Document – Excerpt from the Testimony of a Black Voter about Klan Violence in South Carolina (1871)

Excerpts

1. Q. Were you a voter in York County?
2. A. Yes, sir.
3. Q. Vote at the last election?
4. A. Yes, sir.
5. Q. Are you twenty-one years of age?
6. A. Twenty-six.
7. Q. What ticket did you vote?
8. A. Voted the Radical ticket.
9. Q. Vote for Mr. Wallace?
10. A. Yes, sir.
11. Q. Now, tell the jury about the Ku Klux coming to your house last March, on the night that Jim Williams was killed; what they said and did and what you said, and all about it.
12. A. They came to my house on a Monday night ….
13. Q. Very well, tell what occurred.
14. A. They came to my house about ten o’clock, and I was in bed at that time; and I was asleep, and my wife she heard them before I did, and she shook me and woke me up, and told me she heard a mighty riding and walking, and said I had better get up, she thought it was Ku Klux. I jumped up, and put on my pantaloons, and stepped to the door, and looked out, and very close to the door I seen the men, and I stepped right back into the house; so when they knocked the door open they couldn’t see me; and they came in and called for me to give up my gun, and I says I has no gun; and when I spoke they all grabbed me, and taken me out into the yard.
15. Q. What sort of looking people were they?
16. A. They was all disguised, as far as I could see – they was all disguised, and struck me three licks over the head, and jobbed the blood out of me, right forninst my eye, with a pistol; and four of them walked around to Mr. Moore’s; and, when they started off, one touched the other, and said let’s go around, and see this man, and then the crowd that had me taken me to Mr. Moore’s, and asked Mr. Moore if I had a gun; and he said no, not that he knew of; and they asked me if I had a pistol, and he said no; they asked if I belonged to that company; he said no.
17. Q. What company?
18. A. Jim Williams’ company; asked him was I a bad boy, and run about into any devilment; he said no; I was a very fine boy, as far as he knew; they asked how I voted; he said I voted the Radical ticket; they says, “There, G—d d—n you, I’ll kill you for that”; they took me on out in the lane, and says, “come out and talk to Number 6”; they locked arms with me, and one took me by the collar, and put a gun agin me, and marched me out to Number 6; when I went out there, he was sitting on his horse; I walked up to him; he bowed his head down to me, (illustrating with a very low bow), and says, “How do you do,” and horned me in the breast with his horns; had horns on the head about so long, (indicating about two feet;) I jumped back from him, and they punched me, and said, “Stand up to him, G—d d—n you, and talk to him.” I told them I would do so; he told me that he wanted me to tell him who had guns.
19. Q. Who said that?
20. A. No. 6; I told him I knew a heap that had guns, but hadn’t them now; they had done give them up; well, says he, ain’t Jim Williams got the guns? I says I heard folks say that he has them, but I do not know whether he has them or not. Then he says to me: “We want you to go and show ups to where his house is; if you don’t show us to where his house is we will kill you;” and then one looked up to the moon and says: “Don’t tarry here too long with this d—n n–; we have to get back to hell before daybreak. It won’t do to tarry here too long.” Says he, “get on.” There was a man standing to the right of me with his beast; his head was turned from me; I stepped around and got on behind him and rode on around until they turned towards the school house, about sixty yards down the road, and he asked me did I want to go, and I told him no. Says I, the fix I am in, if you don’t do anything to me, may kill me. I hadn’t nothing on but a shirt, pantaloons and drawers. They started in a lope then, and he hollowed to No. 6 that he could not keep up, that I was too heavy. Says he, “this God damned n—is too heavy.” No. 6 hollows back to him, “let him down,” and he rode close enough to the fence so that I could get down, and I stepped off; says he, “you go home and go to bed, and if you are not there when we come along, we will kill you the next time we call on you; we are going to kill Williams, and we are going to kill all these damned n—s that votes the Radical ticket; run, God damn you, run.” I ran into the yard, and I heard somebody talking near the store, and I slipped up beside the palings, and it was Dr. Love and Andy Lindsey tallying, and Love seen me, and says, “Gadsden, did they hurt you?” “No,” says I, “not much; they punched the blood out in two places, and knocked me two or three times about the head, but they did not hurt me very much.” Says he, “you go to bed and I don’t think they will trouble you very much.” I went home and put on my clothes … and I waked the others up, and we all went out into the old field and laid there until the chickens crowed for day, and went back to Mr. Moore’s, near the house, and lay there till clear daylight, and I goes into the yard there, and Mr. Moore came to me and looked over my face and seen where they had punched the blood out of me, and says then for me to go on to my work and make myself easy, that they should not come and bother me any more; I never seen any more of them after that.”
21. Q. Now, what time the next day did you learn that Jim Williams was dead?
22. A. It was about 8 o’clock, when I heard of it.
23. Q. Did you go down near him?
24. A. No, sir; I didn’t go. I was busy employed, and didn’t go. I didn’t quit my work to go. I was working at the mill, and some come there to the mill very early that morning and told it ….
25. Q. Jim Williams was killed that night, was he?
26. A. Yes, sir. He was killed that night