Race Leader, Ferd. Barnett, In Duluth Defending His Race.
Type of event: Legal Proceedings
Location: Duluth; St. Louis County; Minnesota; United States
Document date:
Document type: Newspaper(s)
Documents: Race Leader, Ferd. Barnett, In Duluth Defending His Race.
Citation:
National Advocate, July 24,1920, page 1.
“Race Leader, Ferd. Barnett, In Duluth Defending His Race”
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RACE LEADER, FERD. BARNETT,
IN
DULUTH DEFENDING HIS RACE.
The Duluth grand jury which investigated the lynching horror, which shocked
the country on the 14th of June last returned indictments against
seven men charging them with rape. They were Max Mason, Clarence Greer, William
Miller, Loney Williams, Nate Gray, Louis Hayes, and Frank Spier. The remaining
six men held in prison since the lynching were declared not guilty by the grand
jury and were set at liberty Wednesday.
R. C. McCullough, who represented
all of the prisoners, secured the services of Hon. F. L. Barnett formerly for
fifteen years an assistant state attorney in Chicago, to assist as associate
council. Mr. Barnett arrived in Duluth Monday morning and with Mr. McCullough
started to make things hum. A call was made on the clerk of the county court for
copies of the indictments but as the men had not been arraigned the copies could
not be delivered. The lawyers then consulted County Attorney Greene and Judge
Cant, and arraignment was set for two o’clock.
Promptly at the hour
the seven indicted men were brought into court were called upon to plead and all
pleaded “not guilty.” The attorneys, R. C. McCullough of Duluth and
Hon. F. L. Barnett of Chicago, were entered as attorneys for all the prisoners,
and the hearing of the Habeas Corpus writ which was previously issued was set
for Friday morning.
Then the lawyers proceeded to secure the release of the
men whom the grand jury refused to indict. These were Eugene Jefferson, John
Thomas, Charles Harris, Norman Ousley, Albert Smalls, Earl Thomas. Necessary
records of the no bills and issue of discharges required some time but the time
was well used by the lawyers who called a few citizens together, Wm. M. Gibbs
and Spencer Russell of Chicago, and the Woman’s Welfare, and gave them the
task of securing clothes for the prisoners. Hon. McClure, Atty. at law; made
arrangements for these six men to have a place to stop as soon as released from
jail, a very happy number. These six will be witness at the trial of the
indicted men.
Mr. Barnett, in speaking about the case, said that the
lynching of the three colored men and the subsequent persecution of the other
fourteen men constituted a plot upon the fair name of the state. He said every
one of the seven men would be acquitted.
Mr. Barnett, while in the city, is
stopping with Attorney McCullough, 411 E. 4th st.