Keowee courier. [volume] (Pickens Court House, S.C.) 1849-current, 1898-11-17

D SpsN- ~ - S'sAss
his insinaation that Ethridge wa
| shot by5White men. SSs s55 $}s
/ l visited the scene Of the firs
| shooting Thursday afternoon. TX
|giyeia clear idea Of the first battle
when Ethridge was killed and Ton
Tolbert was wounded, o description
of the store where the shooting oo
Cured is necessary. Phoenix is :
little GROSS roads settlement ton miles
South of Greenwood and boasting o.
Ethree or four country residences ant
one little3store, which is used rs i
tpost Office, i NJ " Z
| The store Is a one.room two story
frame affair, the front door of which
is about twenty-five yards from where
tho roads GROSS. Coming into tie
place one looks into the front doc,
over his left shoulder. just before
coming to the cross. The side door
opens immediately upon the other
road and faces a large cotton field
Each door is provided with small
portioo. Over zoe negroes we're coa.
gregated in the cotton field in front OF
the side door, while some twenty white
mon, about twelve of whom were
armed, were in the house, on the
front porch and in front of the
house. Ethridge was shot by me-
gro while he and Bob Cheatham and
Tom Tolbert were scuffiing over the
little pasteboard box which Tom
Tolbcrt established on the piazza
against the protests of the writes, to
receicve the affidavits of the negroes.
The negro was seen to fire the fatal
shot into Ethridge's forehead, and
another negro was in the act of
shooting Cheatham in the breast
when he waa wounded by white man.
The negroes followed tho shooting
of Ethridge by sending a volley of
shots into the house. l found eight
or ten bullet holes in that side of the
house and that side Of the reef was
still more numerously shot. Glass
was shattered in each of the win
dows opening out into tho cotton
field from the second story where
the Democratic managers were hold
ing the State and Federal elections.
Tom Tolbert did not deny to me
that Ethridge was shot by negroes;
he bad nothing to say on this point.
Charley White, one of the doomed
eleven whom / interviewed lust
before the four were shot under the
tree at Rehobeth, told me that Eth
ridge was shot by his brother, Will
White, in the confusion that pre-
coded the shooting of Hamp Nc
Kinney. carried Charley off few
PAGES fro n hiN fellow prisoners and
he told me that his brother Will had
said that he had killed Ethridge.
Charley denied that he had taken
any part in tho shooting, but admit
ted that he was on the outskirts of
the negro crowd, coming up as the
shoe ting began. He gave me long
list of names of those negroes who
were at the shooting and said he
could give more If he had time to
think of them. He had not been
told by the Tolberts to come to the
place armed, but other negroes, whom
he named and said were in the crowd
before the store, had told him and
others that they had been 80 in
structed. What he told me he said
he had told other white men.
Two white men who had been in
the battle at the store and in that
before the house of Thomas Tolbert
when John II. Tolbert and his little
nephew were wounded, said that
John r. Tolbert attacked them at
the head of party of negroes that
one of the negroes fired upon them
with a Winchester and that the
negroes they saw there were mounted
and armed.
Tom Tolbert was shot--not with
buckshot but with small shot. .Ac-
cording to his own statement he was
shot on the piazza where he had mis-
box, which he said was made of past
board. He did not tell mo that he
made any attempt to fight at all, but
he said he got away from the place
as soon as the trouble began. He
could have been killed as he went
down the road from the store toward
homo in the direction of Greenwood.
1t is likely that he was shot by his
own party, but of course this is only
a Burmise.
The motive of the party that
waited upon Tom Tolbert that night
cannot be determ;nei,, but my iudg-
ment is, from all / could hear, that
they did go there for the purpose
of killing him. They likely under
stood him to be dying, and it is prob
able that some of the cooler heads
prevailed on the part? not to attack
him in that condition. This is his
story also. He mentioned tho name
of the man who thus saved his life.
The killing of the four negroes
was a brutal piece CT work, which
was done by about 15 per cent of tho
crowd, the cruel, drunken, reckless
clement who came from abroad and
who knew little or nothing of the
alleged guilt of the negroes and who