Rensselaer Republican, Volume 21, Number 19, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 January 1889 — THE WAHALAK AFFAIR. [ARTICLE]

THE WAHALAK AFFAIR.

It is reported at Wahalak Miss., that three bands of five men each, whe have been hunting in the mountains for the negroesconcerned in the recent masr sacrehere, have killed four of them named Cheatman; Wilder, Maury and Stennis. Cheatman, was shot in his own yard while begging for his life; Maury -m his cotton gin, while conversing with the vigilantes, and Wilder who was a Union soldier and fought with Grant at Vicksburg, on the road to Wahalak. His body was buried in a shallow hole and stones w'ere piled upon the dirt Stennis «as found hiding in an abandoned house, where he had been nearly two weeks. He tried to defend himself with an axe, and was shot three times before he fell. Merchants in this county are protesting against these crimes and have urged the Sheriff toput a stop to them, especially as it is believed that the trouble is simply a local affair, growing put of the general bad feeling against the negroes, many of whom own farms of their own. LaGrange county has spent $128,000 for public improvements and sloo,€oo for school houses since the war ~~ -