn,
in the severest terms, the lyncher in every case as a cold-blooded,
cowardly murderer, and let it vigorously denounce every case of
jhuman punishment that is not the result of a legal trial.
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