Vernon County censor. [volume] (Viroqua, Wis.) 1865-1955, 1901-01-23
MOB BURNS A NEGRO.
LEAvENWORTH, KAN, WITNESS.
ES A HORRIBLE AFFAIR.
Doomed Man Fastened to a Stake and
oil-Saturated Fuel Piled Abont Him
Wretch Had Attacked Miss Eva
Roth-Suspected of Another Crime.

Wretch Had Attacked Miss Eva
Roth-Suspected of Another Crime.
Five thousand Infatuated men storm
Ell the county Jail in Leavenworth, Kan,
Tuesday afternoon. took from it Fred
Alexander, a negro, and burned him at
the stake. Alexander was under arrest
for an attempted assault ON Miss Eva
Roth and was suspected of having as
saulted and murdered Miss Pearl Forbes
last November.
The negro was taken from his cell at
the State peniscntiary ut 3 o'clock in
the afternoon aud loaded into back and
taken 10 Leavenworth, Fifty deputy
marshals surrounded him and Deputy
Sheriffs Stancemyers and Tom Brown
sat n the hack on either side of him.
There were fifty buggies and wagons in
the pi, ,ession which followed the hack
in. and it was funeral march indeed for
Fred Alexander. The trip to town was
made quietly and there was no attempt to
create disturbance on the road.
Entrance to the Jail was effected by
steel rails and iron bars. with which the
mob battered in the doors and wrenched
the cell doors AND gratings from their
fastenings. Sheriff Eyerhards was call
ed upon TO surrender the negro, but re-
fused. The mob was prepared for this
action ON his part, and in minute the
steel rails, propelled as battering rams
by the united strength of hundreds OF
determined and bloodthirsty men, began
a resistless attack on the Jail doors. One
after another the barriers gave way to
the onslaught and in less than fifteen
minutes the trembling Legro was in the
clutches of his captors,
The punishment melted out to Aivxan-
der was idell zeal with that administered
by Colorado mob last November to an
other negro. Preston Porter. The details
Of Pofter's execution were fresh in the
minds of Leavenworth's people, and as
Alexander was accused of precisely a
similar crime his punishment was made u
replica of the Colorado affair
He taken to the scene of his alleg
cd victims death, fastened by chains &c
an iron stake driven in the ground, fuel
was then piled around him and saturated
with oil and the father of his alleged vic
tim given the privilege of putting the
torch to his funeral pyre. Alexander
Iaade ~ resistance after once dragged to
the stake and only kept saying: You are
killing the wrong man"
While preparations were being made
for the execution there stood on box
across the street a woman of 20. She
lad stood at the door of the penitent AIRY
and had said, "That is the man." as she
saw Warden TomlinSon pioduce AleXan-
der. That is the man. she said, who
assaulted me-" The crowd had heard her
evidence. That evidence was the negro :
sentence and the mob was carrying it out.
BY ) o'clock the stake was declared
ready. 1t was the -rork of but a few
moments for half a dozen men to haul
Alexander from the wagon up the four
foot bank of cordwood, and to fasten a
lhain about his chest and another about
lis feet to the rail. Then came the coal
oil. 1t was poured on his head and
splashcd upon the core wood.
More. Good! Light it," were the
| cries.
Confess, for a last time" said rugged
| old Mr.. Forbes, determined to finish the
| tragedy he had set ont to witness, but
| anxious to have conviction that he was
about to help kill the man who had killed
| his daughter
II aint got thing to confess
"Then you are off for hell was his
| answer.
wait. Let me see my mother Let
me shake hands with my friends. see
lots of them here But the oil was all
poured and the match was ignited. In n
moment there was a flicker, fame. the
head of the negro waved from side to
side az the flames jumped 10 meet it. a
fiendish roar burst from the multitude.
AleXanders mother was the only one
noticed crying. She was taken away by
her negro friends before the match was
applied.
In less than FIVE minutes he was hang
ing limp and lifeless by the chains that
bound him. As soon as the crowd saw
that lie was extinct it began slowly to
dispose.
When. two hours later. the fire had died
down sufficiently to allow the crowd TO
approach what remained of Alexander,
there was a wild scramble to obtain
relies bits of charred flesh, pieces of
chain scraps Of wood-eyerything that
could possibly serve as souvenir. was
seized on with morbid eagerness.