———-
Hellraisers Journal – Tuesday December 23, 1919
State of Arkansas Sanctions Legalized Lynching of Twelve Union Men
From The New Solidarity of December 20, 1919:
TWELVE UNION NEGROES SENTENCED TO GALLOWS
A wholesale judicial lynching threatens to be the outcome of the recent situation in Arkansas, where a protest on the part of a group of Negroes known as the Farmers Protective Union [Progressive Farmers and Household Union of America] has resulted in a general charge of conspiracy against all the Negroes of the community. One hundred and twenty-two have been brought to trial. On the flimsiest evidence, sixty have been sentenced to prison terms ranging from one to twenty-one years. After a trial lasting exactly seven minutes, twelve have been condemned to die. This hideous travesty upon justice has been well called “legalized lynching”
———-
[Photograph and emphasis added.]
From The New York Age of December 20, 1919:
NEW BRUNSWICK FOLK GIVE TO DEFENCE FUND
NEW BRUNSWICK, N. J.-Acting on the suggestion of THE AGE that a fund ought to be raised for the defense of the colored men convicted and sentenced to be executed in Elaine (Arkansas) riots, the citizens of this, town, through M. J. Preston, have raised and forwarded $68.25 to Miss Mary White Ovington, chairman of the executive committee. N. A. A. C. P.
[There follows a list of person who made donations (from $.25 to $5.00) to the Defence Fund.]
[Emphasis added.]