them.
38. Pace a davit: “I paid …for him and I kept him ten months.” Thompson's
mother eventually appeared and paid to set her son free. “There was no
commitment paper from any court given me at that time,” Pace said.
39. Affidavit of Note Turke, June 30, 1903, File 76909, EPRRC.
40. Town of Goodwater, Acts of Board of Aldermen, Sept. 2, 1904.
41. 1900 Census, Laray A. Grogan, born May 1872, with a wife, daughter, six, son,
five, son, three.
42. Affidavit of Dock Crenshaw, May 25, 1903, File 76909, EPRRC.
43. Affidavit of Charley Williams, May 25, 1903, File 76909, EPRRC.
44. Affidavit of Pat Hill, May 12, 1903, File 76909, EPRRC.
CHAPTER VI: SLAVERY IS NOT A CRIME
1. Montgomery Advertiser, May 27, 1903.
2. Alabama voted to secede January 11, 1861; the Confederate Constitutional
Convention convened in Montgomery; Je erson Davis was sworn in on the state
capitol portico; the Confederate capital moved to Richmond, Virginia, in July
1861.
3. Charles W. Chesnutt, “Peonage, or the New Slavery,” Voice of the Negro 1
(September 1904): 394–97.
4. Booker T. Washington, “To the Colored Citizens of Alabama,” Tuskegee Student,
Feb. 28, 1895, p. 2, BTW Papers.
5. O cial Programme of Daily Events, Cotton States and International Exposition,
Dec. 30, 1895 (Atlanta: C. P. Byrd), author's collection.
6. Theodore Roosevelt to Booker T. Washington, Washington, D.C., Nov. 9, 1901,
BTW Papers.
7. TR to BTW, July 9, 1901, BTW Papers.
8. TR to BTW, March 21, 1901, BTW Papers.
9. Theodore Roosevelt, “Expansion of the White Races,” Speech to Methodist
Episcopal Church celebration of the African Diamond Jubilee, Washington, D.C.,
Jan. 18, 1909.
10. TR to BTW, Sept. 14, 1901, BTW Papers.
11. BTW to TR, Oct. 2, 1901, BTW Papers.
12. C. N. Dorsette to BTW, May 31, 1890, telegram, BTW Papers.
13. Thomas Goode Jones to BTW, June 28, 1901, BTW Papers.
14. BTW to TR, Oct. 2, 1901, BTW Papers.
15. William A. Sinclair, The Aftermath of Slavery (Boston: Small, Maynard &
Company, 1905), pp. 187–90.
16. Ibid.
17. Edmund Morris, Theodore Rex (New York: Modern Library, 2002), p. 203.
18. Dadeville Spot Cash, March 13, 1903, reprinting editorial of Birmingham
Ledger.
19. Ibid.
20. Ibid.
21. Sinclair, pp. 188–89.
22. New York Times, June 5, 1903.
23. Reese to Parsons, Jan. 27 and April 11, 1903, RG60, NA; typescript, “The Slave
Traffic Today,” Appointment and Credentials Files, Dept. of Justice, RG60, NA.
24. Jones to Philander C. Knox, March 21, 1903, 5280-03, RG60, NA: Sir: Some
witnesses before the Grand Jury here developed the fact that in Shelby county in
this District, and in Coosa county in the Middle district, a systematic scheme of
depriving negroes of their liberty, and hiring them out, has been practiced for
some time.
The plan is to accuse the negro of some petty o ense, and then require him, in order to
escape conviction, to enter into an agreement to pay his accuser so much money, and
sign a contract, under the terms of which his bondsmen can hire him out until he pays
a certain sum. The negro is made to believe he is a convict, and treated as such. It is
said that thirty negroes were in the stockade at one time.
25. United States v. William Eberhart, indictment, U.S. District Court, Northern
District of Georgia, April 19, 1898, Dept. of Justice, RG60, EPRRC; Atlanta Journal,
April 21, 1898.
26. Angier to Attorney General W. H. H. Miller, April 19, 1898, RG60, NA.
27. United States v. Eberhart, Jan. 25, 1899 (127 F. 254), District Judge Newman.
28. Angier to Attorney General W. H. H. Miller, Jan. 17, 1899, RG60, NA.
29. Pete Daniel, The Shadow of Slavery: Peonage in the South, 1901–1969 (Urbana:
University of Illinois Press, 1972), p. 3.
30. Eagan to Attorney General Knox, July 13, 1901, RG60, NA.
31. Daniel, pp. 6–13.
32. Reese to Knox, April 7, 1903, ff 5280-03, #5664, RG60, NA.
33. Thomas R. Roulhac to Knox, April 9, 1903, ff 5280-03, #5762, RG60, NA:
The late Grand Jury at Birmingham Ala. made a careful investigation of the
complaints as to the attempt to deprive citizens of African descent of their
liberty and I am grati ed to state that this investigation was not only
closely and carefully made, but that the desire was universal among all its
members, composed of as excellent material, in intelligence and character,
as the district or State a ords, to vindicate the State from such unlawful
and disgraceful proceedings, and to bring to punishment every man who
by the proof was shown to have had any connection with it.
Indictments were found against nine persons, all that the testimony
connected with the transaction but enough was disclosed to show that the
same or like systems prevailed in other districts in the state. I do not think
the present the most propitious time for employing the services of a secret
Service operative. In my judgment after a comparatively short lapse of
time, his investigation will not have so much attention attracted to them as
they would have if begun immediately, and I think the participants and
those who can impart any information will be more likely to do so when
the present flutter has somewhat subsided.
It is equally gratifying to state that the said Grand Jury were aroused by
an attempt to intimidate one of the witnesses before them, and that they
promptly returned indictments against all who had any part in anything of
that character. Indictments were found against all of these, arrests were
promptly made, and such of them as were able to make bond were
admitted to bail in the sum of the Two thousand Dollars each…. One was
committed to jail in Birmingham….
No e ort will be spared to obtain a conviction of all of these parties,
and it has been reported to us that already the e ect has been most
salutary [sic] resulting in the discharge of a number whose con nement
has been illegal, or of questionable legality, and their restoration to
liberty.
34. Affidavit of L. E. White, undated, File 76909, EPRRC.
35. Reese to Knox, April 25, 1903, ff 5280-03, RG60, NA.
36. Asa Stratton to Attorney General, Feb. 18, 1897, Records Relating to the
Appointment of Federal Judges, Marshals and Attorneys, W. S. Reese Jr. le,
#068849, RG60, NA.
37. Marielou Armstrong Cory, “History of the Ladies Memorial Association,” 1902,
http://www.monumentpreservation.com/monument/history.html.
CHAPTER VI : THE INDICTMENTS
1. Montgomery Advertiser, June 9, 1903, p. 7.
2. Reese to Knox, June 15, 1903, RG60, NA.
3. A davit of Paul Ho man, May 8, 1903; a davit of Si Caldwell, May 9, 1903,
File 76909, EPRRC.
4. Davis affidavit.
5. Affidavit of J. G. Dunbar, May 11, 1903, File 76909, EPRRC.
6. A davit of J. L. Purifoy, May 13, 1903; a davit of Jim Caldwell, May 9, 1903,
File 76909, EPRRC.
7. A davit of D. M. White, certifying copy of Mayor's Court Docket, May 29, 1903,
File 76904, EPRRC.
8. Receipt, April 24, 1902, File 76904, Tallapoosa County Bank, EPRRC.
9. Purifoy affidavit.
10. White affidavit.
11. Affidavit of Esau Williams, May 25, 1903, File 76909, EPRRC.
12. A davit of Glennie Helms, May 25, 1903; a davit of Dave Johnson, May 25,
1903, File 76909, EPRRC.
13. Johnson affidavit.
14. Helms affidavit.
15. E. Williams affidavit.
16. Dec. 1, 1955.
17. Affidavit of John W. Pace, May 11, 1903, File 76909, EPRRC.
18. Ibid.
19. Affidavit of Fletch Turner, May 12, 1903, File 76909, EPRRC.
20. Affidavit of George Cosby, May 15, 1903, File 76909, EPRRC.
21. Affidavit of J. M. Kennedy, May 30, 1903, File 76909, EPRRC.
22. Dunbar affidavit.
23. Affidavit of G. B. Walker, May 12, 1903, File 76909, EPRRC.
24. A davit of Mat Davis, May 9, 1903, File 76909; a davit of Charles Davis, May
9, 1903, File 76909, EPRRC.
25. Kennedy affidavit.
26. Ibid.
27. Affidavit of J. W. Havalson, June 29, 1903, File 76909, EPRRC.
28. Montgomery Advertiser, May 30, 1903, p. 1.
29. Ibid.
30. Ibid.
31. Cleveland Gazette, Jan. 24, 1903, p. 2.
32. New York Evening Post, May 26, 1903, no page.
33. Montgomery Advertiser, June 13, 1903, p. 4.
34. Ibid., July 7, 1903, p. 4.
35. Ibid., June 9, 1903, p. 4.
36. Dadeville Spot Cash, June 5, 1903, p. 1.
37. New York Herald, June 8, 1903.
38. Montgomery Advertiser, June 12, 1903, p. 3.
39. Sinclair, p. 245.
40. Attorney General to Roosevelt, June 8, 1903, Executive and Congressional
Letter Book 64, p. 341, NA.
41. Reese to Knox, June 10, 1903, RG60, NA.
42. Stanley W. Finch, Examiner, to Attorney General, Feb. 18, 1904, “Report on W.
S. Reese Jr.,” ff 5280-03, RG60, NA.
43. 1900 Census, 1870 Census, 1860 Census.
44. Montgomery Advertiser, June 10, 1903, p. 3.
45. Judge Thomas G. Jones, “Charge to Jury,” June 15, 1903, 5280-03, RG60,
NA.
46. Prattville Progress, June 26, 1903, p. 2.
47. Birmingham Age-Herald, June 17, 1903.
48. Montgomery Advertiser, June 18, 1903, p. 4.
49. Reese to Knox, June 15, 1903, ff 5380-03, RG60, pp. 1–4, NA.
50. Ibid., p. 4.
51. Ibid., pp. 4–6.
52. Ibid., pp. 7–8.
53. Pete Daniel, The Shadow of Slavery: Peonage in the South, 1901–1969 (Urbana:
University of Illinois Press, 1972), p. 46.
54. Reese to Knox, June 15, 1903, p. 8.
55. Nation, June 11, 1903, p. 1.
56. Montgomery Advertiser, June 23, 1903, p. 7.
57. Ibid., June 25, 1903.
58. Dadeville Spot Cash, June 19, 1903, quoting Atlanta Constitution.
59. Montgomery Advertiser, June 25, 1903, p. 4.
60. Ibid., June 13, 1903, p. 4.
61. Ibid., June 19, 1903, p. 9.
CHAPTER VI I: A SUMMER OF TRIALS, 1903
1. Stanley W. Finch to Frank Strong, General Agent, Department of Justice, June 23,
1903, Peonage Files (5280), ff 9927, RG60, NA.
2. Affidavit of Owen Green, no date, File 76909, EPRRC.
3. 1860 Census (Pace month of birth: October 1853).
4. Macon Telegraph, June 25, 1903; Speer to Attorney General, June 25, 1903,
EPRRC.
5. Montgomery Advertiser, June 28, 1903, p. 3.
6. Ibid., June 30, 1903, p. 2.
7. Ibid., July 1, 1908, p. 1.
8. Reese to Attorney General, June 30, 1903, ff 10157, RG60, NA.
9. Edward M. Adams to John E. Wilkie, Chief of Treasury Secret Service
investigators, June 24, 1904, ff 13098, RG60, NA.
10. Montgomery Advertiser, July 5, 1903.
11. Affidavit of Fletcher Turner, May 12, 1903, EPRRC.
12. Helms affidavit.
13. Montgomery Advertiser, July 8, 1903.
14. Ibid., July 11, 1903.
15. Ibid.; New York Times, July 11, 1903.
16. New York Times, July 13, 1903.
17. Montgomery Advertiser, July 14, 1903, p. 1; Dadeville Spot Cash, July 17,
1903; New York Times, July 25, 1903, p. 2.
18. Montgomery Advertiser, July 21, 1903, p. 1.
CHAPTER IX: A RIVER OF ANGER
1. Reese, the prosecutor, wrote to newspapers in response that He in had grossly
understated the facts alleged in the indictments. Reese statement, July 21, 1903,
Miscellaneous Papers, Peonage Cases, File 76904, EPRRC. He in replied,
denouncing Reese, and Judges Jones and Speer in Alabama and Georgia, wrapping
his condemnation in a defense of the jury system:
I care not whether the Judge be named Jones or Speer; whether he lives in
Alabama or Ohio. My contention is that no judge has the right, legal or
moral, to coerce a jury into nding a verdict to his liking, that the jurors
are the sole judges of the facts and they must nd the verdict according to
their own conviction and consciences that they are entitled to protection
from insults and abuse of the presiding judge. We cannot be too strenuous
in our e orts to guard the dignity and integrity of the jury system of our
country…. It was only when, according to my honest convictions, he had
invaded the sacred province of the jury, had used language if denunciation
and intimidation that no judicial authority on earth could warrant, and
had set a precedent fraught with the gravest danger to that ancient
institution that great bulwark of the people's rights and liberties, the “right
of trial by jury,” that I excised the right that is mine as an American
citizen to criticize his o cial conduct, and to speak publicly my views
concerning this most remarkable occurrence in Alabama. Montgomery
Advertiser, July 22, 1903, p. 2.
2. Ernest H. Hill to Reese, July 15, 1903, Miscellaneous Papers, Peonage Files, File
76904, EPRRC.
3. Thomas Dixon Jr., The Leopard's Spots: A Romance of the White Man's Burden
(New York: P. F. Collier, 1902), pp. 381–84.
4. Thomas Nelson Page, The Negro: The Southerner's Problem (New York: Charles
Scribner's Sons, 1904), p. 64.
5. Montgomery Advertiser, April 25, 1903, p. 1.
6. Ibid.; Nation, Aug. 19, 1903, p. 1.
7. William Hannibal Thomas, The American Negro (New York: Macmillan, 1901),
cited in Page, p. 82.
8. Montgomery Advertiser, April 26, 1903, p. 1.
9. Dadeville Spot Cash, May 15, 1903.
10. Montgomery Advertiser, May 21, 1903, p. 4.
11. Ibid., June 5, 1903, quoting Columbus Enquirer-Sun, p. 4.
12. William A. Sinclair, The Aftermath of Slavery (Boston: Small, Maynard &
Company, 1905), pp. 221–22.
13. Phillips Verner Bradford and Harvey Blume, Ota: The Pygmy in the Zoo (New
York: St. Martin's, 1992).
14. Montgomery Advertiser, June 10, 1903, p. 1.
15. Proceedings: Joint Committee of the Senate and House to Investigate the
Convict Lease System of Georgia, Vol. 1, transcripts of rst meeting, Gaither
testimony, pp. 187–97, GDAH.
16. New York Times, July 21, 1903.
17. Montgomery Advertiser, April 10, 1903, p. 1.
18. J. E. Sistrunk to Department of Justice, July 6, 1903, Peonage Files, EPRRC.
19. Montgomery Adverti
ser, April 16, 1903, p. 1.
20. Ibid., May 17, 1903, p. 1.
21. Ibid., May 16, 1903, p. 1.
22. New York Times, July 5, 1903.
23. Associated Press, July 5, 1903.
24. New York Times, July 13, 14, 1903.
25. W. E. B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk, 1903 (New York: Dover, 1994), pp.
23, 65.
CHAPTER X: THE DISAPPROBATION OF GOD
1. New York Times, July 25, 1903.
2. Dadeville Spot Cash, July 31, 1903.
3. Ibid., Aug. 14, 1903, publishing Tallapoosa County Grand Jury report, July 27,
1903.
4. Ibid., Aug. 28, 1903: “W. W. Pearson, who was one of the attorneys for the
Cosbys, says he will petition Judge Jones to commute their sentence. It will be
remembered that they plead guilty to charges of peonage against them and were
sent to the U.S. Penitentiary in Atlanta to serve a year and a day. It is agreed that
their penalty is too severe and the late deliverances of the court show it to be
inclined to mercy and it is thought that the petition will meet with favor…. The
citizens of Tallapoosa county are signing petitions for the release of the Cosbys
now in prison in Atlanta …claimed that the petition will go up with at least 3000
names signed to it.”
5. Montgomery Advertiser, Dec. 14, 1903: “The state convict inspectors are
surprised at the county commissioners of Tallapoosa county in awarding the
convict labor contract of that county to J. W. Pace. Pace had the county convicts at
the time he was arrested for peonage. He is now under sentence of ve years but
the sentence has been suspended by Judge Jones of the US court.”
6. Nation, Aug. 19, 1903, p. 1; New York Times, Nov. 23, 1903.
7. M. D. Wickersham to Attorney General, Sept. 21, 1903, File 5280, 14901,
Peonage Files, RG60, NA.
8. Catherine McRee Carter, “History of Kinderlou, Georgia, 1860–1940,”
unpublished typescript, December 1940, in possession of author.
9. “The New Slavery in the South, An Autobiography,” Independent, February 25,
1904, pp. 409–14.
10. Affidavit of Henry C. Dickey, Nov. 24, 1903, EPRRC.
11. Kinsey File, Department of Justice, Peonage Files, RG60, NA.
12. Affidavit of Edward McRee, Nov. 24, 1903, EPRRC.
13. Opinion of Judge Emory Speer, U.S. v. McClellan and Crawley, March 17, 1904,
EPRRC.
14. Akerman to Attorney General, March 27, 1905, EPRRC.
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