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A HISTORY OF THE COLFAX RIOT   

Facts Gathered from Eye Witnesses Correcting the Miss statement that it Was a
Massacre of Innocent Negroes by Whites Without Cause or Any Reasonable Grounds
of Justification

(Front the Colfax (La.) Chronicle, June 3, 1982

The following account of the Colfax riot contains such a glaring misstatement
of some of the occurrences on that memorable Easter Sunday of April 13, 1873,
and does such injustice to a majority of the whites who took part in that
unfortunate conflict, that, for the purpose of correction, we publish the
article entire.  It is from the N. O. Mascot of May 27, 1882.

***

During the summer of 1873, in the town of Colfax, parish of Grant, the nation
was thrilled by one of the most frightful massacres ever recorded in the
annals of this State.

According to the published statements of the time, a negro ring leader, named
Ward, undertook to take forcible possession of the parish offices of Grant,
and install negro incumbents, claiming to be elected in opposition to Judge
Rutland, and other white parish officers, who held commissions from W. P.
Kellogg, then Governor of Louisiana.

The testimony elicited at the trial of the case, before the U. S. District
Court in this city, was to the effect, that Ward and a gang of negroes claimed
to be legally elected officers of Grant parish, after taking forcible
possession in several instances, were finally by the infuriate whites, into a
building, formerly a sugar house in the town of Colfax, which was then use as
a court house.  This edifice was surrounded by the whites and the negroes who
attempted to escape were at once seized and stood in a long line, each being
securely pinioned.  After remaining in a standing position several hours the
signal was at last give, and the massacre commenced.  The row of negroes were
shot to pieces where they stood, and the slaughter becoming general, negroes
thourgtout the parish were shot on sight.  If the writer be not mistaken in
the summary, one hundred and twenty dusky corpses in one heap told of the
dismal story, and for days together the birds of prey in the parish feasted
upon negro carrion.  The individual directly responsible for this horrible
butchery, whose fiendish brain conceived the murder and who, with deliberate
deviltry, carried it into execution, is a person named to the Mascot by a
prominent Republican, who makes not the slightest objection to the use of his
name, and expressed to The Mascot his entire willingness to testify under oath
to the exact truth of the revelation he is about to make.  To quote
substantially the gentleman's very words, he said:

"One day in the spring of 1873, I was sitting in the office of W. P. Kellogg,
Governor of Louisiana, when Ward, a colored member of the Legislature, and a
colored political leader in Grant parish, entered the Governor's office, with
the commissions of the newly elected Republican parish officers, which had
just been received from the office of the Secretary of State.  I heard W. P.
Kellogg direct Ward to deliver those commissions to the parties designated, in
person, and say to each of them that he, Kellogg, expected them to take
possession of their offices and exercise their fullest functions, even if in
exerting their authority it were necessary to resort to violence.  I heard
Ward ask Kellogg if he were authorized to tell these men that they would be
sustained by the Executive of the State, and Kellogg replied, "If necessary I
will sustain them with the entire militia force under my command."  Ward had
scarcely left, when Judge Rutland, parish judge, and the Democratic leader in
Grant, made his appearance in the Governor's office.