The independent. [volume] (Elizabeth City, N.C.) 1908-1936, 1929-01-11
'CAMDENCOUNTY
CORN BLAMED
FOR TRAGEDY
Co.n Liquor Furnished Negro
Timber Cutters Said to Have
Brought on Cutting and
Killing

Camden County Corn put one
Negro in a grave yard and put
Herman II. Owens, white, in the
Elizabeth City Hospital last Fri
day with a knife cut that will
leave a Iivid scar on his face from
ear to chin as long as the lives, ac-
cording to one version of Cam
den's latest tragedy.
Under the influence of liquor
white men and Negroes engaged in
rough play. The play became too
rough for one of the Negroes and
he resented it with knife. Jim
Gallop. Negro laborer slashed Her
man Overs face. Owens reached
for gun in the hands of a COM
panion and shot Gallop to death.
There are two versions of the
shooting. C. S. Staples, eye witness,
says that he employed Jim Gallop
and H. H. Hughes, two young
Negroes, to cut timber for him.
While they were cutting timber on
his farm, about two miles from
Shiloh, Herman Owens came along.
Owens was hunting. Owens and the
Negro Gallop had griendly wrest-
ling match. according to Staples, in
which Gallop was worsted.
Staples says that after the
wrestling incident, and while re-
turning home with Owens, he carry
ing Owens gun, Gallop suddenly
came upon them and attacked
Owens with knife. That Ovens
reached for his gun and first shot
at Gallops feet; that the shot did
not deter Gallop who rushed mad
ly upon him with the knife, where
upon Owens fired the shot that kill
ed. This is the story Staples tells.
But Shiloh Negroes tell another
story. According to their story,
Staples hired the Negroes Jim Gal
lop and H. II. Hughes under prom
ise to supply them plenty of liquor
while they were cutting timber for
him; that the liquor was supplied
and that Owens joined in the drink
ing when he appeared on the scene,
Enlivened by the liquo: there was
much rough play and Owens and
Gallop were each rough with the
other. More liquor was sent for
and there was more rough play and
a lot of argument. In the COM
motion Gallop was hit over the head
with the butt Of gun. This en-
ragged the Negro and his drunken
mind suddenly conjured up all the
insults and indignitieS heaped upon
Negroes by rough white men.
white folks always pickin' on
niggerS; niggers always git de worst
OF it: white folks think niggers was
ies made to pick on; niger jeS a
door mat fo' white folks to wipe dar
feet on" So unused Jim Gallop with
blood in his eye.
Only the night before he had lain
awake listening to an old Nanny
grooming a Negro spiritual that car
ried with it the burden of a black
mans woes in white mans world:
Nobody knows de troubles I see;
Nobody knows but Jesus
In his muidled mind suddenly ap-
peared an age long train of griev-
ances against white folks; white
men had been kicking, cutting and
mauling him all of his days; they
had kicked and cuffed and mauled
his ancestors before him. And mig
ger had to take everything from a
white man. Old niggers always
said:
"Bes way ter git along wifi white
folks is jes humour 'em and let 'em
have dey way; white folks do er lot
for er niger eff niger jest watch
he step and don't sass back"
But Jim's mind was hot and mud
c,led with liquor this day and his
head ached from a white mans
blow. Jim Gallop forgot all his
training as a menial in a white
mans world; his jungle nature as
serted itself all of the Negros age
long hatred of white oppression
was aroused in a moment. It was
then that he Used his knife.
There was not a time when Mr..
Staples could not have stopped the
row between his colored laborer and
his white neighbour, says the Hughes
Negro who saw the killing. But Mr..
Staples tells different story. 1t is
a white mans word against black
mans; and that means but ore
thing in Camden County-the same
thing it means in Pasquotank, for
instance.
Many ills are caused by loss of