People's Pilot, Volume 2, Number 51, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 9 June 1893 — LYNCHED. [ARTICLE]

LYNCHED.

A Colored Brute Suffers from a Mob's Vengeance at Decatur, Ill.—Taken from Jail and Hanged—The Action of the Mob Denounced by Gov. Altgeld, Who Offers a Reward for the Perpetrators of the Deed. DECATUR, Ill., June 5.— Sam Bush, the negro arrested near Windsor early Friday morning for outraging Mrs. Vest, of Mount Zion township, was lynched at 3 a. m. Saturday. There were threats heard early Friday evening, but a scout sent out by the officers to Mount Zion returned with the information that the people were quiet and had no intention of coming to Decatur. Nevertheless a guard of twelve men was put in the jail and an extra force of men was put on duty outside. About 500 curious people stood around the jail all night, though most of them thought no serious attempt would be made to take the prisoner out. At just 2 o’clock twenty-five men came on a rush up Wood street. They were quiet, without masks, and moved in a solid body. They forced their way through the crowd and knocked on the door of the jail. Deputy Sheriff Midkiff and Special Officer Foster sat just inside and refused them admission. One blow from a sledge crashed in the wooden door, and the two officers were surrounded by twenty-five armed men. The keys of the jail were demanded, but both officers declared they did not have them. The men then went to work with sledge hammers and chisels on the outside door. It was of solid cast-iron an inch thick. Twenty minutes elapsed before it was forced. Meanwhile the crowd of Decatur people stood outside quietly. No one seemed to care much. There was no talk of resistance and the officers were not upbraided for making no more objection. When the first door was opened another one of steel bars held them another twenty minutes. There was only an occasional yell, and altogether it seemed to be a quiet attack on a jail. The next bars across the corridor were forced, and with them a lock that opened all the cells.

A frightened negro inside pointed out Bush’s cell. Three men rushed in and found it apparently empty. They jerked over the mattress, then lifted it up and tumbled out the negro. He had crawled inside. All day Friday Bush shook with fear. Now he seemed cooler than at any time before. “Gentlemen, you are killing an innocent man,” he said. He was dragged up into the jail office. So many men stood around that it took five minutes to pull him through the crowd to the street. All this time Bush said nothing, but the crowd yelled excitedly. News of the attack on the jail seemed to have spread over the town, and 1,500 people were there. In front of the jail is a telegraph post. A drive towards that was made, but the lynchers finally went to one about 600 yards away, on one of the most prominent corners in the city, and directly in front of the courthouse. An arc light made the street intersection as light as day. A rope made of halter straps had been put around the negro’s neck. When the crowd stopped at the foot of the pole the victim asked for time to pray. The men said: “Give him all the time he wants.” He knelt down on the bricks and began to pray in a sing-song way, calling on Jesus to come and take his soul and forgive the men who were murdering him. He did not beg or cry as he had done when first arrested, but seemed to make up his mind he must die, and prayed disconnectedly full ten minutes, while a thousand people crowded around as close together as they could be. There were side jests, and not a single soul seemed impressed with the awfulness of the scene. Finally the spectators began to get impatient. A man had climbed half way up the pole and stood in the glare of the light all the time. “Cut that short,” he said; “he gave those women no time.’’ Others took up the cry. “Hang him; he’s prayed enough.” “Let him go,” was yelled. The rope was passed to the man on the pole, he put it over a guide wire, and the crowd pulled. The negro’s body, now naked as the day it was born, swung up into sight 4 feet from the ground and fell back. The negro uttered no sound. A few in the crowd groaned, while others yelled. Then a hack was driven into the crowd against the protests of the cab-man. The negro was told to stand up on it. He refused, when half a dozen hands threw him up and then held him while the rope was tied to the cross arm on the pole. The hack was then driven away and the body fell with the man’s toes not 2 feet from the ground. It was then just 3:07 a. m. Two doctors walked up and held the pulse, and pronounced him dead in two minutes. The neck was not broken. The body was cut down by Coroner Bendure at 3:40 a. m. The rope was cut up and divided among the crowd around. The Mount Zion men left for home as soon as the negro was pronounced dead. A dispatch from Springfield says that Gov. Altgeld has issued a proclamation denouncing the lynching as a cowardly and diabolical act, as murder, and as a blot upon the fair name of the state. He declares the men who were engaged in it must be punished and offers a reward of $200 each for their apprehension and conviction.