Devil in the Grove
Page 54
128 “They must have beat us”: MM 44-127, FBI.
128 “These are not your tracks”: MM 44-156, FBI.
128 “Nigger, you are”: Ibid.
128 “a lot of motors”: Ibid.
128 “They hit me”: Ibid.
129 “he would get a thrill”: Ibid.
129 “My mouth was bleeding”: MM 44-127, FBI.
129 recognized as Wesley Evans: MM 44-156, FBI.
129 “quite a hose wielder”: Ibid.
129 “They tried to make me say”: MM 44-127, FBI.
129 “saved all the beating”: MM 44-156, FBI.
130 “right jaw appeared”: MM 44-127, FBI.
130 “I was bleeding”: Ibid.
130 “a mob was on its way”: Ibid.
130 “Where are those”: Ibid.
130 “really kicking him then”: MM 44-156, FBI.
130 “red and bruised”: MM 44-127, FBI.
131 “All of this is true”: Ibid.
131 “was going to tell”: MM 44-156, FBI.
132 “I have no shoes”: MM 44-127, FBI.
132 “Jesus,” Greenlee had said: FOHP, Williams.
132 “devoted to the Socialist”: New Leader, January/April 2006.
132 “I been told by”: MM 44-127.
132 “Sammy is a good boy”: Ibid.
133 “If they had a picture”: Wormser, The Rise and Fall of Jim Crow, p. 166.
133 “arrogance”: FOHP, Williams.
133 “Had been communicated”: Ibid.
133 “uppity Nigger”: “Florida’s Little Scottsoboro: Groveland,” Crisis, October 1949.
133 “McCall knew exactly”: FOHP, Williams.
134 “blood was still in their hair”: Ibid.
134 “it was seldom”: Lawson, To Secure These Rights, p. 26.
134 “The resources of the association”: Corsair, The Groveland Four, p. 78.
134 “entirely innocent”: Press release, NAACP, August 9, 1949.
134 advised Harry T. Moore: Green, Before His Time, p. 92.
135 “to indict the guilty mobsters”: Moore to Warren, Florida State Archives, July 30, 1949.
135 “brutally beaten by local officers”: Ocala Star Banner, August 14, 1949.
135 “duty bound”: McCall, Willis V. McCall, Sheriff of Lake County, p. 20. Also author interview with Isaac Flores, February 9, 2011.
135 “It’s a damn lie”: Ocala Star Banner, August 14, 1949.
136 “negroes in a yellow convertible”: FOHP, Williams.
136 “very distinguished criminal lawyer”: Ibid.
136 “You know, Franklin”: Ibid.
136 “he would not raise any issue”: Ibid.
136 “I can’t do this”: Ibid.
137 “I was not completely at ease”: Ibid.
137 “would give me some”: Ibid.
137 “for failing to follow”: Tushnet, Making Civil Rights Law, p. 97.
138 “You were in rare form”: Horne to Marshall, NAACP, August 9, 1949.
138 “it would appear undesirable”: MM 44-127, FBI.
138 “full and exhaustive investigation”: Ibid.
138 “all of the persons interviewed”: MM 44-156, FBI.
139 “a pair of pants”: Ibid.
139 “asked them why”: Ibid.
139 “population of thirty-six thousand”: Census of Population and Housing, U.S. Census Bureau, 1950 Census.
140 “leading citizens”: MM 44-156, FBI.
140 “caused by the people”: Ibid.
140 “cleared the county”: Orlando Sentinel, December 3, 1997.
140 “he wouldn’t have a building left”: MM 44-156, FBI.
140 “watching the City Hall”: Ibid.
141 “one man police department”: Ibid.
141 “affirmative action”: Ibid.
141 “County Sheriffs openly joined”: Moore Report, p. 7.
141 “I believe the only thing”: Corsair, The Groveland Four, p. 35.
142 “Bay Lake region people”: MM 44-156, FBI.
142 “They might have got in a fight”: Corsair, The Groveland Four, p. 88.
142 “physician who examined”: MM 44-156, FBI.
143 “Report of Accident”: Ibid.
143 “I knew that this would be”: Corsair, The Groveland Four, p. 94.
144 Unable to fulfill: Orlando Sentinel, July 5, 1992.
144 “one full day of work”: Mount Dora Topic, September 1, 1949.
145 “The University of Scuffletown”: Ibid.
145 “filled with odds and ends”: Ibid.
145 “a tin building”: Mount Dora Topic, August 25, 1949.
145 “He was almost a caricature”: FOHP, Williams.
145 “Where is the third defendant?”: Ibid.
145 “The dirty bastard”: Williams to Wilkins, NAACP-LDF, August 25, 1949.
146 “We are not the defendants”: Ibid.
146 “Well, come on in”: FOHP, Williams.
146 “It was very clear”: Ibid.
146 “in shirt sleeves”: Williams to Wilkins, LDF, undated.
146 “lawless mobs were roaming”: Fl. v. Shepherd, Affidavit, p. 78.
146 “Filed too late”: Fl. v. Shepherd, Vol. 1, p. 78.
147 “by persons purporting”: Fl. v. Shepherd, Affidavit, p. 78.
147 “completely irrelevant”: Fl. v. Shepherd, Vol. 1, p. 320.
147 good faith reasons: Fl. v. Shepherd, Affidavit, p. 44.
147 “extremely inconvenient”: Fl. v. Shepherd, Vol. 1, p. 4.
147 “Every time” the defendants: Corsair, The Groveland Four, p. 96.
148 “disgusting an disheartening”: Fl. v. Shepherd, Vol. 2, p. 191.
148 “What are those nigger lawyers”: Fl. v. Shepherd, Affidavit, p. 79.
148 “Nigger lawyers better”: Ibid.
148 Particularly hard hit: Barnes, Florida’s Hurricane History, p. 184.
149 So it wasn’t much of a surprise: Corsair, The Groveland Four, p. 99.
Chapter 11: Bad Egg
150 “If I were asked”: MM 44-156, FBI. Dr. Binneveld’s examination of Norma Padgett on the morning of July 16, 1949, was taken from a report made by Agent John L. Quigley on September 2, 1949, from Agent Watson Roper’s investigation and interview with the physician. In this report, Quigley noted that when U.S. Attorney Herbert S. Phillips in Tampa learned of the FBI’s interview with Binneveld and the examination of Norma Padgett’s medical report, Phillips wired FBI offices with instructions to “discontinue investigation in this matter.”
151 “highly regarded” Dr. Geoffrey Binneveld: Ibid.
153 “Dirty Commie”: Robeson, The Undiscovered Paul Robeson, p. 168.
153 “Go back to Russia!”: Ibid.
153 “We were having enough trouble”: Rise, The Martinsville Seven, p. 60.
153 “If you were a Negro”: COHP, Marshall.
153 “Franklin Williams had”: Greenberg, Crusaders in the Courts, p. 101.
154 “was to go into”: Thurgood Marshall, “Remarks at a Testimonial Dinner Honoring Raymond Pace Alexander, November 25, 1951,” Tushnet, Thurgood Marshall, p. 140.
154 “giv[ing] foreign governments”: Ibid., p. 140.
154 “high-powered petitions”: Ibid.
154 “only the movement”: Rise, The Martinsville Seven, p. 66.
155 “These cases, the Groveland cases”: Marshall to Patterson, LDF, June 9, 1950.
155 “Dear Steve”: Marshall to Spingarn, LDF, June 18, 1950.
155 “I never believed”: FOHP, Williams.
155 “can come up with more ideas”: Presidential Recordings Program, Lyndon Johnson Tapes Transcripts, Monday, January 3, 1966: Thurgood Marshall, Lyndon Johnson, participants, http://whitehousetapes.net/transcript/johnson/wh6606-01-9403.
156 “every bit of energy”: FOHP, Williams.
156 “to cause constitutional error”: Ibid.
156 Jesse Hunter kept it simple: Fl. v. Shepherd, Vol. 2.
156 �
�Jesse Hunter won’t have to ask”: Mount Dora Topic, September 1, 1949.
156 “Honor Will Be Avenged”: Mount Dora Topic, July 2, 1949.
156-57 “Special Rules of Court”: Fl. v. Shepherd, Affadavit, p. 40.
157 “agitators or agents”: Ibid.
157 “They had deputies”: FOHP, Williams.
157 “worst crime in Lake county’s history”: Mount Dora Topic, September 1, 1949.
157 “there is considerable”: Fl. v. Shepherd, Vol. 2, p. 78.
157 “Supreme Court is the aim”: Mount Dora Topic, September 1, 1949.
157 “to the staunch believers”: Ibid.
158 “when the true story”: Ibid.
158 “damned scared”: Hauke, Ted Poston, p. 77.
158 “in the mail car”: Ibid., p. 58.
158 “kick in the pants”: Ibid., p. 59.
158 When Scottsboro: Ibid.
159 “grown young lady”: Ibid., p. 13. This scene is recounted in Hauke’s book: Allison Williams, Poston’s lifelong friend, recalls conversations she had with Poston about his boyhood sexual encounters with a white woman.
159 “Horror in the Sunny South”: New York Post, September 9, 1949.
159 “seething jealousy”: Chicago Defender, July 30. 1949.
160 “I will leave this place”: Ibid.
160 “The theory was”: FOHP, Williams.
160 “generally read from”: Moore Report, Exhibit 71.
160 “greater modicum of security”: FOHP, Williams.
160 “just in case anything happens”: State of Florida v. Walter L. Irvin, Charles Greenlee, and Samuel Shepherd, Prosecution Report, April 2, 1950, Exhibit 1, FBI 44-2722.
161 that Norma Padgett was a “bad egg”: FBI 44-2722.
161 “had grown up”: Ibid.
161 “stirred up” the violence: Ibid.
161 When pressed by Williams: Bertha E. Davis to Goldberg, LDF, August 1, 1949; and July 21, 1949.
161 “Mrs. Padgett, her husband”: FBI 44-2722.
161 “any traces of”: Davis to Goldberg, LDF, August 1. 1949; and July 21, 1949.
162 “grave doubts”: FBI 44-2722.
162 “considerably affected”: Ibid.
162 “the investigation will result”: Ibid.
162 “Richard Roe and John Doe”: Ibid.
162 “the confidential nature”: Corsair, The Groveland Four, p. 121.
162 “those clay eating crackers”: FOHP, Williams.
162 “How would you feel”: Fl. v. Shepherd, Vol. 3, pp. 398, 322.
163 “They are not on trial”: Ibid., p. 413.
163 Akerman’s other primary concern: Fl. v. Shepherd, Vol 2, p. 236.
163 “in favor of it”: Fl. v. Shepherd, Vol 3, p. 338.
163 “gray haired old handyman”: Carson et al., Reporting Civil Rights, Part One, p. 127.
163 “one of the best niggers”: Ibid.
163 “Women Beg for Reserved Seats at Trial”: Mount Dora Topic, August 18, 1949.
163 “Through sentiment”: Chicago Defender, September 10, 1949.
163 “Bay Lake Crackers”: Corsair, The Groveland Four, p. 132.
164 “always intimidated me”: FOHP, Williams.
164 “bare feet making”: Mount Dora Topic, undated clipping, FHW Papers, July 1949.
164 Oppressive heat: FOHP, Williams.
164 “of what he might do”: Ibid.
164 “dying declaration”: Williams to Wilkins, undated letter, LDF, September 1949.
165 “promenading”: Corsair, The Groveland Four, p. 127.
165 “Undiscovered American Beauties”: International Center of Photography Blog, Ladies Home Journal Prospectus, September 21, 1948, John Morris, Picture Editor, http://icplibrary.wordpress.com/2010/12/14/ladies-home-journal’s-undiscovered-american-beauties-provide-potential-bounty-to-photographers’/.
165 “rise and point out”: Fl. v. Shepherd, Vol. 4, p. 509.
166 “The nigger Shepherd”: FOHP, Williams. This is Franklin Williams’s recollection of the manner in which Norma Padgett identified her alleged attackers, according to the transcripts from FOHP, Williams. According to the trial transcripts, Norma Padgett, in her testimony, repeatedly referred to the defendants (and the deceased Ernest Thomas) as “this (or the) Thomas nigger,” “that Shepherd nigger,” “the Greenlee nigger,” and even “that Shepherd man” at times. Walter Irvin was referred to only as “Irvin” by Padgett.
166 “probably the most dramatic moment”: FOHP, Williams.
166 “resentful-eyed”: Mount Dora Topic, September 8, 1949. Also transcript of interview with Mabel Norris Chesley, Franklin Hall Williams Papers, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture (FOHP, Chesley).
166 “wasn’t wearing a watch”: Fl. v. Shepherd, Vol. 4, p. 521.
166 “plaster Paris casts”: Ibid., p. 541.
166 “the sheriff has kept me”: Ibid., p. 542.
167 “feed you and sleep you”: Ibid., p. 552.
167 “jostled by a couple of hoodlums”: New York Post, September 9, 1949.
167 “Objection is overruled”: Fl. v. Shepherd, Vol. 4, p. 600.
167 “I see no purpose”: Ibid., p. 601.
168 “Well, Mr Williams”: Corsair, The Groveland Four, p. 149.
168 “It’s the worst framed-up case”: Ibid.
168 “It was like a story”: FOHP, Williams.
168 “Mr. Williams,” he said: Ibid.
169 “Willis McCall,” Shepherd told him: Ibid.
169 “murdered blacks”: Ibid.
169 “tall, gangly”: Ibid.
169 “if you just tell”: Ted Poston, “The Story of Florida’s Legal Lynching,” The Nation, September 2, 1949.
170 “I said to myself”: Fl. v. Shepherd, Vol. 4, p. 600.
170 “hurry up and take me away”: Ibid., p. 640.
170 “So I was sitting”: Ibid., p. 641.
172 “Would you have been”: Ibid., p. 644.
171 “the white lady”: Irene Holmes to Franklin Williams, LDF, December 12, 1949.
171 “Charlie Greenlee’s such a good actor”: Green, Before His Time, p. 104.
171 “eyes filled with grief”: Mount Dora Topic, September 8, 1949.
171 “When are you going to put him”: FOHP, Williams.
171 “You know what your problem is”: Green, Before His Time, p. 104.
171 “At Long Last”: Mount Dora Topic, September 8, 1949.
172 “Except for the”: New York Post, September 9, 1949.
172 “Not necessary”: Ibid.
172 “Mr. Hunter didn’t want”: Ibid.
172 “possible stains”: Ibid.
172 “If that white lady”: Ibid.
172 “bowing and cringing”: Ibid.
172 “I won’t take very long”: Fl. v. Shepherd, Vol. 4, p. 644.
172 “a lot can happen”: Green, Before His Time, p. 103.
172 “no human being”: Corsair, The Groveland Four, p. 165.
173 “grim game of ‘Musical Chairs’ ”: St. Petersburg Times, April 9, 1950.
173 “a little out of line”: Ibid.
173 “Jesse,” Futch said: Corsair, The Groveland Four, p. 167.
173 “the one long distance phone booth”: New York Post, September 9, 1949.
173 “an expectant father”: State of Florida v. Walter L. Irvin, Charles Greenlee, and Samuel Shepherd, Prosecution Report, April 2, 1950, Exhibit 1, FBI 44-2722.
173 “Keep your shirt on”: New York Post, September 9, 1949.
173 that Sheriff McCall “needed help”: Moore Report, Exhibit 53.
173 “no demonstration: Fl. v. Shepherd, Vol. 4, p. 654.
174 “We the jury find”: Fl. v. Shepherd, Affadavit, p. 22.
174 “Hope was gone from the eyes”: Mount Dora Topic, September 8, 1949.
174 “Then a smile”: Ibid.
174 “Alex, psst, Alex”: FOHP, Williams. This scene is mostly derived from Franklin Williams’s recollections (FOHP, Williams), and f
rom Ted Poston’s “Horror in the Sunny South” stories in the New York Post.
174 “go home quietly”: Ibid.
174 “I don’t doubt”: Ibid.
175 “Aren’t you going to escort us”: Ibid.
175 “jammed that cigarette lighter”: Ibid.
175 “hostile sea of white faces”: New York Post, September 9, 1949.
175 “Hurry up and get in”: FOHP, Williams.
175 “Where’s Ramona?”: New York Post, September 9, 1949.
176 “Jesus Christ,” Williams said: FOHP, Williams.
176 “Oh, God. It’s my fault”: New York Post, September 9, 1949.
177 “I have never been so happy”: FOHP, Williams.
177 “I couldn’t see my own shame”: New York Post, September 9, 1949.
177 “Aw, you have got”: FOHP, Williams.
Chapter 12: Atom Smasher
179 “if he didn’t say”: Corsair, The Groveland Four, p. 188.
179 “He was going to handme over”: Ibid., p. 188.
179 “You lied on the witness stand?”: Moore Report, p. 288. This scene is derived from the transcript that Harry T. Moore’s biographer, Ben Green, made (July 15, 1992) from Willis McCall’s interview of Charles Greenlee. The transcript appears in the Moore Report.
180 “Scotland Yard”: Mount Dora Topic, undated clipping, FHW Papers, September 1949.
180 “An unlettered but articulate”: New York Post, September 6, 1949.
180 “ample opportunity”: Fl. v. Shepherd, Vol. 4, Affadavit, p. 142.
180 “vicious,” in Williams’s judgment: FOHP, Williams.
180 “the evidence was”: Corsair, The Groveland Four, p. 188.
181 “My feeling is that”: Wilkins to Spingarn, NAACP, September 6, 1949.
181 “that Tavares business”: New York Post, September 6, 1949.
181 “thrown behind the defense”: Press release, NAACP, August 1949.
181 “We’ll keep Frank’s promise”: New York Post, Septe,ber 6, 1949.
181 “bloodthirsty, motorized mob”: New York Post, September 9, 1949.
182 “all the characteristics”: FOHP, Williams.
182 “He may have been”: Greenberg, Crusaders in the Courts, p. 32.
182 “I would not live in the South”: Corsair, The Groveland Four, p. 154.
182 “deterred the assertion”: Greenberg, Crusaders in the Courts, p. 98.
183 “So if God be with me”: Corsair, The Groveland Four, p. 194.
183 “damn bunch of Communists”: Ibid., p. 198.
184 The FBI chose: Moore Report, Exhibit 76.
184 “intended to stop car”: Ibid.