Wednesday, July 22, 2015

May 9, 1888: Unknown Negro (Thomas Reney)

Today we learn about a lynching in Kentucky through the pages of the Dixon Evening Telegraph (Dixon, Illinois) dated May 11, 1888:

Lynched on a Supposition.

BOWLING GREEN, Ky., May 11.—Wednesday night a mob composed of about 100 men went to the farm of Joe Smith, in Rich Pond neighborhood, in this county, and took a negro farm hand and hung him. Marion Sloss, a farmer, has had about twenty horses poisoned during the past year, and the negro is supposed to be the guilty party, as he was once in the employ of Sloss and discharged. He made threats against Sloss several times. Only meager details have been received.

According to the lynching list found in the December 30, 1888 edition of the Chicago Daily Times, Thomas Reney was lynched on May 10, he was listed as colored and lynched for the crime of poisoning horses in Richford, Kentucky. I had a hard time finding an article on this lynching until I started looking through papers starting with May 10th editions that mentioned lynchings. After a while, I happened to find several identical articles to the one above. I am pretty positive this is the lynching listed for Thomas Reney. It is always difficult to know the date when it is only printed to have happened at night. Before midnight is one date and after is another. Sometimes there are discrepancies between articles as to date. In that case I usually go with the earliest dated article; knowing that as more papers print the articles little details get changed due to misunderstandings and sometimes a careless person laying the type. Thank you for joining me and as always, I hope I leave you with something to ponder.    

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