The Greenville times. [volume] (Greenville, Miss.) 1868-1917, 1903-10-31
GROWING PISTOL HABIT.

Sam L. hucks, one VI Ihe peeC
known commercial travellers going
from Memphis into the Mississippi
Delta, is authority for the statement
that in the past few months the de-
mand on the part Of the negroes for
pisols is greatly on the increase.
Ir. Rucks travels for the big Belknap
hardware house which sells all sorts
of firearms. In speaking to a re-
porter for The News about the pistol
trade he said:
Every often l have suggestions
from Tennesseens that l sell them
dill of pisols, and even though the
Tennessee act exempts army pistols
refuse to sell any here. No good can
ONE of such trade.
"But down i'll Mississippi the
pistol trade is on a boom. The IN
creased demand is almost entirely
among the negroes You may be sur
Jrised to hear it, but every negro who
Guys a pistol wants the best weapon
that can be made. He does not care
Tor the price so long as it is good
weapon.
"Of course this is a good thing for
us people who sell arms, but | am
more interested in the general vel
fare of the Delta than | am i'll the
sales of any one season. | am getting
really alarmed about the way the
negroes are arming themselves. In
many sections where they outnumber
the whites, it offers anything but
healthy condition. If clash should
come of even local character, the
would be serious and
many good white men might be
killed before the matter was finally
setteld. In addition to this, the armed
negro often takes shot with serious
which the unarmed ne
gro could not take.
at occurs to me that there should
be some concerted movement to pre-
vent the negroes from carrying arms
as they are now preparing to do. =
Memphis Mornine News.
We are not an alarmist, but we do
not believe in crying Peace, peace,
when there is no peace, and the
above from The News sounds warn
ing tha6 should be needed by our peo-
pie. And right in this connection
we may mention that one of Green
ville's prominent harness makers tolc
the writer some time ago that If the
people right here around our city
knew the number of orders he re-
ceived for making holsters for pistols
for negroes they would be very much
surprised and greatly alarmed.
But it is not the fear of race riots
so much as the fear of molestation OF
our unprotected homes by negroes
that haunts us, and it is useless to ar
que that we have not reason to be-
come more and moer fearful on this
account. The lack of courage pos
sessed by the negro when face to face
with "A white man who has his gun
leveled is proverbial, and squad OF
good white cracksmen can put to
fight hundreds of banded negroes.
Nearly every day we read OF impu-
dent nergoes in fits of anger wound
ing, if not killing, white men who OPP
pose them with the pistol, and gener-
ally it is the case that the white man
is acting as peacemaker in quarrels
among their own race.
LII the. sale of pistols to negroes is
not stopped the danger can not be
foretold and some law to prevent
this growing trade should be enacted
by the State Legislators. And in
the cities and towns it is the duty of
the peace officers to catch the pistol
toter and give him the full limit of
the law. Stringent measures must be
adopted to prevent this nefarious
trade before dire results follow.