The whites, well armed, took their game by surprise, bagged and shipped it without bloodshed. Now the "empire is peace" they say, although for a time terror reigned among the startled colored people.
With a Negro population six or seven times as large as the white, it is not strange that the County Court Judge, the County Clerk and his deputy should be Negroes, nor that they should aspire to other places in public life.
Unfortunately, as all witnesses agree, Judge Lewis and Clerk Ferguson were given to drinking habits, which brought them under accusation before the courts for drunkenness. It was probable that they would have been convicted; but without awaiting the tardiness of the law, a shorter process was found.
In palliation of their hasty banishment it is claimed that anonymous letters were sent to some of the leading white citizens, warning them to leave the county. These letters it is asserted—not proved—must have proceeded from Clerk Ferguson's office, although not written by himself. The object was to intimidate those who would be most efficient in convicting and deposing the unworthy officials.
Furthermore, there are two opposing factions of colored Baptists at Marion, and it is surmised that one of these factions, regarding these prominent characters as their enemies, had something to do with the letter-writing in order to bring down wrath upon them. Still another theory is, that the whites have only been awaiting their chance, and taking advantage of favorable conditions, knew when and whence the said letters would be issued. It was all arranged beforehand. At all events, the time was very short, after the delivery of the letters, until Winchester rifles and shot-guns were in the hands of some scores of white citizens, and fifteen Negro men, including Lewis and Ferguson, York Byers, a deputy sheriff and well-to-do farmer, Dr. Stith, a successful young physician, and others, were speedily sent across the river to Memphis.
Clerk Ferguson found himself surrounded by a squad of these brave [pg 278] men, who, with rifles presented, demanded that he sign without ceremony a resignation. He signed. Byers escaped through the swamps, made his way to the river, and came to Memphis in a sorry plight. The other victims were put upon the train with orders to go and never return. Byers was to be violently dealt with, had they caught him.
Sandy S. Odom, living on his farm about six miles from Marion, I am informed, refused to leave his home, when waited upon and ordered to go. Said he. "All I have is here—wife, child and farm—I can't go away." For a time his pluck seemed to be respected. His fault was that of being a friend of the Marion officials. He had once served at Little Rock as a legislator from his district, but, like Cincinnatus, had since resumed the plow.
According to the latest by the Memphis Appeal, Odom has decided that discretion is the better part of valor, and will be off for a safer place as soon as his business affairs can be arranged.
The Governor of Arkansas has refused to interfere, because the Circuit Court Judge at Marion has solemnly charged the grand jury as to their duty toward the writers of threatening letters, and also toward those who unlawfully drove citizens from their homes, etc. But this solemn part of the proceeding was enacted, in spite of the fact that the sheriff of Crittenden County was one of the leading spirits in the outrage upon the defenceless black men, and the judge and grand jury and all Crittendon County are far from expecting to hear of any white man being arrested.
But last Sunday, Dr. Stith, one of the exiles, went back to Marion on the morning train. He had heard that his wife was sick, and he said: "If I am a man I must go to her." He was promptly arrested by the patrol force at Marion and lodged in jail, where he is likely to remain until next January meeting of court before he can have a trial. There is nothing brought against him aside from his having been once associated with the "offensive partisans." He had at one time been an active politician, but more recently has devoted himself to his profession, and was already known as a successful physician. Like Odom, his character is not assailed: but he was educated, and influential among the people.