“Eddie Williams, a little Negro who was extremely fresh with the police, was fined $10 or ten days.”

+SHOCKING BRUTALITY+

The whole city was at the mercy of the mob and the display of brutality was a disgrace to civilization.  One instance is described in the Picayune as follows: 

A smaller party detached itself from the mob at Washington and Rampart Streets, and started down the latter thoroughfare.  One of the foremost spied a Negro, and immediately there was a rush for the unfortunate black man.  With the sticks they had torn from fences on the line of march the young outlaws attacked the black and clubbed him unmercifully, acting more like demons than human beings.  After being severely beaten over the head, the Negro started to run with the whole gang at his heels.  Several revolvers were brought into play and pumped their lead at the refugee.  The Negro made rapid progress and took refuge behind the blinds of a little cottage in Rampart Street, but he had been seen, and the mob hauled him from his hiding place and again commenced beating him.  There were more this time, some twenty or thirty, all armed with sticks and heavy clubs, and under their incessant blows the Negro could not last long.  He begged for mercy, and his cries were most pitiful, but a mob has no heart, and his cries were only answered with more blows.

  “For God’s sake, boss, I ain’t done nothin’.  Don’t kill me.  I swear I
  ain’t done nothin’.”

  The white brutes turned

+ A DEAF EAR TO THE PITYING CRIES+

of the black wretch and the drubbing continued.  The cries subsided into moans, and soon the black swooned away into unconsciousness.  Still not content with their heartless work, they pulled the Negro out and kicked him into the gutter.  For the time those who had beaten the black seemed satisfied and left him groaning in the gutter, but others came up, and, regretting that they had not had a hand in the affair, they determined to evidence their bravery to their fellows and beat the man while he was in the gutter, hurling rocks and stones at his black form.  One thoughtless white brute, worse even than the black slayer of the police officers, thought to make himself a hero in the eyes of his fellows and fired his revolver repeatedly into the helpless wretch.  It was dark and the fellow probably aimed carelessly.  After firing three or four shots he also left without knowing what extent of injury he inflicted on the black wretch who was left lying in the gutter.

+MURDER ON THE LEVEE+

One part of the crowd made a raid on the tenderloin district, hoping to find there some belated Negro for a sacrifice.  They were urged on by the white prostitutes, who applauded their murderous mission.  Says an account: