Rensselaer Republican, Volume 23, Number 23, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 February 1891 — SHOT DOWN IN THEIR CABIN. [ARTICLE]

SHOT DOWN IN THEIR CABIN.

Faur Negroes Kill'a and Five Severely Wounded in Walker County, Alabama. Four negroes were shot dead and five others severely wounded, three of them perhaps fatally, at Carbon Hill mines, in Walker county, Ala., last Friday. The offense of the dead and wounded ‘negroes thus far ascertained is that they took the places of white miners during the strike, and when the strike was settled the company would not discharge them. The negroes were surrounded while asleep in their cabin and shot down before they could escape or offer resistance. White miners are suspected of the crime,-batr there seems no evidence against any of them, as at last accounts no arrests had been made. The wounded negroes say the men who shot them down were white, but they are unable to identify any of them. It is believed another deadly conflict be* tween white and colored miners will take place. Repeating rifles and cartridges in large numbers have been ordered by both sides. It is reported that the officers o' the company operating the mines have announced that they Will all protect colored miners in the territory. Thisjnay pr even further bloodshed, but it is doubtful. A very bitter feeling is said to exist between the white miners aud the negroes who were put to work during the strike. The ! shooting of nine of tbeir number has raised I the other colored men to the fighting point. The men shot all worked together and oc« cupied the same cabin at night. About midnight it was surrounded and the doors and windows broken open, and, as they leaped out of bed,a storm of bullets poured in upon them. None of the negroes was armed, and they were all shot down inside their cabin. Telegraphic advices received later from the operator, at Carbon Hill, say, “Wil 1 i Murray, a white miner, shot and instantly killed .Tames Guttery, a woll-be-haved negro, last night, st Galloway. The negro lay where he fell until this morning, when he was buried by the Mayor.” Although it is not so stated, tlrs appears to be a continuation of the troubles of Friday night when the negroes were attacked in their cabins. It is this last development which caused Governor Jones to send troops from this place. Mr. Robert Galloway, one|of the owners of the mines at Carbon Hill, Ala., said to a reporter, on the Ist, in regard to the reported troubles at the mines: “Thesecut rages are the work of an element that knows no law, that has terrorized that par of Walker County for the past three years and has no regard for human life. The powers of the county officials seem limited. but the time has come for the State of Alabama to crush out this class.