The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1910-10-06
FIRED into HOUSE
Negro Puts Handful OF Rifle
Slugs on Governors Desk.
G. A. Williams Says They We're
Fired Tuesday Night.
APPEALS FOR HELP.
Asks Executive to Protect Him
From Pratt Citizens.
Says He Can Not Occupy Own
Home.

H. A. Williams, a negro farmer who
recently bought a residence in Pratt
and moved to that town from the
country, came to Topeka today to try
to get the governor or attorney general
to bring proceedings against the aIleg-
ed mob of white men composed of his
new neighbors, who fired on his house
Tuesday night. Williams claims that
the county authorities have failed to
take any steps to apprehend the guilty
parties, although there is plenty of evil
dence to lead to their identity.
Last August Williams who is a we'll
to-do and respectable appearing negro,
bought a house in the residence sec
ton of Pratt about three blocks from
the poStoffice. Joe Lees. the rural mail
carrier, sold him the property. When
Williams started to move into his pro-
perty he was threatened by his new
neighbors, he says, and warned to keep
away from his own property. Early in
september he was visited by a delega-
tion of these neighbors, or citizens and
told that he could not live in that
neighborhood- He came to Topeka then
to Complain to the state authorities
about the matter and his story was
given some publicity at the time
Now he comes to the governor and
shows handful of rifle slugs that he
picked up inside of his house and found
imbeded in the furniture and walls af-
ter a bombardment on Tuesday night.
He tells a story that reads like an Al
ALBANIA race war. He says that the
crowd came to his house about mid
night and fired some 80 shots into the
dwelling and then went away.
Williams had moved his furniture
into the house Monday and expected
to move in with his family that night,
but the illness of his mother prevented
him from doing so. But he declares
that so far as the mob knew he might
have been in the house with his fam
lily and been killed by the fusillade of
bullets that tore through the house
and raked every room.
He went, he said to the county au-
thorities to complain in the matter,
but the county attorney told him, he
says, that he could do nothing for him.
The sheriff has not been near him.
Williams claims that he and his fam
lily are in danger and he wants the
governor to take steps to protect him
Governor Stubbs is out of town. Sec
retary Leahy sent Williams over to
the attorney generals office to get ad-
vice as to just what steps could be
taken in this matter by law.
Will Not Buy Him Out.
Williams claims that he paid $4,000
for the property. He offered to sell
it to the neighbors for $500 and
then later for $4,000, the price he
paid for it. But he declares that they
will not pay him that much. but that
they claim that he paid only S2,4O for
the property.
1t is a strange case and sounds
stranger still coming from a Kansas
town. 1t is true that there are a
great many towns in western Kan
sas where there are no negroes at
all, and a great many other towns
in that section, and even counties,
where only one or two families of ne
several negro families and there never
has never been any race trouble there
before.
Jesse Lees. the mail carrier who sold
the property to the negro, was threat
ened at first by his old neighbors, so
it is reported. and he went to Harry
Bone, United States district attorney,
and asked what he could do for pro-
lection. The district attorney told him
that there was no law covering the
threats made in this case, but that if
he, a United States mail carrier was
run out of town, he, the district at
torney, would take a hand in the game.
Since then Lees has been let alone,
while the burden fell upon Williams,
the man with the deed to the property
in his pocket.
When Williams first complained at
the governors office Leahy sent a let
ter to the sheriff of Pratt county to in
quire if he was in any danger and the
reply was that he was not. Still, the
handful of slugs that Williams brought
here with him and that he found in
his house after the bombardment
would indicate that the protest against
his residence in the neighborhood had
passed the conversational stage.
Assistant Attorney Geenral Mar
shall said today that he did not know
just vet what steps his Office would
take in the matter. He did not seem
to regard that Williams was in danger
from mob violence and appeared to &c
disposed to leave the matter to the
local authorities.