The night after the hanging of Tom Turner [another oral tradition says his name was Tom McNeel] isolated, demagoguery- susceptible, rural vigilantes listened to hateful speeches about how “Negroes were evil, and similar crimes might happen at any time unless some action were taken. Of the men who remained after the hanging not one voted against the proposal” to ride the following night to ride from house warning blacks to leave the county by sunset on August 6, 1886 or be killed. The action did not go unopposed in town where more reasonable people approved of the hanging, but not the expulsion. It just didn’t seem right to hold the entire black population responsible for the murder of Sallie Stephens. The Comanche townspeople were much more tolerant toward the 40+ blacks in the county. Several worked in town and were respected members of the community, one family had an adopted four-year old African-American girl. Many of the tolerant townspeople were probably members of the Human Party, referenced in an earlier post and described as an early manifestation of the left-leaning Populist Party. Fifty-five residents held what came to be known as the “Law and Order Meeting” at the courthouse. These citizens passed a resolution that “we regard the demonstration in the town of Comanche on last night in ordering the negro population out of the county as uncalled for, wrong and lawless.” As the days passed the gulf between the townspeople and the farmers grew even wider.” Those refusing to send their employees and the four-year old girl away received several death threats until they complied. One man, Captain J.F. Manning received a warning that he would “pull on the tight end of a rope” if he didn’t stop criticizing the vigilantes, Manning was sure he knew who sent that note and pistol-whipped Tom Stewart, even though Steward swore it wasn’t him. Sheriff John Cunningham told the Law and Order Committee that since a squad of Texas Rangers was still a week out, that he could deputize 100 men to oppose the mob, but that “would be arraying neighbor against neighbor and be productive of feuds that would be handed down to the net generation.” While waiting for the Texas Rangers, there were “small skirmishes fought between the ‘law and order’ and the mob. Vigilantes posted notes to people they thought opposed them, signed ‘Comitty.'” The Rangers arrived on August 4 and stayed until September trying to piece together what happened, but nobody dared testify for fear of reprisal. The Comanche County grand jury report at the beginning of September described the county as “gripped by fear.”

Elliot Jaspin. “All ‘Difficult History’ is Local and ‘Rises with Depressing Regularity’ to this Day,” in The Austin Statesman July 9, 2006; and Billy Bob Lightfoot. “The Negro Exodus from Comanche County, Texas,” The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, January, 1953, Vol. 56, No. 3, pp. 407-416.

The spark that led to the purge of black residents of Comanche County came with the murder of Mrs. Ben Stephens (Sally) on a farm nine miles north of Comanche. Ben Stephens had just gone into town to buy parts for his plow when a man on a mule rode up and told him his wife had just been killed. According to interviews 75 years later, a farm worker, 18 year-old Tom Turner, was angry that he was not allowed to accompany Ben to town. Using hawk near the chickens was his excuse for bringing out the family shotgun and then shooting the farmer’s wife in the back. Posses were immediately organized to search for the young man. Tom was barefooted and everyone thought he would be caught right away, but Tom was able to make it nearly to Stephenville before he was captured two days later. He was returned to the Stephen’s farm where a large crowd was waiting to see the hanging. Frank Sherill, who had a rabid hatred of black people, argued that Tom should be burned alive, but “Zack Hulsey, the father of the murdered woman, said, “Now boys, the laws of our land say hanging, not burning; so we’ll hang him.” Deputy W.D. Cox made a weak attempt to take the prisoner from the mob for a legal trial, but rode away when threatened by a shotgun. Tom was placed in a wagon to be used as a gallows platform, as the rope was being fitted around his neck, Hulsey asked Tom if Sally had mistreated him. Tom replied, “No sir, she’s the best kind to me.” “Then why did you kill her?” Tom replied, “Just for meanness.” [Keep in mind this is 75-year-old oral tradition] When the wagon was pushed Tom’s weight broke the limb. While a boy attached the rope to a stronger limb, Frank Sherill, jumped upon a stump and harangued the crowd to ride house to house to demand that all black families leave the county in ten days. Later”there was a lucrative business in souvenirs carried on by an itinerant peddler who sold ‘authentic remains’ of the Last Negro.'” These sales lasted as late as 1889. Lightfoot, The Negro Exodus from Comanche County, Texas, 1953.

“. . . environmental scarcities will have profound social consequences – contributing to insurrections, ethnic clashes, urban unrest, and other forms of civil violence. . . ”

Thomas F. Homer-Dixon. “Environment, Scarcity, and Violence,” Princeton University Press, 1999.

“The year 1886 was a hard one in Comanche County, a year of social and political upheaval, a year of hardship and drought. By the summer of 1886 the average citizen of Comanche was living on corn pone and blackstrap garnished with turnip greens if he were lucky. Meat was a thing of the past, cattle had to be driven from four to ten miles to water, and most of the herds had been sold before the cattle died of hunger. Farmers could not work, their crops died in the ground, and idle men turned to other things than labor that brought no profit. The people of the county were further agitated by the appearance of a split in the county political organization, a split that soon developed into a full-fledged revolt and the formation of the Human party, the first Populist party in Texas. [The Populist Party was a left-leaning agrarian movement] It did not succeed, however without rousing some hot and flaring tempers still further, for the people took their politics seriously and fought bitterly and sometimes physically over their differing political opinions. Rash actions were the rule rather than the exception. . . Fierce tempers made more fierce by the drought and the political disturbances, were making their points by threats of lawlessness. Mobs in the nominal strength of the law had paid several visits . . . and had come away with prisoners to be left on the first stout limb. . . Comanche County was one watched pot that was beginning to boil.”

Billy Bob Lightfoot. “The Negro Exodus from Comanche County, Texas,” The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, January, 1953, Vol. 56No. 3, pp.407-416. This is a Master’s Thesis based mostly on interviews made during the 1940s.

The 1886 expulsion of blacks from Comanche would not have become national news if it weren’t for a New York Times reporter at the New York train station when ethnic refugees arrived.

“Negroes Ordered Away,” New York Times, 30 July 1886,1.

On July 26, 1886, a black man man accused of murder was captured near Stephenville and taken nine miles north of Comanche, where he was lynched at noon. Sheriff Cunningham and his deputies dared not interfere with the mob of over 500 and left the scene minutes before.

Town and Country (Comanche newspaper)

African Americans have been violently expelled from at least 50 towns, cities and counties in the United States. The majority of these expulsions occurred in the 60 years following the Civil War but continued to occur until 1954. The justifications for the expulsions varied, but often involved a crime allegedly committed by an African American, labor-related issues, or property takeovers.” Such towns were known as Sundown towns [a term I heard used to refer to Comanche] banned blacks for many years.

Wikipedia

1886: The night of July 20th was one of “unprecedented sensation in Comanche. A large body of men on horseback variously estimated at from 200 to 500 came into town after dark and visiting the negroes [sic] one by one, gave them notice to wind up their affairs and leave the country in ten days’ time.”

Town and Country (Comanche newspaper)

“The Great Plains drought of 1931-1939 was a prolonged socioecological disaster with widespread impacts on society, economy, and health. While its immediate impacts are well documented, we know much less about the disaster’s effects on distal human outcomes. In particular, the event’s effects on later effects on place-based stress. ” This study looked at young men’s exposure to drought and dust storms in 341 Great Plains counties in order to see if there is a link with higher risk of death in early-old age. Contrary to expectations, it turns out that exposure to drought conditions had no adverse effect among men aged 65 years or older at time of death – rather – they actually lived longer compared to men who did not live through a drought. Sue Sanders was right about the common herd.

Serge Atherwood. “Does a Prolonged Hardship Reduce Life Span? Examining the longevity of Young Men who Lived through the 1930s Great Plains Drought.” Population and Environment 43, 530-552 (2022).

Sue Sanders writing about 1893: “That fall and winter was a time long to be remembered, as it still holds the record of being the worst drought in Texas history. How we lived I can’t tell you, bit somehow we got through till spring. None of the farmers had feed or seed to start work on another. . . Assistance finally came from some source at Stephenville . . . Ma received notice to come and get her supplies at Stephenville, but our team was too weak to make the trip. She asked a neighbor who was going to town if he’d haul them out for her. She also asked him not to get back to our house until after dark, as she didn’t want people to see we were receiving help. Other farmers felt the same way: they were ashamed of accepting a loan without security. . . Ma did a heap of worrying in those two years, and the strain put her back in bed. But there is always a turn in even the worst of things, and right after Christmas the rain started. It was a mighty good rain, and it made up for a lot of lost time. Sue Sanders, Our Common Herd, 1939

Sue Sanders: “Our old milk stock kept alive by eating mesquite beans and even twigs from the trees. The trees themselves were doing well to keep alive, and their foliage was mighty scarce. We couldn’t understand where the cows found water and how they managed to get there and back to the farm every night. But Old Spot, the herd leader, never failed to come walking in, bringing the rest of the herd with her. Even then I was proud of Old Spot. I had always held up for her when Ma had compared her to Jersey. But it wasn’t until later in my life that I realized what the spotted cow was made of. She could keep on living when the going was so tough that the jersey fell out and quit. Erath County then was no place for blue-bloods, whether man or beast.”

The Sue Sander’s Our Common Herd 1939 first edition was reprinted in 1980 by Annette Baxter, Leon Stein, and Barbara Welter (eds.) Signal Lives: Autobiographies of American Women, Arno Press: New York. I picked up the first edition in an Austin bookstore years ago as Larry McMurtry set it down and took a few steps away.