A Negro, who had been charged with
killing a white police officer, was seized from jail by an angry
mob. After hanging him from a telephone pole, the mob riddled his
body with bullets, Then, they went on to destroy large sections
of the Negro part of town.
In 1808 Springfield, Illinois, was the scene of the famous riot
which helped to motivate the founding of the N.A.A.C.P. There, a
white woman claimed to have been raped by a Negro. Although she
admitted that she had, in fact, been assaulted by a white man,
the angry mob was only further enraged. It ran out of control for
several days, and the state's militia was called in to restore
order. Besides looting and burning, the mob boldly and
deliberately lynched two of the city's responsible Negro
citizens. The leaders of the mob, as usual, went unpunished.
Although DuBois had urged the Negroes to close ranks with
white America during the war, white racists did not reciprocate.
An even worse race riot occurred in East St. Louis, Illinois, in
1917. The white community was afraid that a mass influx of
Negroes from the South was about to occur.
Pages:
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214