Audubon County journal. (Exira, Iowa) 1884-1993, 1901-01-17
DIES AT TIE STAKE.
FRED ALEXANDER LYNCHED BY A MOB
AT LEAVEiIWORTH.
Negro Dragged to Scene of His Crime,
Coal Oil Poured Over His Body and Set
Afire--Eight Thousand Persons Witness
the Lynching.


Aire--Eight Thousand Persons Witness
the Lynchin-.
LeavenWorth, Kan, Jan. 16.-Fred
Alexander, the negro who Saturday
evening attempted to assault Miss Eva
Roth, and who was supposed to have
assaulted and kill Pearl Forbes in
this city in November last, was yester-
day afternoon taken from Jail and
burned to the stake at the scene of his
crime, half dozen blocks from the
center of the city. Probably 5000
people witnessed the lynching The
wretch protested his innocence to the
last
Alexander was brought to the city
from the penitentiary at Lansing at
4:3O p. m. and placed in the county
Jail. The citizens gathered in great
numbers and finding peaceable en-
trance to the Jail impossible, armed
themselves with railroad irons. The
Jail doors We're battered down and AL
eXander dragged to the scene of his
crime, followed by hundreds Of howl
ing, frenzie2 men and boys. Arrived
into the ground and the negro fast
ened to it with chains. Then coal oil
was poured over his body.
Before the match was applied John
Forbes, the father of the murdered
girl, stepped up to Alexander and said:
care you guilty of numbering my
daughterF'
81 don't know what you have me
here for" said the doomed man.
Forbes replied: For killing my
girl on this very spot"
''Mr. Forbes, if that's your name
you have the wrong man."
! Burn him, burn him." cried the
crowd.
Gentlemen, you have got lots OF
time said Alexander. you're burn
ing an innocent man. You took advan-
tage of me. You gave me no show.
Can see my mother?'
a man in the crowd called for the
mother, but she was not in the crowd
He then said: 'NNill you let me
shake hands with all my friends?"
you have no friends in this crowd
you damned beast" said one of the
men in charge of the negro eff you
have anything to say, do so in Il
hurry"
Another man then stepped up and
said to Alexander: make your peac"
with your God, niger, for you will
surely die
Forbes Applies the Match.
Coal oil was then applied for the
second time, and while it was being
done, Alexander called to friends In
the crowd and told them good bye He
did not seem to realize that he was
TO be burned at the stake, and talked
nationally until John Forbes. the
father Of the murdered girl. lighted
the match.
Again Alexander was asked to make
confession, but he replied that he
had nothing to say
AS the flames leaped about him. Al
eXander turned CHASTITY pale. and for
the first time realized that his death
was near. He clasped his hands to-
gether, and began to swing to and fro
while the crowd yelled. In less than
five minutes he was hanging linn and
lifeless by the chains that bound him.
As soon as the crowd saw that life
was extinct, it began to slowly dis
perse. There were hundreds of the
morbid, however, who STAYED TO the
last. Men kept piling on wood all the
time, until about O'Clock, when the
flames were allowed to die down.
From 6 until O'Clock there was a
continuous stream OF people going to
the scene OF the burning. These were
persons who had been unable to get
away from their work in the afternoon
but were determined not to miss see
ing the awful spectacle.
When the fire had died down suf
ficiently to allow the crowd TO an
! nroach what remained of Alexander.