News and Observer (Raleigh, N.C.), 6 September 1908.

This rundown of Superior Court cases reveals crazy times in the streets of Wilson. It’s not easy to determine which defendants were African-American, but:

Jack Rountree was charged with setting fire to the house of Jesse Howard (whose honorific “Mr.” was unusual for an African-American at the time.)

Josephine Blount and white madames Cora Duty, Mallie Paul, Rosa Holland, Gladys Moore, Nan Garrett, Fannie Burwell, Willie Bright, and Maud Kelly were charged with “maintaining ‘red light’ houses.” Blount, who operated from Samuel H. Vick‘s Orange Hotel, was already in jail, awaiting trial.

Gladys Moore, seated wearing boater, and Mallie Paul (or, perhaps, Paul and Moore). Arguably, Paul, who operated for decades, was the doyenne of Wilson’s red light district madames. Photo courtesy of Jim Gaddis.

The first of two “squads of blacklegs” charged with gambling — Jesse Taylor, Mid Farmer, Dock Atkinson, Wiley Dupree, John Lancaster, and Bud Bynum — was comprised of Black men.

George Rountree, probably. I have not been able to identify Abner Renfrow.