Bedford inquirer. [volume] (Bedford, Pa.) 1857-1884, 1866-08-17

of citizens had Joined the police force and
about the Institute and great crowds, gath
cred at the corners of Canal and Common,
and along the route to the City Hail. were
firing at or rushing upon the few prisoners
brought along.
Finally a crowd OF policemen and citizens
made rush ct the doors of the Convention
chamber and broke them down, The exact
order Of what Immediately followed no man
can tell. tits only certain that as they en-
tered the attacking party delivered volley
into the huddled mass of members and spec
tators, which killed and wounded several,
and received one, severely wounding some OF
the policemen and killing some of the citi-
zens Each side charged that the other
fired first, and whether from testimony OF
participants or from the sound of the vol
leysi it seems impossible to reach any other
conclusion that they were nearly or quite
simultaneous.
There followed series of short and
bloody individual conflicts. Negroes were
shot down, members of the Convention
wounded and arrested, and the scenes of
violence in the streets intensified tenfold as
persons began to emerge from the building
Standing all this moment in the highest
! verandah of Victor's restaurant, looking
I ,
was a late Major General of the United
States service. He saw four policemen bear
out the seemingly lifeless body of DIR. Dos
| tie, an earnest, sincere, perhaps fanatical
member of the Convention, a prominent
| Free Mason, and gentleman against whose
! private character no charge was ever made.
! His head hung down till it almost dragged
on the pavement blood was streaming from
| his wounds and marking the path by which
| he was borne Around this inanimate body
! the crowd rushed and blasphemed, or laugh
| ed and eheered. At last cart was reached
and the body was thrown in, when a more
| determined rush than any previous one was
made, and the rioters broke through Be
| fore the cart could be started, several blows
! had been rained upon the bleeding body,
and the General felt sure that as one man 5
| hand descended he caught the gleam of a
knife
| The news few among the rioter that DIR.
| Dostie was killed, and it was everywhere re-
ceived, many squares of, even where people
| had scarcely became infamed with the fever
of the massage, with expressions Of salts
faction and positive delight.
! Meanwhile, returning from Canal street
up Carondelet, had just secured a place
on the verandah of friend room, near
came up from the Institute, and a dense
mob crowded along Common street toward
the ST. Charles Hotel As they approached
we could make out four policemen with
cooked revolvers, and in their midst with
hat knocked off, with coat nearly torn from
his shoulders, with blood clotted over his
head and about his neck, with citizens rush
ing at him, striking at him, shouting, kill
him, partly limping and partly jerked
along by the infuriated policemen, came Mi
chael Hahn, exmember of the United
States House Of Representatives, ex-Goy-
ernor of Louisiana, and United States Sen
ator from the Legislature Of Louisiana-
the man to whom Abraham Lincoln conf
dentially wrote that negro suffrage might
yet in some hour of peril, help to keep the
Jewel of Liberty in the family of Freedom y
In ten minutes he was lying bleeding and
feverish, in 4 cell of the city jail He was
more scared than hurt, is the cool COM
ment Of the leading journal this morn
ing
A little later came the only stroke of the
comic in al this sad tragedy. The boaster
of the Convention, the hero who would do
and dare and die for his new born love for
negro suffrage, had not yet been found
ArTayed in 81 otless white he had been seen
to enter the Chamber before the opening of
the Convention, but since the firing began,
no eye of negro had been cheered, no heart
of Convention member nerved, no soul of
policeman inhamed by the radiant sight of
r. King Cutler The last member had
been driven out to the mob, and the last
negro stabbed the Chamber was occupied
only by the police, the other rioters and the
dead but still the hero was missing. At
last bright thought strucS q policeman.
He explored the chimney. Its throat was
narrow, and King Cutters body was large,
and so, instead of being quite swallowed
up, there he stuck In moment a monde
script figure came up the street, between
policemen and rioters, all so amused that
for the moment, they lost their appetite for
murder. Republican or not, King Cutler
was black His white hat, jammed down
over his blackened nose and ears, like half
painted ship, was already colored, fore and
aft. His white coat hung down all black
behind. His sparkling shirt front presented
a fitting stripe 10 correspond. The waist
band Of his voluminous pantaloons-but
alas that was where he struck and so
musl |.
The Convention had been thoroughly bro
ken up an hour ago-if that we're the OBJ
iect of Mr. John I. Monroe and his rebel
soldier policemen. The negro procession
had been scattered, its leaders killed, and
dozens of innocent negroes struck by the
same hopeless fate, if that we're their object.
But still the authorities and the citizens con-
tinued the riot.
An innocent negro, carrying roll Of cot
ton samples under his arm, quietly passed
the St. Charles Hotel Four hackmen
poanced upon him, began beating the non
resistant, and collected crowd. A police
man rushed up, and without word of in
duiry discharged every barrel of his revolv
er at the prostrate negro, who kept crying,
ARREST me, I've done nothing arrest me,
but for Gods sake don't kill me in cold
blood To the amazement of all, every
shot missed him. But, exclaimed a repu-
table citizen-let the expression be set down
forever to his honor with those who know
him-''if I'd had pistol, I'd have killed
the miscreant policeman
Carts were constantly passing laden with
the bodies of murdered negroes In one |
counted six many had two and three. All
we're greeted with laughter occasionally
one evoked cheer. Now and then a car
riage passed with some wounded white
man, and not unfrequently the crowds would
make rush upon him to see if he were one
of the obnoxious radicals
Meantime, the fighting negroes retreating
below Canal street, into the French quar-
ter of the city, had once or twice reorganized
and made charges on the police in the.hope
of rescuing some oftheir friends or avenging
their death In the course OF the afternoon