Death at Cross Plains: An Alabama Reconstruction Tragedy PDF
Preview Death at Cross Plains: An Alabama Reconstruction Tragedy
Death At Cross Plains : An Alabama title: Reconstruction Tragedy author: Howard, Gene L. publisher: University of Alabama Press isbn10 | asin: 0817307494 print isbn13: 9780817307493 ebook isbn13: 9780585295725 language: English Reconstruction--Alabama--Cross Plains, Cross Plains (Ala.)--Race relations, Lynching--Alabama--Cross Plains--History- subject -19th century, Luke, William C.,--d. 1870, Missionaries--Alabama--Cross Plains-- Biography, Civil rights workers--Alabama-- Cross Plains--Bi publication date: 1994 lcc: F334.C68H68 1994eb ddc: 364.1/523/0976163 Reconstruction--Alabama--Cross Plains, Cross Plains (Ala.)--Race relations, Lynching--Alabama--Cross Plains--History- subject: -19th century, Luke, William C.,--d. 1870, Missionaries--Alabama--Cross Plains-- Biography, Civil rights workers--Alabama-- Cross Plains--Bi Page iii Death at Cross Plains An Alabama Reconstruction Tragedy Gene L. Howard With a Foreword by Gary B. Mills Page iv Copyright © 1984 The University of Alabama Press Tuscaloosa, Alabama 35487-0380 All rights reserved Manufactured in the United States of America Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Howard, Gene L., 1940 Death at Cross Plains. Bibliography: p. Includes index. 1. ReconstructionAlabamaCross Plains. 2. Cross Plains (Ala.)Race relations. 3. LynchingAlabama Cross PlainsHistory19th century. 4. Luke, William C., d. 1870. 5. MissionariesAlabamaCross PlainsBiography. 6. Civil rights workersAlabama Cross PlainsBiography. 7. Cross Plains (Ala.) Biography. I. Title. F334.C68H68 1984 364.1'523'0976163 83-5839 ISBN 0-8173-0749-4 First Paperback Edition 1994 1 2 3 4 / 99 98 97 96 95 94 Page v TO: William J. Calvert; a gentleman and a friend. Page vii Contents Acknowledgments ix Foreword xi I. Cross Plains in 1870 1 II. The Morning After 7 III. William Luke's Introduction to Alabama 18 IV. William Luke As Minister 26 V. Ku Klux Klan Terrorism 34 VI. A New Start for William Luke 41 VII. Community Antagonism to William Luke 50 VIII. Violence Erupts in Cross Plains 61 IX. The Trial and Klan Justice 75 X. Aftermath of the Tragedy 93 XI. Justice Denied 111 Epilogue 120 Notes 125 Bibliographical Note 141 Index 147 Page ix Acknowledgments My experience with the Cross Plains story began in late 1978, when Lane Weatherbee, editor of the Piedmont Independent-Journal, shared several articles with me about a mass hanging that was part of the city's history. He obtained much of his information from county historian Jack Boozer, and serialized an account of the tragedy for his readers. The articles intrigued me as I recognized several universal themes in the story of old Cross Plains. I became curious about William Luke and why he became the center of controversy so far removed from his native Canada, and why Patona never experienced the industrial growth that would have made the town a thriving metropolis. The answer to these questions is this work, essentially an interpretive synthesis of several years of historical research. I am grateful to Dr. Grace Gates, author and historian, whose editorial advice contributed to the success of the study. As we remember again what others seem so willing to forget, the justification for our recollectionsif we need onecan be framed by a line from William Faulkner's novel, Intruder in the Dust: "The past is never dead. It is not even past." GENE HOWARD Page xi Foreword The political, social, and economic turmoil that gripped the South after the Civil War created an atmosphere conducive to violence amid a people already fiercely proud and exceedingly passionate. The federal Reconstruction of the defeated Confederacy closed to southerners those avenues of protest against injustice that are customary in civilized society, forcing them to seek both defense and vengeance by more surreptitious means, against whatever targets might be accessible. The subjected southerners could do nothing to reach the roots of the very real problems caused by a lost war and a ruined economy, but they couldand didstrike at the people who contributed to their plight; and amid their frustration, it seldom mattered whether their victims were actually guilty or merely symbolic. Traditionally, history has tended to relate all violence during this era to organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan and to portray the victims as innocent idealists. In reality, there can be no doubt that some of the deaths and assaults were unrelated to politics. Personal vengeance and satisfaction for affronts to honor were important tenets of the code inherited by generations of southerners. Such individual expressions of violence continued to occur during Reconstruction, and many victims of this era were by no means innocent. Some had fomented violence or had purposefully acted in a provocative manner. Page xii The newly potent groups within southern societythe carpetbaggers, scalawags, and blackswere a myriad assortment, motivated by diverse factors. To view them all as righteous idealists intent upon creating a utopia in the South is both naive and indefensible. The southern-born scalawag certainly was aware of the nature of his own people, he presumably calculated his personal risk, and he could hardly have been surprised at the South's response to the problems of Reconstruction. The carpetbagger, alien to the southern culture, displayed little tolerance for the values he did not understand and consequently brought wrath upon himself with ease. Finally, there were the more noble-minded, who did not fear even though they might vaguely realize the dangers of their mission. The apostles of enlightenment, spirited and zealous, did indeed exist. Beclouded by their idealism, such men saw only the good they expected their ministry to accomplish and were unresponsive to the discomfort that their narrow-minded righteousness stirred in others. Incredulity often marked such men, who ultimately confronted death in the eyes of an angry mob. Such a man was William C. Luke, a former minister who had fallen from grace and been reborn as a missionary, committed to the goals he had set for himself in his second chance at living a spiritual life. Southerners saw him as a do-gooder in search of good to do. Ironically, in but a few months after he found his purpose, he lost his life. Why? Fundamentally, Luke did not understand humanity as it existed in the great mission field that he chose for himself. As a Canadian, he could not empathize with the southern psyche, the anomalous state in which individuals could display abundant hospitality to strangers while their society remained impenetrable. Unexposed to the years of civil conflict, he did not com-
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