BACK PAGES: The horror of mob rule is clear from this Reuters report a century ago about the notorious lynching of two men, one black and one white, in the town of Cairo at the southern tip of Illinois in the US. They were accused of separate and unconnected murders and were murdered by a mob from the town's then population of some 15,000.
WILL JAMES, a negro who was accused of murdering a shop girl, was lynched by a mob at Cairo, Illinois, yesterday evening. An attempt was first made to hang the man, but the rope broke. His body was then riddled with bullets, and the corpse was afterwards dragged for a distance of a mile, and thrown into a fire, where it was burned to a cinder.
A report having been circulated that James had confessed to the crime, and admitted that he had had an accomplice by the name of Alexander, the infuriated townspeople set out for the jail to seize the man, but being unable to find him they started to batter down a steel cage in which a white photographer, named Henry Stazner, charged with murdering his wife with an axe, was confined.
For an hour the mob tore and hammered at the cage, Stazner, meanwhile, pleading piteously for mercy, and protesting his innocence. At last the stout bars gave way, and the prisoner was dragged to one of the main streets and hanged on a telegraph pole. A volley was then poured into his body.
At the time of telegraphing, the mob, composed of 10,000 persons, including numerous women, who helped in the attempt to hang the negro, was scouring the town for Alexander. The Governor has ordered eleven companies of the militia to proceed to Cairo to restore order.
The local Sheriff kept James hidden in the woods for two days in the hope of saving him from the vengeance of the townspeople.
Further particulars of the lynching affair at Cairo, Illinois, state that when the rope was placed around the neck of the negro, James, the latter said – “I killed her, but Alexander took the lead.”
The mob then shouted – “We don’t want to hear him; string him up; kill him; burn him.”
A notable feature of the lynching was that women held the rope and lit the fire into which the negro was thrown.
This morning nothing was left but the negro’s bones. Salzner’s body was left in the street, and claimed by his father . . .
His lynching is regarded as a rebuke to the system of postponing the execution of justice, since the people asked for an immediate trial, but the case was put off by the court.
All was quiet this morning, the mob had dispersed, and only a few persons on the lookout for Alexander were lurking about the streets.
It is known that the negro is in custody, and was spirited about the town in a policeman’s clothes.
Yesterday evening, before James’s body was burnt, his head was cut off and placed at the end of a pole, the other end being stuck in the ground.
The heart was taken out and cut up into small pieces, which were passed around among the men as souvenirs. Pieces of rope soaked in the negro’s blood were also kept as souvenirs.
Mr Woodward, Deputy Sheriff, reports to Governor Duneen that 1,500 men are now searching the river front and breaking in the freight cars in the hope of finding Alexander. It is feared that serious rioting will ensue.
On learning that the saloons were open, and that numbers of the mob were drinking heavily, the Governor ordered the Sheriff to close the saloons immediately.
The Mayor and the Chief of Police are being guarded in their homes, as the infuriated mob threatened them.
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