Wanton Murder, As It Is Applied in the Great State of Arkansas -- December 12, 2021

Rock Island Argus, 08-December-1921

The Cotton Belt was officially known as the St Louis Southwestern Railway. I covered up a word in the newspaper headline that I hope never to print in this blog. 

WANTON MURDER,

As It Is Applied in the Great State

of Arkansas.

ITS VICTIMS ARE FIVE "N*****S,"

Whose Only Fault Seems To Be That They Were Working for Their Living -- The Usual Talk of Bringing the Murderers to Justice

Little Rock, Ark., Dec. 8. -- A special to The Democrat from Malvern, Ark., says: What may be regarded as reliable information has Just reached here that on last Tuesday afternoon at a point about midway between Camden and Rearden, on the line of the Cotton Belt railroad occurred one of the foulest and most damnable massacres of negroes that has ever blackened the record of that locality. At the place mentioned a gang of section men composed principally of negroes, with a white foreman, was engaged in the labor of improving the road bed, when a gang of unknown persons made its appearance upon the scene and without warning began immediately to fire into the crowd of helpless and unsuspecting negroes, resulting in the death of five of them.

Have Heard the Same Story Before.

The foreman claims that he did not recognise any of the assassins. Many believe that he knows who they are, but on account of probability of personal danger to himself he is afraid to give out any information that would lead to their arrest. The section where these last murders occurred is occupied almost entirely by the mills and is filled with lawless characters. The sheriff of Ouachita county is exerting himself in every way possible to apprehend the guilty ones, and the Cotton Belt railroad company has offered a Belt Railroad company has offered a reward of $250 for the capture of the murderers. If they are captured it is believed the courts of Ouachita county will mete out swift justice to them.