October 7, 1906: H. Blackburn

Join me in a jaunt to the past. Today we visit the Tyrone Daily Herald (Tyrone, Pennsylvania) on The 8th of October, 1906:

MOBS LYNCH NEGROES

One at Argenta, Ark., and Two at Mobile, Ala.

RACE RIOTS AT FORMER PLACE

Whites and Blacks Fire on Each Other and Store of Colored Man is Dynamited—One White Man Killed and Several Injured.

Argenta, Ark., Oct. 8—As a sequel to the killing of John Lindsay and the wounding of his son, Policeman Milton Lindsay, here, presumably by Garrett Colum and Charles Colum, negroes, H. Blackburn, a negro, was lynched at the corner of Sixth and Main streets. The trouble originated on September 12, when a white man named R. R. McDonald killed a negro musician named Wiley Shelby. Next day at the inquest at the Colum's undertaking establishment a difficulty arose, in which Robert Colum was killed and Deputy Constable Ed Lindsay and Garrett Colum were severely wounded. When the police and citizens attempted to enter the store they were fired on. It is supposed Charles and Garrett Colum did the shooting. Later in the night, thinking the Colum brothers were still locked in the rear rooms of the store, the place was dynamited, but the negroes had escaped unseen in the darkness.

Will Harding, a painter, was halted on the street by unknown parties, whether black or white, he could not tell in the darkness. He was asked if he was black or white. On replying that he was white he was told to go back, and while leaving he was shot in the back. James Mahoney, a contractor, and Al Belding, a reporter of the Little Rock Gazette, while going to see Harding, discovered a house on fire. Mahoney fired his pistol in the air to give the alarm, and immediately the two men were fired upon on from four different quarters with shot guns.

H. Blackburn, 37 years old, a negro, who conducts a confectionery store in Argenta, was arrested on suspicion of being the man who fired on Mahoney and Belding. Four masked men entered the police station from the rear, and one covered the turnkey with a pistol, while his others got his keys and quickly unlocked Blackburn's cell and took him out the back way. Not a shot was fired, and there was no disturbance, so that Policeman Pratt and two deputies who were standing on the street a few blocks away knew nothing of what was going on until they heard several shots fired at Main and Sixths treets [sic]. Going there, they found Blackburn already dead, hanged to a telegraph pole, while the crowd were apparently merely onlookers.

I have not added the following column covering the two lynched in Mobile since the lynchings occurred on the 6th.  Join me the Altoona Mirror (Altoona, Pennsylvania) on October 8, 1906, where we will not be looking at the whole article because many parts are identical, but at the parts that have more detail:

RACE WAR EPIDEMIC

From All Over Southland Comes News of Murder and Lynching,

ARKANSAS TOWN WROUGHT UP

Series of Murders by Negroes Results in Lynching—Negro Murderer at Macon Escapes Mob—White Men and Women Victims of Assassins.

Argenta, Ark., Oct. 8.—As a sequel to the killing . . .

Mahoney was painfully shot in the hand and Belding's clothes were peppered with birdshot. H. Blackburn, 37 years old, a negro, who conducts a confectionery store in Argenta, was arrested on suspicion of being the man who fired on Mahoney and Belding. As a precaution Mayor Fawcett swore in 15 extra policemen and the sheriff sent several extra deputies to assist the police. . .

When first arrested Blackburn said he only arrived from Lake Village Saturday night after the shooting. There was positive evidence, however, that after the Lindsays were first fired on Blackburn ran out of a negro house adjoining and fired at John Lindsay, and that later he delivered inflammatorw [sic] speeches to crowds of negroes at several points.

Thank you for joining me today and as always, I hope I have given you something to ponder.