The Terrible Fate Of An Interracial Couple In Lousiana

 

Jan. 11, 1896, the authorities of Jefferson Perish claim they are unable to discover the perpetrators of the arson and murder that killed Patrick Morris and his wife Lottie even though the couple’s 11-year-old son says he identified several members of the mob that killed his parents.

The Morris’ were an interracial couple who lived on a flatboat in the Continental Grain Company canal in Westwego Louisiana near the company’s large grain elevators. Patrick Morris worked for the railroad and the couple rented beds in their flatboat.

Whether it was just the interracial marriage and biracial child or something more has been lost to history. The local newspapers report that there was a large public outcry over the level of violence committed, however, they also make excuses for the crime. Among other things, they mention that Mrs. Lottie Morris was a rude and disrespectful woman and that the lodging of guests was illegal.

A mob of 20 men reportedly surrounded the home in the early morning hours and set it afire. When Mr. Morris came out the mob shot him a number of times. Young Patrick Morris Jr snuck out the back but was also shot at before he made it to the woods.

Mrs. Morris was found within the remains of the building, curiously her head had been separated from the body. There was no explanation for the violence committed against her. While it was said that the flatboat was used as a rooming house there was no one else there at the time.

Patrick Morris Jr was turned over to the New Orleans Waifs Home and there is no further record after reports of the grand jury. He appeared before the grand jury that was impaneled but everyone he named had a story and the jury refused to indict any adult based on the word of a child.

The Times-Picayune newspaper of New Orleans, Westwego is not far from the city and gives the most complete record of the incident with three stories over the span of a week. Even with several hundred words they could not explain what the disorderly conduct was that the neighbors were so upset over, nor were they able to get any authority to go on the record.

The Times-Picayune led their final story with, “to all appearances, the murder and cremation of Patrick Morris and his colored domestic partner had even been forgotten in Jefferson parish.” This appears to be the most honest statement in all their reporting. 

Sources:

https://www.newspapers.com/image/28193491/?terms=Patrick%20Morris&match=1

https://www.newspapers.com/image/28193755/?terms=Patrick%20Morris&match=1

November 23, 1887: The Thibodaux Massacre and the Crushing of Black Unions

A farmworkers union was a challenging concept for anyone to accept in 1887 but especially for White landowners employing Black laborers. On Nov. 23, 1887, the idea led to one of the worst racial/labor massacres in United States history.

In the “Sugar Bowl” area of Louisiana, encompassing St. Mary, Terrebonne, and Lafourche parishes, sugar cane was cut and pressed by black laborers who were trapped by being paid only in company script and Thibodaux, the town at the center of the cane planting industry was a company town and the store only took the script at a 100 percent mark-up leaving most workers destitute, they also owed their housing to the company. Because of the Louisiana laws about debt and vagrancy, this left most of the workers as indentured servants to the growers.

In 1887 the largest union in the United States was the Knights of Labor and after two failed stoppages/negotiations with the growers, the laborers of the sugar bowl reached out to the Knights, over a few months the Knights organized sugar workers into seven locals of 100 to 150 members and in August of 1887 attempted to meet with the growers, but they refused.

In October as the pressing season began the union requested $1.25 a day in cash wages and the growers again refused and fired all union leaders, so the cutters and rollers went on strike. As the October shadows grew longer and the cane remained in the fields. and growers requested aid from the governor, Samuel D. McEnery, Democratic governor, and former planter, he in turn called for the assistance of several all-white Louisiana militias under the command of ex-Confederate General P. G. T. Beauregard. At this point, Some 10,000 plantation workers took part in the strike. Most of the strikers were black, but nearly 1000 were white. When striking plantation workers were faced with soldiers armed with Springfield rifles, they offered little to no resistance. They heeded the orders to leave the plantations. Many congregated in the black section of Thibodaux.

With strike-breakers brought in from Mississippi and Tennessee, tensions were extremely high, with the town of Thibodaux sealed and all blacks needing a pass to travel. On the morning of the 23rd shots came from a cornfield at white guards this shooting was a fuse setting off an explosion of violence across the sugar bowl. The white militia began hunting blacks and killing them at random. Records are incomplete, census and pay records are best available but don’t direct much to a crime that was completely covered up. At least 30 people were murdered but based on the available records it is more likely 300 were killed. There was no federal investigation, the state ignored it because of the governor and even the press like the Daily Picayune blamed the black strikers for the violence.

Organized labor made no attempts to work with the Sugar Growers Association until the 1950s and even today the plantations still hold most of the power in the region politically. 

Picture "Cutting sugar cane in Louisiana" by William Henry Jackson for the Detroit publishing company

Sources:

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/thibodaux-massacre-left-60-african-americans-dead-and-spelled-end-unionized-farm-labor-south-decades-180967289/

https://libcom.org/article/thibodaux-massacre-1887

https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/the-thibodaux-massacre-november-23-1887/