Lynching at Clapp's Factory, 09 JUN 1900: "...Some of the jurors [in the 1912 trail of four men for the lynching of T. Z. McELHANEY], several of whom were middle-aged or older, might have recalled a lynching that took place near Clapp's Factory in 1900. Many of the townspeople must have remembered it. Certainly Judge Price GILBERT, who was solicitor of the Chattahoochee Circuit at the time the lynching took place, would have recalled it. So would Solicitor George PALMER, most likely. "It happened in June, the lynching month in Columbus. The victim was Simon ADAMS, 19, a black farm laborer who had worked for Judge A. H. ALMOND in northern Muscogee County for three years. The ALMOND family was widely known in Columbus. ALMOND was, in reality, a farmer who was a justice of the peace in the Nances District. His 17-year-old daughter, Jessie, attended St. Elmo Institute in town, and there were a 10-year-old daughter and a teen-age[d] son as well. "In the first hour of Saturday, June 9, ADAMS was [allegedly] discovered trying to slip through a window into the bedroom of ALMOND's daughters. Jessie ALMOND was [supposedly] awakened by the sound of ADAMS' foot striking the floor by the window. She sent up an alarm. The girls fled from the room and ALMOND [allegedly] discovered ADAMS hiding in a closet in the girls' bedroom. [Transcriber's note: this man never had a trial and nor an opportunity to either tell his side of the story publicly or defend himself. Because the accused is presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law, according to the principals of our system of Justice in America, it would be unfair to portray this man as guilty of any crime. - jml] He was bound, at gunpoint, and a heavy iron chain was secured around his neck. At some time after first light, he was started along Hamilton Road toward Columbus 'in the hands of a trustworthy keeper,' not named but presumably ALMONDs teenage[d] son. "As reported in The Enquirer-Sun, it was initially understood that at Denson's store in Beallwood, ADAMS was seized by unnamed parties and hurried westward across the country, through Beallwood back of the YOUNG place, to the North Highlands woods by the Chattahoochee River, where he was lynched. "'It is said,' reported The Enquirer-Sun, 'that the Negro was thrown into the water at a rather swift place in the river and was told to swim for his life. It is understood that the iron chain was still around his neck, but notwithstanding this fact, he managed to keep above the water for a short while. As he struggled out in the stream the party fired at him. He was wounded, but began to dive. It is said that his last dive was some ten feet. As he came up this time, he is said to have been shot in the head, a bullet from a Winchester entering near the ear. He then sank to come to the top no more. The shot evidently killed him. It is possible that the chain will not be of sufficient weight to keep the body down, and that it will rise in the next day or two.' "Subsequently, although The Enquirer-Sun appears to have been able to substantiate its version of the lynching, it was learned that ADAMS was not taken by the lynchers from Denson's Store, but had been turned over to a Muscogee County bailiff for escort to town. The Enquirer-Sun's reporter tracked down the bailiff and asked him what happened. (Where the bailiff's comments are in italics [in *asterisks*], they are based on extensive indirect quotations recorded by the newspaper reporter.) "The bailiff said he had been at Denson's Store in Beallwood at around 8 o'clock on Saturday morning when he received instructions to go get ADAMS and carry him to jail in Columbus. The bailiff said he was told that ADAMS was over on the edge of the North Highlands woods, just west of the River Road. "*I went there and found the Negro with two or three persons about him,* the bailiff said. *A boy seemed to have him in charge. The boy asked me if I were an officer, and I told him that I was, and the Negro was turned over to me. I got in the wagon and began driving it through the woods toward the North Highlands pavilion.* "At this point the reporter interrupted and asked the bailiff why he did not go straight down the River Road to town instead of cutting through the woods. The bailiff said it was his idea to go around by North Highlands so as not to attract attention and slip his prisoner safely into the city. The reporter noted that the road the bailiff had chosen would have led only to the vicinity of the pavilion and stopped. [By 1908, there was an area known as North Highlands Park, and this pavilion may have been a feature of the park. - jml] "The bailiff said that, at that point, he was overtaken by a crowd of men who drew Winchester rifles on him and forced him to surrender his prisoner. "The Sun reporter asked him how many men had been in the lynching party. "*I dont know,* the bailiff replied, grinning. *At that moment, every man looked like three.* "Asked if he knew any of the men, the bailiff said: "*I didnt recognize anybody. I was more concerned with the guns than with the men behind them.* "It is not known if ADAMS' body was ever found, or if there was any effort on the part of local authorities to pursue the case. The only eyewitness who would talk was a black woman who had seen a group of white men early that morning at the point where Clapp's Creek empties into the Chattahoochee. She saw the men stop and take off their coats. Something in their manner frightened her and she ran. She did not see ADAMS. Later that day, someone reported having heard 15 to 20 gunshots from the direction of the North Highlands woods. That afternoon, about 20 empty shotgun, rifle and pistol shells were found on an island near Clapp's Factory. If these shells had anything to do with the lynching of Simon ADAMS, we do not know for certain. "There is much about the death of Simon ADAMS that we may never know, just as there is much we may never know about the deaths of Jesse SLATON, Will MILES, William CORNAKER, the Rev. Joseph HARDY, John CRUTCHFIELD, Belle HATHAWAY, Eugene HEMMING, John MOORE and all the rest of the victims of mob violence in the Columbus area and throughout the South and the nation. "However, by a curious stroke of fortune - it is preserved on a fading and rarely consulted strip of microfilm in the morgue of The Ledger-Enquirer - we know the name of the bailiff who had charge of the prisoner in the North Highland[s] woods that brilliantly clear Saturday morning, June 9, 1900. "It was A[aron] B[rewster] LAND." [Excerpted from "Incident at Wynn's Hill, Part Seven: Tale Passes Into Memory," by Bill Winn, in the "Columbus, GA, Ledger-Enquirer" newspaper, Saturday, 31 JAN 1987, pp. A-1 and A-4. A. Brewster LAND was my great-grandfather. - jml]