The Laurens Riot took place October 20, 1870, the day after the general election, and racial and political tensions in post-War South Carolina were bound to boil over somewhere. The account of the Laurens Riot is found here, but the aftermath was even darker. Here is the story:
By
nightfall the whole thing seemed to be over, that is until riders from
surrounding counties and outlying areas came into Laurens and into the barrooms
in Clinton,[1] having
heard the rumors flying of race war.
However, Leland says, “as to the number of these armed men thus assembled, there has been much exaggeration. It can be safely asserted that no time after the row, were there more than three hundred nonresidents in the town, at one and the same time. Most of these, as soon as they saw that their services were not needed, quietly turned their horses' heads the way they had come.[2] Nevertheless, Laurens resident J.N. Wright and carpetbagger Erastus W. Everson claim that by eleven o'clock that evening there were 4,000‑5,000 mounted men all around town from the surrounding area.[3] The whites tore Joe Crews' office on the courthouse square to pieces.
However, Leland says, “as to the number of these armed men thus assembled, there has been much exaggeration. It can be safely asserted that no time after the row, were there more than three hundred nonresidents in the town, at one and the same time. Most of these, as soon as they saw that their services were not needed, quietly turned their horses' heads the way they had come.[2] Nevertheless, Laurens resident J.N. Wright and carpetbagger Erastus W. Everson claim that by eleven o'clock that evening there were 4,000‑5,000 mounted men all around town from the surrounding area.[3] The whites tore Joe Crews' office on the courthouse square to pieces.
"Volney Powell, a handsome
young white carpetbagger constable from Ohio, who had been elected Probate
Judge the day before, and Bill Riley (Reily), a prominent negro Republican, set
out for Newberry in the direction taken by a company of United States
regulars" who had left Laurens at four that morning. They intended to
bring them back to Laurens to enforce the peace. Armed men caught Powell and
Riley three miles from Laurens at Milam's (or Milton's) trestle and
buckshot them to death.
buckshot them to death.
Two Negroes were found shot to death
in the Rocky Springs community. Black state representative Wade Perrin (R), re-elected
the day before to the SC House, was indeed assassinated below Martin's Depot
(Joanna) near the railroad and county line. His body lay in the road a day
later as many Republicans fled toward Columbia. On his way to
Newberry, Everson saw Rep. Wade Perrin’s body in the road with his pockets
turned out. They stopped in at Dr. Francis’ medical practice and asked him to
call the coroner.[4]
Meanwhile in Laurens the two
thousand or more mounted men, in search of a good time since they had ridden so
far, turned the riot "into a negro chase." "By every highway
approaching the village they could be heard riding and yelling all night long.
. . It was two or three days before they [the negroes] began to steal out of
the woods and swamps."[5]Four miles
west of Laurens a man considered an obnoxious negro was taken from a cabin
where he had sought refuge and was "so maltreated that he died a few days
later. The body of another negro was found, stark and stiff, on the side of the
public road [near Clinton], with no indication to show the manner of his
death."[6] The
Laurens citizens were outraged at the armed men from the other counties intent
on punishing the blacks. Leland calls them a "handful of ruffians,"
and insists "there is no evidence that they even belonged to the
county."[7]
[1]Leland, p. 61.
[2]Leland, p. 62.
[3]J.N. Wright, "Some Recollections
of 1870, 1871, and 1872," (Unpublished, June 21, 1918), p. 2. "Colonel
T.W. Woodward of Fairfield who was a terror to the ruling powers, kept his club
of 100 mounted men in their saddles at Winnsboro waiting to see if they would
be needed.", Everson Testimony, Ku
Klux Report, 346.
[4] Ku
Klux Report, 330-349; 1307.
[5]Ball, A Boy's, p. 4.
[6]Jacobs, Life, pp. 88‑89;
Leland, pp. 62‑ 63; Ball, A Boy's, pp. 3‑4; Daily Phoenix,
October 25, 1870. The Phoenix estimates the mounties at 2,000 to 2,500 men. Leland
tells of speculation that the great number of murders occurring on the highway
next to the railroad may have been done by one party going home to Newberry County,
and they may have been searching for Crews who would have fled in the direction
of his friends in Columbia.
[7]Leland, pp. 62‑63. He continues: "And
even if they did [belong to the county], what county is there, north, south,
east or west, which cannot furnish rowdies enough to perpetrate all that was
done in Laurens, in a time, too, of excitement the most intense?"
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