Crime

An inquiry into the death of Will Brown.

We read of the murder of Will Brown here. Below, the conclusion and transcripts of the coroner’s inquest. 

Frank Tart shot Brown near the railroad near Stantonsburg. Witnesses to the crime included five black and three white men. Two years earlier, Otto King, who was found to be an accessory after the fact to Brown’s killing, and his brother Lum King had been involved in a non-fatal shooting that also involved gambling, and Otto King himself was murdered in 1924.

Bob Hall, being duly sworn says I was up the RR on Saturday afternoon near sunset. While up the road I saw Will Brown, Frank Tart, Otto King, Will Edwards, Josh Fleming, gambling playing skin. I saw standing around the gambling crowd. Columbus King & Hagans. I staid there not over 15 minutes. Will Edwards owed me $2.00 and I went for that. As soon as I could get it, I left. While I was there, Will Brown seem to be winning the money. I saw Frank Tart change his pistol from his hip pocket and put it into his side pants pocket. Did not hear pistol shot as I had left before the shooting occurred. /s/ Bob Hall

Peter Ward, being sworn says that Frank Tart and Otto King came to my house Saturday night about 8 o’clock. Staid there until about 9:30 and on leaving told me told me that they were going to Gray Tart. Otto King come to Stantonsburg with me said that he wanted to see Josh Fleming. That Josh had his pistol. I come to Stantonsburg, and Otto come with me. I do not know that he got out of the buggy. [Illegible] Lum told me that Frank Tart shot a man. I told him [illegible] Lum that Frank Tart was at my house. Peter (X) Ward

Josh Fleming, being sworn says that “at or about the time of the killing I was about 150 years from the scene of the homicide at the time. I heard the pistol shot. I saw Columbus King and Otto King come running from the direction of the place of the homicide and from the direction I heard the pistol shot. I asked Otto King who it was shot and Otto King said that Frank Tart had shot a fellow Will, but did not know what Will. Columbus King and Otto King both come to the stable where Frank Tart’s horse was, got the horse and buggy and drove off. I came back to Stantonsburg after the policeman Mr. Stancill. I went back with the crowd to the scene of the homicide. I saw a man shot by the name of Will Brown. /s/ Josh (X) Fleming

Josh Fleming, called to the stand later, says that previous to the shooting was in the woods with Frank Tart, Will Edwards, Otto King, Will Brown gambling. Louis Hagans, Columbus King was there but did not see them gamble. Will Brown was principal winner. I saw Will Brown have as much as twenty-two dollars. Josh (X) Fleming

Richard Stancil, being duly sworn says that Josh Fleming came for me and said that Frank Tart had shot a man down the Rail Road and I hurried as quickly as I could and when I got to the place where the shooting occurred I found no one there but the shot man Will Brown. He was lying near the Rail Road track. He was not dead at the time and I had him carried to the doctors office. /s/ Richard Stancil

Will Edwards being duly sworn says he was with Josh Fleming, Frank Tart, Otto King and William Brown gambling playing skin. Will Brown beat the boys out of the money and he got up and started towards the R.R. He had I know twenty dollars when Brown left the game busted. Mr. Ernest Hartley (white), Bob Hall, Louis Hagans, and Columbus King were on the grounds while the gambling was going on but did not gamble any. I was about 100 yards from the scene of the shooting. Heard the shot. Did not see any pistols. Do not know who shot Will Brown. When I heard the shot I was on R.R. in the woods going  towards home when the shot was fired, but left immediately for home. Will (X) Edwards

Ernest Hartley, being duly sworn says at the time of the shooting I was in the E Road about 30 years from the scene of the shooting. Did not know any one there except Will Brown the shot man. I was out hunting and come up to a crowd. They moved towards the R.R. and stopped and seemed to talking together. I saw one low chunky dark man take hold of Will Brown. About that time heard pistol shot. The pistol was in the hands of a tall yellow negro. Immediately after the pistol fired, saw the black negro bending over Will Brown as if her was searching Will Brown pockets. The crowd dispersed and I left for home. I was near Sunset when it occurred as well as I remember. I work with Mr. Ben Paschall at saw mill so did Will Brown. I think Brown was paid off Saturday afternoon. He had I think $7.00 or $8.00. I think he had some money on his person before being paid off.  /s/ Ernest Hartley

Columbus King, being duly sworn says I was down the Rail Road about 20 yards from the scene of the homicide. Heard the pistol shot. My brother Otto King came running towards me and said, “Let’s us go, Frank Tart has shot a man.” I asked my brother where Frank was — and my brother Otto say, “come on, I know where he is.” Me and my brother got Frank Tart’s horse and buggy and drove off towards Saratoga but when we got as far as Toisnot Swamp, Frank Tart came out of the woods and got on the buggy and put me out. They went on towards home, and I got in with George Edwards and rode home with him. I saw in the crowd when the shooting occurred Josh Fleming, Frank Tart, Otto King. I saw one white man at the scene of the shooting. Think he had on a brown hat.  Columbus (X) King

Dr. H.H. Powell, being duly sworn says that he came in his office about 7:30 Saturday February 14 1914. Found a man who was shot, and the bystanders said his name was Will Brown. He had a bullet wound in forehead. Penetrated the skull from which wound the brain was discharging. He was thus in a dying [illegible.] Died about 8:30. /s/ H.H. Powell

Punctuation added for clarity. Coroner’s Inquest (1914), Miscellaneous Records, Wilson County Records, North Carolina State Archives.

Lane Street Project: trespass.

Yeah. That’s exactly what you think it is. A car … all the way at the back fence of Vick Cemetery. This kind of trespass — and disrespect — continues to happen, though every vehicle that enters has to pass at least one granite pillar emblazoned with the cemetery’s name and climb a curb out of the paved parking lot. 

Vick Cemetery is a sacred space. Lane Street Project — and now the City’s Vick Cemetery Advisory Committee — are working hard to restore dignity to this place and raise awareness of its significance and history. We need the community’s help.

Sam Hall charged with B&E, theft.

Daily Journal (Wilmington, N.C.), 12 September 1871.

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In the 1850 census of North Side Neuse, Wayne County: Lucy Hall, 45, and children Sarah, 16, George, 15, Nathan, 13, Nicy, 10, Samuel, 3, and Esther Hall, 6, plus Alford Artis, 15, and John Artis, 14, and Rhoda Artis, 13, and her children Julia, 12, and Rheuben Artis, 10, plus Rufus Lane, 22.

In the 1860 census of Saratoga district, Wilson County: farm worker Noah Walker, 25; wife Polly, 21; and Samuel Hall, 13. The Walkers were white; Hall, “mulatto.”

In the 1870 census of Wilson township, Wilson County: brick maker Samuel Hall, 22; wife Caroline, 20; and children Donas, 3, and John, 2 months [next door to Wyatt and Nicey Lynch.]

In the 1880 census of Speights Bridge township, Greene County, N.C.: laborer Sam Hall, 32; wife Caroline, 32; and children John W., 10, Jane E., 8, Sam, 6, and Baby, 1.

In the 1900 census of Bulloch County, Georgia: woodcutter Sam Hall, 50; wife Caroline, 50, washerwoman; children Sam Jr., 24, George, 21, Emma, 19, and Minnie, 10; and daughter-in-law Fannie, 23, washerwoman. All but Fannie were born in North Carolina.

In the 1910 census of Bulloch County, Georgia: farmer Sam Hall, 65; wife Caroline, 63; son-in-law John Kennedey, 31; daughter Maria, 19; and their children Pearl, 2, and John, 3 months.

The Prince meets the law.

Wilson Daily Times, 13 March 1937.

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In the 1920 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 515 Warren, barber Andrew Pierce, 35; wife Loss, 35; and children Alice, 15, Mayzie [Boisy], 11, Hellen, 7, Benford, 5, and Ruby, 3.

In the 1930 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 1212 East Nash, Andrew Pearce, 44, barber; wife Lossie, 43, private family nurse; and children Boisy, 22, Hester, 17, Benford, 16, Ruby, 13, and Louise, 3.

In the 1940 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 707 Vance, Andrew Pierce, 55, nurse at home (usually barber); wife Lossie, 55, in hospital; daughters Alice, 35, and Hester, 27; sons Boise, 29, cafe [cook?], and Binford, 14; daughter Ruby, 19, “cook school;” and grandchildren Randolph, 9, and Montheal Foster, 7, and Mickey Pierce, 1.

In 1942, Benford Pierce registered for the World War II draft at the D.C. Reformatory, Lorton, Virginia. Per his registration card, he was born 31 March 1915 in Wilson; lived at 1231 W Street, N.W., Washington, D.C.; and his contact was mother Lossie Pierce, 538 East Nash Street, Wilson.

Sentenced to shovel dirt on the Western road.

Wilson Advance, 30 May 1884.

Justice was merciless in 1884. In a single week of May of that year, Inferior Court, which handled low-level misdemeanors and minor civil matters, heard 23 cases. Two black men were convicted and sentenced to the state penitentiary. As a practical matter, as revealed in this news brief, that meant brutal work on the Western North Carolina Railroad under North Carolina’s convict leasing system. Between 1870 and 1890, roughly 65% of North Carolina’s prison population, disproportionately black men, was forced to cut through mountain rock, lay tracks, and blast tunnels under lethal conditions. They faced frequent cave-ins and landslides, rock-blasting accidents, and outbreaks of serious disease.

Ephraim Perry was sentenced to serve two years for stealing a shovel, and Nathan Herring got five for taking a clock out of the “colored Methodist church,” i.e. Saint John A.M.E. Zion.

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  • Ephraim Perry — this possibly was the 26 year-old farm laborer Ephraim Perry listed in the 1870 census of Sparta township, Edgecombe County. In 1892, several years after his release from incarceration, Perry was arrested in Asheville on suspicion of theft.
  • Nathan Herring

Convicting White Caps.

As late as 1897, black men could still sit on Wilson County juries hearing cases charges brought against white men.

In State vs. Pharaoh Rowe, James Montgomery, J.V. Lamm, and John Bone, the jury included James J. Jones, Louis Townsend, Lee Moore, and Scott Johnson.

On 9 February 1897, the jury found the defendants guilty. They were White Caps, members of extralegal vigilante groups that targeted not only black people, but white people who flouted moral standards or otherwise defied the group norms.  Just months before this trial, Pharoah Rowe had been shot in the stomach when a band of his confederates sought to tear down the fence of a white Lucama man’s fence who had opposed a road project.

Wilson Advance, 11 February 1897.

In June 1896, a man who had been initiated into the White Caps by defendant James Montgomery testified that he had been told the group “was a good thing for the country, in that it saved expenses by attending to those who made themselves obnoxious to the community” and that “their signs were a peculiar whistling and the passing of the hand across the face.”

Montgomery’s good word notwithstanding, these vigilantes were looked down upon by Wilson County’s white elite, and the White Cap era seems to have been short-lived.

“They’re all working that way down there.”

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Wilson Daily Times, 1 March 1939.

It took me a minute to figure the alleged fraud out.

Southern Tobacco Company required its stemmers to process 25 pounds of tobacco per day. If they struggled to make quota, the company told them to bring in someone to help. (Southern President James I. Miller denied knowing anything, of course. Southern was an affiliate of J.I. Miller Tobacco Company and shared its South Tarboro Street facility.) The “buddy” was not officially employed by Southern, but worked under the actual employee’s name and Social Security number and got a cut of the employee’s pay. Everybody did it, workers insisted. The problem came when the buddies filed for unemployment benefits, claiming they had earned no wages. Moses Hodge had not reported that Theodore Bell had given him half of his paycheck, and the hammer dropped.

Five people were charged and found guilty of defrauding the Unemployment Compensation Commission.

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  • Mose Hodge — in the 1940 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 315 Finch, owned and valued at $600, tobacco company stemmer Moses Hodge, 27; wife Macy, 20, tobacco company stemmer; children Loula, 7, and Connie Lee, 2; and mother Lula, 71. In 1940, Moses Jack Hodge registered for the World War II draft in Wilson County. Per his registration card, he was born 22 October 1912 in Durham, N.C.; his contact was wife Macy Thompson Hodge; he lived at 315 Finch Street; and he worked for Farmers Oil Company, Barnes Street.
  • William Henry Thomas — in 1940, William Henry Thomas registered for the World War II draft in Wilson County. Per his registration card, he was born 21 August 1918 in Wilson; lived at 524 South Lodge Street; his contact was wife Margaret Obery Thomas; and he worked for Export Tobacco Company.
  • Burley Ford — in the 1930 census of Black Creek township, Wilson County: farmer Burley Ford, 27, and wife Mary, 28.
  • Lela Hines — in the 1940 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 208 South Vick, owned and valued at $1000, Raiford McPhail, 75, janitor at Fidelity building, widower; lodger Robert Sherdon, 50, carpenter; and lodger Lela Hines, 45, laundress at laundry.
  • Emma Crosland
  • Theodore Bell 
  • William “Tweet” Ellis
  • Cleo Barber — in the 1940 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 6-8 Daniel, rented for $7/month, Sam Clarke, 32, electrician at “town department”; Cleo Barber, 29, lodger, tobacco factory hanger; and “lodger’s son” Maskar Barber, 13.

Four guilty of gambling.

Wilson Advance, 16 June 1892.

Judgment was suspended against Arthur Young, but James Eatman, Wiley Simms, and Mack Dozier were sentenced to serve two months in jail to be followed by a period in which jail officials could hire out their labor.

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  • James Eatman
  • Wiley Simms
  • Arthur Young
  • Mack Dozier 

In the 1900 census of Wilson, Wilson County: painter Mack Dozier, 60; wife Elibeth, 48; children Julia, 17, and Sid, 15; and mother Charlotte, 69.

Mack Dozier died in Richmond, Virginia, on 28 February 1905 at the City Almshouse. Per his death certificate, he was 64 years old; was born in Wake County, N.C.; was married; and worked as a painter.