The Arkansas Peons
A brief prepared by Scipio Jones reviewing the case for
presentation to the Supreme Court of the United States.
Your petitioners, Frank Moore, Ed. Hicks, J. E. Knox, Ed. Coleman and Paul Hall state that they are
citizens and residents of the State of Arkansas, and are now residing in Little Rock, confined in the
Arkansas State Penitentiary, in the Western Division of the Eastern District of Arkansas, within the
jurisdiction of the court; that the defendant is the keeper of the said Arkansas State Penitentiary, and as
such is unlawfully restraining your petitioners of their liberty, and will, unless prevented from so doing by
the issuance of the writ herein prayed for, deprive them of their life on the 23rd day of Sept., 1921, in
violation of the Constitution and laws of the Untied States, and the Constitution and laws of the State of
Arkansas.
Petitioners further say that they are Negroes, of African descent, black in color, and that prior to the times
hereinafter mentioned were citizens and residents of Phillips County, Arkansas, at Elaine; that on the —
day of October, 1919, they were arrested, placed in the Phillips County jail and thereafter until their trial
were kept in close confinement upon an alleged charge of murder in the first degree for the killing of one
Clinton Lee, a white man, said to have occurred on the 1st day of October, 1919; that said Clinton Lee was
killed, as they are informed, while a member of a posse of white men who were said to be attempting to
quell a race riot, growing out of the killing of W. A. Adkins on the night of September 30, 1919, at Hoop
Spur in said County and State; that said Adkins was killed, as they are advised, under these circumstances
and conditions: Petitioners and a large number of the members of their race were peaceably and lawfully
assembled in their church house at or near Hoop Spur, with no unlawful purpose in view, and with no
desire or purpose to injure or do any wrong to any one; that while they were thus assembled, white
persons began firing guns or pistols from the outside into and through said church house, through the
windows and shooting the lights out therein, causing a great disturbance and stampede of those assembled
therein; that the white persons so firing on said church came there in automobiles, of which there were
several, and came for the purpose of breaking up said meeting; that said Adkins was killed either by
members of his own party or by some other persons unknown to your petitioners; that the white men sent
out the word to Helena, the county seat, that said Adkins had been killed by the Negroes, shot down in
cold blood while on a peaceable mission, by an armed force of Negroes, assembled at the church, which
caused great excitement all over the City of Helena and Phillips County; that the report of said killing
spread like wild-fire into other counties, all over the State of Arkansas, and into other States, notably the
State of Mississippi; that early the next day a large number of white men of said County armed
themselves and rushed to the scene of [the] trouble and to adjacent regions, the vicinity of Elaine being
one of them, and began the indiscriminate hunting down, shooting and killing of Negroes; that in a short
time white men from adjoining counties and from the State of Mississippi likewise armed themselves,
rushed to the scene of the trouble and began the indiscriminate shooting down of Negroes, both men and
women, particularly the posse from the State of Mississippi, who shot down in cold blood innocent Negro
men and women, many of whom were at the time in the fields picking cotton; that highly inflammable
articles were published in the press of Arkansas and especially of Helena and throughout the United
States, in which the trouble was variously called a “race riot,” “an uprising of the Negroes,” and a
“deliberately planned insurrection among the Negroes against the whites” of that part of Phillips County;
that the officers of Phillips County, especially the Sheriff, called upon the Governor of the State, and the
Governor in turn called upon the Commanding Officer at Camp Pike for a large number of the United
States soldiers to assist the citizens in quelling the so-called “race riot”, “uprising”, or “insurrection”; that
a company of soldiers was dispatched to the scene of the trouble who took charge of the situation and
finally succeeded in stopping the slaughter.