On the 20th of February, 1873, the Committee on Privileges and Elections of the Senate made a report in which they say they were satisfied by testimony that the manipulation of the election machinery by Warmoth and others was equivalent to 20,000 votes; and they add that to recognize the McEnery government “would be recognizing a government based upon fraud, in defiance of the wishes and intention of the voters of the State.”  Assuming the correctness of the statements in this report (and they seem to have been generally accepted by the country), the great crime in Louisiana, about which so much has been said, is that one is holding the office of governor who was cheated out of 20,000 votes, against another whose title to the office is undoubtedly based on fraud and in defiance of the wishes and intentions of the voters of the State.

Misinformed and misjudging as to the nature and extent of this report, the supporters of McEnery proceeded to displace by force in some counties of the State the appointees of Governor Kellogg, and on the 13th of April, in an effort of that kind, a butchery of citizens was committed at Colfax, which in bloodthirstiness and barbarity is hardly surpassed by any acts of savage warfare.

To put this matter beyond controversy I quote from the charge of Judge Woods, of the United States circuit court, to the jury in the case of The United States vs.  Cruikshank and others, in New Orleans in March, 1874.  He said: 

In the case on trial there are many facts not in controversy.  I proceed to state some of them in the presence and hearing of counsel on both sides; and if I state as a conceded fact any matter that is disputed, they can correct me.

After stating the origin of the difficulty, which grew out of an attempt of white persons to drive the parish judge and sheriff, appointees of Kellogg, from office, and their attempted protection by colored persons, which led to some fighting, in which quite a number of negroes were killed, the judge states: 

Most of those who were not killed were taken prisoners.  Fifteen or sixteen of the blacks had lifted the boards and taken refuge under the floor of the court-house.  They were all captured.  About thirty-seven men were taken prisoners.  The number is not definitely fixed.  They were kept under guard until dark.  They were led out, two by two, and shot.  Most of the men were shot to death.  A few were wounded, not mortally, and by pretending to be dead were afterwards, during the night, able to make their escape.  Among them was the Levi Nelson named in the indictment.

The dead bodies of the negroes killed in this affair were left unburied until Tuesday, April 15, when they were buried by a deputy marshal and an officer of the militia from New Orleans.  These persons found fifty-nine dead bodies.  They showed pistol-shot wounds, the great majority in the head, and most of them in the back of the head.  In addition to the fifty-nine dead bodies found, some charred remains of dead bodies were discovered near the court-house.  Six dead bodies were found under a warehouse, all shot in the head but one or two, which were shot in the breast.