The Ouachita Telegraph - Race Riot in Red River Parish Date: May 2000 Submitted by: Lora Peppers ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/la/lafiles.htm *********************************************** The Ouachita Telegraph Friday, September 4, 1874 Page 1, Column 6 THE BLACKS AT COUSHATA. Two Negroes and One White Man Killed. Yesterday very startling news reached this city from Red River parish. Mr. W. Hamilton received a letter from Mr. H.C. Stringfellow, dated the 28th, from Cotton Point, about twenty miles above Coushatta, stating that 800 armed negroes were below the latter place threatening the extermination of the whites. The latter stated that but two hundred whites were confronting them, and aid was needed, and the opinion ws expressed that a collision was imminent. Seventy-five men in this city with arms and equipments were immediately mounted in two bodies, one under commander H.C. Rogers and the other under Mr. N.B. Murff and dispatched toward Coushatta; while the steamer Clifford was got ready, commissary stores procured, and arrangements made to reinforce the cavalry with a hundred infantry who were to have left last night on the boat. Late in the afternoon we received an extra from the Reporter, of Mansfield, stating that the negroes were concentrating near Brownsville, about fifteen miles below Coushatta; that two negroes and one white man had been killed; that Mr. Joe Kickson had been shot and severely wounded, in Coushatta, by a squad of negroes; that twenty-five white men had left Mansfield, and a hundred and fifty would leave that night to reinforce our Red River parish friends. Previously we learned that forty men had gone down to Cotton Point and a hundred from Beard's Landing. During the day dispatches were sent us from Marshall, Jefferson and Longview, offering prompt assistance if needed. Late last evening, while preparations were going rapidly forward for the movement down the river of a large body of men, a courier arrived at the Times office with dispatches stating that the leaders of the radical party in Red River parish had been captured by the whites, and that the negroes discontented by the capture of their chief had rapidly disbanded. The following are the men who have been captured, and who doubtlessly at the instigation of Kellogg, got up the riot with a view of provoking the President to send troops to North Louisiana: F.S. Edgerton, Sheriff; H.T. Twitchell, Tax Collector; Clark Holland, Register; R.A. Dewees Tax Collector of DeSoto parish; Gilbert Cane, Deputy Clerk; W.H. Howell and — Scott. In addition to these six Negro chiefs were captured. The capture of these fellows put an end to the war, and a courier was immediately dispatched hither. The courier met the Shreveport men on the road, fifteen miles from town, and turned them back. One party arrived here about eight last night and the other will be here this morning. Any additional facts we may be able to obtain we will promptly lay before the public. The courier informed us that when he left the seat of war upwards of fifteen hundred white men, well armed, had concentrated there, and others were coming in, but couriers had been sent in every direction to turn them back. — Shreveport Times 30th ult. # # #