In the preceding chapter we have been concerned with the origin of the term by which the practice has come to be known. In this chapter we are concerned with the practice itself. Something of the nature of lynch-law procedure during the Revolutionary epoch has already become apparent, but a more detailed investigation into the early history of such procedure will reveal other characteristics.
It has been said by some that the first instance of the operation of lynch-law in America was in December, 1763, at Paxtang (now Harrisburg), Pennsylvania. Indian scalping parties had been laying waste the settlements with relentless fury, and the appeals of the settlers to the Quaker government for help had been treated with contempt. Exasperated at the policy pursued by the Quakers toward the Indians, the Scotch-Irish who had settled in Lancaster and Cumberland counties formed several companies of Rangers to patrol the borders and give protection. “About the middle of December, word was brought to the settlers living at Paxtang, that an Indian known to have committed depredations in the vicinity had been traced to Conestoga. Matthew Smith, a man of influence and popularity among his associates, called together a number of the Paxtang Rangers, and led them to the Conestoga settlement. One of the men saw an Indian issuing from a house, and thought that he recognized him as the savage who had killed his own mother. Firing his rifle, he brought the Indian down. Then, with a loud shout, the furious mob rushed into the cabins, and killed all the Indians whom they found there, some six in number. Fourteen of the Conestogas managed to escape, and, fleeing to Lancaster, were given a place of refuge in the county jail. While there, word was again carried to the Paxtang men that an Indian, known to have murdered the relatives of one of their number, was among those who had received the protection of the Lancaster magistrates. This again aroused a feeling of rage and resentment amongst the Rangers. On December 27, some fifty of them, under the leadership of Lazarus Stewart, marched to Lancaster, broke open the jail, and with the fury of a mob massacred every Indian contained therein, man, woman, and child.”[68]
In connection with this incident it has been suggested that the Scotch-Irish are to blame for the introduction of lynch-law in America; that they brought with them traditions of the administration of summary justice in Mediæval Scotland, and, amidst the perils of the frontier, quickly resorted to the ancient methods of suppressing violence and depredation. The case of the Regulators in the Carolinas is also cited as an instance of the Scotch-Irish backwoodsmen taking the administration of justice into their own hands, when their rulers failed to provide for them a safe government. It is said that this same self-reliant spirit is exhibited in the “family feuds of Kentucky, which for the most part seem peculiar to families bearing Scottish names.”[69]
Undoubtedly the Scotch-Irish played an important part in the early history of lynch-law in the United States. But it was rather because they were the vanguard of a new civilization than because they were of Scottish descent that they played this important part. Environmental influences of old had made them pioneers. Before coming to this country they had behind them a century of frontier life. Their experience in Ireland, where the soil was poor and where by reason of the difference in religion they lived apart from, and often in open hostility to, the natives, led them to be self-reliant and self-assertive. Their training had thus made them sturdy frontiersmen, quite the sort to subdue the wilderness and become the founders of a new civilization. Amid the vicissitudes incident to settlement in a virgin territory it was often necessary, as a matter of self-preservation, to use prompt and decisive measures against depredators. That the early settlers did not always observe “due process of law” can scarcely be urged as deserving condemnation. They merely adopted the means which seemed to them the most expedient under the existing circumstances.
The adoption of summary measures by Scotch-Irish Rangers in Pennsylvania in 1763, however, does not furnish an isolated instance, nor indeed the earliest instance, of the use of such measures against Indians. The provincial governments were not infrequently called upon to take note of such occurrences in order to preserve amicable relations with the various Indian tribes, and considerable difficulty was commonly experienced when the attempt was made to bring to justice white men who had murdered Indians.
In the Province of New Hampshire in June, 1753, two white men killed two Indians who were accused of having carried off two negroes the preceding year. After several months the men were arrested, indicted for the murder, placed in the jail at Portsmouth, and their trial set for March 21, 1754. The night previous to the day appointed for the trial a party of their neighbors appeared in Portsmouth, broke open the jail and set them free. “This outrage produced great excitement in the community—some endeavoring to discover and retake the murderers, and others favoring their escape. Both the murder and the rescue, however, were generally justified in the community. And, although rewards were offered by Governor Wentworth for the apprehension of Bowen and Morrill, yet in a short time they went openly about their business, without fear of molestation, and the men engaged in breaking the jail at Portsmouth, though well known, were never called to account, but, on the contrary, were considered as having performed a most meritorious act. In fact, some of the most substantial men in the country were engaged in the rescue,—by act or advice,—and the Government could not have made an arrest had they made the attempt. Presents were afterwards made to the relatives of these Indians by the Government of New Hampshire, and thus the ‘blood was wiped away’ to the satisfaction of the Indians.”[70]
In May, 1795, in the county of St. Clair in the Illinois country, two Indians were murdered while they were in the custody of the sheriff who was conveying them to jail upon warrant. An effort was made to bring the murderers to justice, but although “the most positive evidence was adduced to the grand jury against two persons, inhabitants of the county of St. Clair, that the murder was committed by them,” no bill of indictment was found against them. Three attempts were made to secure an indictment from the grand jury, all of which were unsuccessful. Referring to another instance where Indians were murdered by whites, which occurred at about the same time but the circumstances of which were “not only not blameable but laudable,” Governor St. Clair wrote, in his report to the Secretary of State, “had the affair been ever so criminal in its nature, it would have been, I believe, impossible to have brought the actors to punishment.”[71]
In several respects there is a resemblance between the means which were employed by the early settlers for protection against Indian depredators and the methods which have been adopted in more recent years for the punishment of public offenders. In their purpose, in their organization, and in their summary infliction of the death penalty, the Rangers were not unlike the vigilance committees which have been closely identified with the later operation of the frontier type of lynch-law. In breaking open jails, and, as in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, in massacring inmates against whom there was a strong popular resentment, or, as in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, in liberating prisoners whose criminal conduct was generally justified in the community, there appear some of the distinctive features which have marked the later operation of lynch-law in well settled communities. It is also probably true that the antagonistic relations which existed between the whites and the Indians during the early history of this country directly encouraged a popular disregard of all legal procedure on the part of the whites when dealing with Indians. But the use of summary measures against Indians and the attendant occurrences can scarcely be said to mark the beginning of the operation of lynch-law in America. The meaning which was at first attached to the term Lynch’s law and the nature of the practice which first came to be known by that name preclude such a beginning for the practice. Lynch’s law originally corresponded much more closely to what was known as “regulating,” a practice which was early adopted not only where the frontier type of society existed, but also where there was the stable and better organized form of society characteristic of older communities.
The following appeared in the New York Gazette of December 18, 1752: “We hear from Elizabeth-Town, that an odd Sect of People have lately appeared there, who go under the Denomination of Regulars: there are near a Dozen of them, who dress themselves in Women’s Cloaths, and painting their Faces, go in the Evening to the Houses of such as are reported to have beat their Wives: where one of them entering in first, seizes the Delinquent, whilst the rest follow, strip him, turn up his Posteriors and flog him with Rods most severely, crying out all the Time, Wo to the Men that beat their Wives:—It seems that several Persons in that Borough, (and ’tis said some very deservedly) have undergone the Discipline, to the no small Terror of others, who are in any Way conscious of deserving the same Punishment. ’Twere to be wish’d, that in order for the more equal Distribution of Justice, there wou’d arise another Sect, under the Title of Regulatrixes who should dress themselves in Mens Cloathes, and flagilate the Posteriors of the Scolds, Termagants, &c., &c.”[72]
In a letter dated December 7, 1753, “Prudence Goodwife,” after relating how her husband beats and maltreats her, writes as follows: “My Case being happily nois’d abroad, induced several generous young Men to discipline him. These young Persons do stile, or are stiled, Regulators: and so they are with Propriety: for they have regulated my dear Husband, and the rest of the bad Ones hereabouts, that they are afraid of using such Barbarity; and I must with Pleasure acknowledge, that since my Husband has felt what whipping was, he has entirely left off whipping me, and promises faithfully he will never begin again. Tho’ there are some that are afraid of whipping their Wives, for fear of dancing the same Jigg; yet I understand, they are not afraid of making Application, in order to have those dear Regulators indicted; and if they should it might discourage them for the future, to appear to the Assistance of the Innocent and Helpless; and then poor Wives who have the unhappiness to be lockt in Wedlock with bad Husbands, take care of your tender Hides; for you may depend upon being bang’d without Mercy.”[73]
These may be regarded as sporadic cases of “regulating,” as illustrations of the kind of “regulating” which is found in a stable and well organized form of society. They are instances of the infliction of summary corporal punishment upon individuals for whose punishment under the law little tangible evidence can be adduced, and the nature of whose offense is such that legal penalties are popularly believed to be inapplicable.
In North Carolina, from 1765 to 1771, under frontier conditions combined with political dissension, “regulation” assumed a well-organized form and gained considerable strength.[74] The movement was inaugurated in the north-central part of the province to resist what was considered oppressive exactions laid by government officials. Specifically, the grievances were excessive taxes, dishonest sheriffs, and extortionate fees. A meeting “to inquire into the abuse of power and take proper measures for amendment” was held at Maddock’s mill on October 10, 1766, and several resolutions were drafted and adopted.[75] Nothing was done by the authorities to alleviate the grievances, however, and a general meeting was held on April 4, 1768, at which the organization into a body of Regulators was perfected. An agreement was drawn up and the members bound themselves by oath to its observance. This agreement reads as follows:
“We the subscribers do voluntarily agree to form ourselves into an association, to assemble ourselves for conference for regulating public grievances and abuses of power, in the following particulars, with others of the like nature that may occur.
“1. That we will pay no more taxes until we are satisfied they are agreeable to law, and applied to the purposes therein mentioned; unless we cannot help it, or are forced.
“2. That we will pay no officer any more fees than the law allows, unless we are obliged to it; and then to show our dislike, and bear an open testimony against it.
“3. That we will attend our meetings of conference as often as we conveniently can, and is necessary, in order to consult our representatives on the amendment of such laws as may be found grievous or unnecessary; and to choose more suitable men than we have done heretofore for burgesses and vestrymen; and to petition the houses of assembly, governor, council, king and parliament, &c., for redress in such grievances as in the course of the undertaking may occur; and to inform one another, learn, know, and enjoy all the privileges and liberties that are allowed and were settled on us by our worthy ancestors, the founders of our present constitution, in order to preserve it on its ancient foundation, that it may stand firm and unshaken.
“4. That we will contribute to collections for defraying necessary expenses attending the work, according to our abilities.
“5. That in case of difference in judgment, we will submit to the judgment of the majority of our body.
“To all which we solemnly swear, or being a quaker, or otherwise scrupulous in conscience of the common oath, do solemnly affirm, that we will stand true and faithful to this cause, till we bring things to a true regulation, according to the true intent and meaning hereof, in the judgment of the majority of us.”[76]
As this agreement indicates, this organization was primarily for the purpose of “regulating public grievances and abuses of power,” not for the purpose of bringing to justice public offenders beyond the reach of law, such as horse thieves and desperadoes. Their methods of procedure, however, closely resembled those that have been adopted by other bands of Regulators for the purpose of meting out justice to frontier criminals. Their favorite method seems to have been to administer whippings. In an intercepted letter from Rednap Howell to James Hunter, both leading Regulators, the following passage occurs: “I give out here that the Regulators are determined to whip every one who goes to law, or will not pay his just debts, or will not agree to leave his cause to men, where disputed. That they will choose representatives, but not send them to be put in jail. In short, to stand in defence; and as to thieves, to drive them out of the country.”[77] From time to time, however, serious disturbances and riots occurred. In September, 1770, about 150 Regulators attacked the superior court which was in session at Hillsboro, severely whipped several men who had incurred their enmity, and destroyed considerable property. New laws were hurriedly enacted by the legislature and the leaders of the riots were arrested, but the Regulators were not easily subdued or conciliated. In 1771 Governor Tryon called out the militia, and a battle took place between the Regulators and the militia, in which the Regulators were utterly defeated and their organization broken up. Each side, however, had several men killed and many wounded.
A similar attempt at “regulating” was made in South Carolina at about the same time.[78] The “Back Country,” as it was called, had become infested with robbers and brigands. Prior to the year 1769 the only court of criminal and civil jurisdiction in the Province—except the courts of Justices of the Peace, which had jurisdiction in civil causes as high as twenty pounds current money—“was holden in Charlestown.” This gave practical immunity from punishment to those who were lawlessly inclined in the distant parts of the Province. As early as the year 1752, the inhabitants along the Pedee River near the mouth of Lynche’s Creek petitioned the Upper House of Assembly for the creation of a new county in which twelve or more Justices should be appointed who should have a general jurisdiction over both civil and criminal causes. This and other petitions which were presented in the following years from different parts of the Province received scant attention on the part of the Provincial Government. For several years the Government did not seem to comprehend the real nature of the evils, or the remedies necessary to be applied. Consequently, there was a very decided opposition between the Regulators and the Government.
The earliest account we have of the operations of the organization which became known as the Regulators is in the South Carolina Gazette of May 26, 1767, in an extract from a letter from Pine Tree Hill (Camden), dated May 14, 1767. It is as follows: “On the 6th inst., a number of armed men, being in search of Horse Stealers, robbers, &c., discovered a parcel of them in camp on Broad River, where an engagement soon ensued, and the Thieves were put to flight; and though none of them were taken, it is reasonable to suppose, from the quantity of blood on the ground, that some of them were killed. They left behind them ten horses, thirteen saddles, some guns, &c.”[79]
The South Carolina Gazette of July 27–August 3, in the same year, made this statement: “The gang of Villains from Virginia and North Carolina, who have for some years past, in small parties, under particular leaders, infested the back parts of the Southern Provinces, stealing horses from one, and selling them in the next, notwithstanding the late public examples made of several of them, we hear are more formidable than ever as to numbers, and more audacious and cruel in their thefts and outrages. ’Tis reported that they consist of more than 200, form a chain of communication with each other, and have places of general meeting; where (in imitation of Councils of War) they form plans of operation and defence, and (alluding to their secrecy and fidelity to each other) call their places Free Mason Lodges. Instances of their cruelty to the people in the back settlements, where they rob or otherwise abuse, are so numerous and shocking, that a narrative of them would fill a whole Gazette, and every reader with horror. They at present range in the Forks between Broad, Saludy, and Savannah Rivers. Two of the gang were hanged last week at Savannah, viz., Lundy Hart and Obadiah Greenage. Two others, James Ferguson and Jesse Hambersam, were killed when these were taken.”[80]
Apparently, it was for the purpose of breaking up and bringing to justice this “gang of Villains” that Thomas Woodward, Joseph Kirkland, and Barnaby Pope “instituted the Regulation.”[81] At any rate, an organization had been formed in the region surrounding the Broad River, and, as early as 1767, the members of this organization had come to be known as Regulators. In an address to both Houses of Assembly, November 5, 1767, the Governor of the Province, referring to the “unhappy situation in the Back Parts of this Country,” made the following statement: “The means to suppress those licentious spirits that have so lately appeared in the distant parts of the Province, and, assuming the name of Regulators, have, in defiance of Government, and to the subversion of good order, illegally tried, condemned, and punished many persons, require an attentive deliberation.”[82]
The courts that were asked for by the inhabitants were not established, however, and the “regulation” continued. The following is taken from the South Carolina Gazette of June 13, 1768: “It seems hardly probable that the disturbances in our back settlements will entirely subside, notwithstanding all the prudent steps that have been taken, or can be taken, by the Government to suppress them, until the late Act of the General Assembly of this Province for establishing Circuit Courts,[83] takes effect: for we daily hear of new irregularities committed by the people called Regulators, who, seeming to despair of rooting out those desperate villains that remain among them any other way, still take upon themselves to punish such offenders as they can catch. We hear, that within this month, one Watts and one Distoe, have received 500 lashes each by their direction; and that an infamous woman has also received corporal punishment. We hear, also, that one John Bowles has lately lost his life in attempting to take Mr. Woodward, one of the leaders of the people called Regulators. According to our account, Woodward, refusing to surrender himself, Bowles fired at, and would have killed him, but the ball struck the barrel of a gun which he held across his breast, upon which, some people in company with Woodward, fired, and killed Bowles.”[84]
On July 25, the following intelligence was given in the South Carolina Gazette: “The last accounts from the Back Settlements say, that the People called the Regulators were to have a meeting at Lynche’s Creek, on last Friday, where it was expected 1200 would be assembled. The occasion of this meeting is said to be, a Party of them lately having been roughly used by a Gang of Banditti, consisting of Mulattoes, Free Negroes, &c., notorious Harborers of runaway slaves, at a place called Thompson’s Creek, whom they ordered to remove. It is added, they anxiously wait to hear the fate of the Act for establishing Circuit Courts in this Province, sent home for the Royal approbation, which, if it obtains, will restore good order in those parts.”[85]
The Governor of the Province, not understanding the situation in the remote settlements, made an attempt to enforce order and compel obedience to law by sending an officer with full discretionary power against the Regulators. The course of events is described by Ramsay in the following words: “The extreme difficulty of bringing criminals from the remote settlements to a legal condemnation had induced a number of men, who called themselves regulators, to take the law into their hands. They, by their own authority, inflicted corporal punishment on sundry persons without any regular condemnation. To remedy abuses of this kind, lord Charles Greville Montague, then governor of the province, advanced to the rank of colonel a man of low character, of the name of Scovil, and employed him to enforce regular law among these self-constituted regulators. In execution of his commission he adopted severe measures, which involved multitudes in great distress.”[86] This Colonel Scovil (or Schovel—his name is written in various ways), instead of redressing the grievances on both sides, armed the depredators and paraded them for battle. Before a battle took place, however, between the Regulators and the Schofilites, as they were known from the name of their leader, wiser counsels prevailed and both parties sent delegates to the Governor asking for his intervention.[87] In this way the disastrous results of the conflict in North Carolina between the Regulators and the Government were avoided in South Carolina.
Finally, the necessity for courts in the interior of the Province could no longer be denied. The Royal approval was given, and in the year 1769 seven new courts, with suitable jails and court-houses, were established in different parts of the interior.[88] This marked the end of the Regulation movement in South Carolina. The condition of affairs which had called it into existence had ceased to prevail and the practice of “regulating” was, therefore, discontinued.
A single quotation will conclude all that need here be said in regard to the Regulation in South Carolina. It is an “extract of a letter from a Gentleman at Pedee, to his friend in Town,” and appeared in the South Carolina Gazette, September 2, 1768. It reads as follows:
“I wish you would inform me what is generally thought in town of the Regulators, who now reign uncontrolled in all the remote parts of the Province. In June, they held a Congress at the Congarees, where a vast number of people assembled; several of the principal settlers on this River, men of property, among them. When these returned, they requested the most respectable people in these parts to meet on a certain day; they did so, and, upon the report made to them, they unanimously adopted the Plan of Regulation, and are now executing it with indefatigable ardour. Their resolution is, in general, effectually to deny the Jurisdiction of the Courts holden in Charlestown over those parts of the Province that ought to be by right out of it; to purge, by methods of their own, the country of all idle persons, all that have not a visible way of getting an honest living, all that are suspected or known to be guilty of malpractices, and also to prevent the service of any writ or warrant from Charlestown; so that a Deputy Marshal would be handled by them with severity. Against those they breathe high indignation. They are every day, excepting Sundays, employed in this Regulation work, as they term it. They have brought many under the lash, and are scourging and banishing the baser sort of people, such as the above, with universal diligence.
“Such as they think reclaimable, they are a little tender of; and those they task, giving them so many acres to tend in so many days, on pain of flagellation, that they may not be reduced to poverty, and by that be led to steal from their industrious neighbours. This course, they say, they are determined to pursue, with every other effectual measure, that will answer their purpose; and that they will defend themselves in it to the last extremity. They hold correspondence with others in the same plan, and are engaged to abide by and support each other whenever they may be called upon for that purpose. This, it seems, they are to continue till County Courts, as well as Circuit Courts, shall be rightly established, that they may enjoy, by that means, the rights and privileges of British subjects, which they think themselves now deprived of. They imagine that, as the Jurisdiction of the Courts in Charlestown extends all over the Province, Government is not a protection, but an oppression; that they are not tried there by their Peers; and that the accumulated expenses of a law-suit, or prosecution, puts justice out of their power; by which means the honest man is not secure in his property, and villainy becomes rampant with impunity.
“Indeed, the grievances they complain of are many, and the spirit of Regulation rises higher and spreads wider every day. What this is to end in, I know not; but thus matters are situated; an account of which, I imagine, is not unacceptable, though perhaps disagreeable to hear.”[89]
This letter may be regarded, upon the whole, as an impartial account of the Regulation movement in South Carolina.[90] It exhibits the character of those who were taking the lead in the matter, and indicates the objects which they proposed to accomplish. It also indicates that their usual procedure was to whip and banish all persons whom they considered inimical to the interests of the community. In this respect the Regulation movement in South Carolina closely resembled the Regulation movement in North Carolina. It may be said, therefore, that lynch-law was in operation at this time in the Carolinas, though not known by that name. The practice of administering corporal punishment for reformatory or corrective purposes, the practice of “regulating” public offenders and public grievances, is the essence of lynch-law procedure.
As events shaped themselves for the outbreak of the Revolution in 1775, conditions became such as to encourage the frequent use of summary methods of redressing grievances in all of the colonies. The increasing dissatisfaction among the colonists with the way they were being governed by the mother country, the obnoxious Stamp Act and other measures which they thought to be unjustly imposed upon them, rendered recourse to summary procedure not only easy but popularly justifiable.[91] It was a time of excitement when neighbor looked upon neighbor with suspicion and the slightest offense was deemed worthy of severe punishment. Social conditions were unsettled; the civil authorities were fast losing the respect and support of the people in the community; threats and taunts, satire and insult, were prevalent.[92] Under such conditions it is not strange that summary procedure came to be in vogue from Maine to Georgia.
Furthermore, during the entire period of the Revolutionary War not only were the usual unsettled conditions incident to a war prevailing, but, in addition, there was disaffection and disagreement among the colonists themselves. Almost every community had its Tories who frequently sought, openly or secretly, to further the Royal cause and injure the American cause. In return, the American sympathizers often adopted retaliatory measures against the Tories. In such cases it was hopeless to appeal to the civil or the judicial powers for they were badly disorganized. Not infrequently conditions were such as to preclude action under martial law, and thus the only recourse possible was the popular administration of justice in the form of summary procedure of one sort or another.
Particularly characteristic of the Revolutionary period was the practice of tarring and feathering.[93] It has been said that “this singular punishment” was begun in America by British troops who tarred and feathered an inhabitant of the town of Billerica, Massachusetts, on March 9, 1775.[94] But a number of instances may be cited showing that this punishment had been administered in more than one of the colonies several years earlier. It is probable that many of the early immigrants knew of this manner of punishment before they left their native shores[95]; at any rate, they did not wait until 1775 for the British troops to set them an example.[96]
On September 7, 1768, at Salem, Massachusetts, a “Custom-House Waiter” informed an officer of the customs that some measures had been taken on board a vessel, in the harbor to elude the payment of certain duties. This “engaged the Attention of a Number of the Inhabitants. Between the Hours of Ten and Eleven, A.M. he was taken from one of the Wharves, and conducted to the common, where his Head, Body and Limbs were covered with warm Tar, and then a large Quantity of Feathers were applied to all Parts. The poor Waiter was then exalted to a Seat on the Front of a Cart, and in this Manner led into the Main Street, where a Paper, with the Word Informer thereon, in large Letters, was affixed to his Breast, and another Paper, with the same Word, to his Back. This Scene drew together, within a few Minutes, several Hundred People, who proceeded, with Huzzas and loud Acclamations, through the Town.”[97]
On Saturday, September 10, 1768, “two Informers, an Englishman and a Frenchman, were taken up by the Populace at Newbury-Port, (Mass.) who tarred them & feathered them; but being late they were hand-cuffed and put into custody until the Sabbath was over:—Accordingly on Monday Morning, they were again tarred and rolled in Feathers, then fixed in a Cart with Halters, and carried thro’ the principal Streets of the Town.”[98] Upon his release the Englishman, Joshua Vickery by name, went before a justice of the peace and took oath “that he never did directly or indirectly make or give any Information to any Officer of the Customs nor to any other Person either against Capt. John Emmery, or any other Man whatever; that he was no ways concerned with Francis Magno in his Information, nor ever wrote one Line for the said Francis, on that Account.”[99] These statements were corroborated by the Frenchman and it was shown that the only ground for suspicion against Vickery was the fact that he had been in the company of the Frenchman on the day that the “Information” was given.
On the evening of May 18, 1769, at Providence, Rhode Island, Jesse Saville, “a Tidesman belonging to the Custom-House” who was accused of “Informing,” was seized by a number of people, stripped naked, covered from head to foot with turpentine and feathers and severely beaten. “For the better bringing to Justice and condign Punishment the Authors of this daring & atrocious Outrage, the Commissioners of His Majesty’s Customs” offered a reward of fifty pounds sterling for their discovery and conviction.[100]
A similar case of tarring and feathering, the offender being “a Person who had informed against a Merchant, respecting a Vessel then in the West-Indies,” occurred in New Haven, Connecticut, in September, 1769.[101]
In New York, in October, 1769, “one Kelly, an Oysterman, Mitchner, a Tavern-keeper, and one or two more, having, it is said, made an Information to the Custom-House Officers, which occasioned the Seizure of a few Casks of Wine belonging to the Mate of a Vessel, and was, it is said, the whole Saving he had made of three Years Wages: The Populace being greatly incensed against the Informers, after several Days Search, found and seized them, placed and tied them in Carts, and carried them thro’ great Part of the City, attended with many Thousand People, who huzza’d, insulted and treated them with the utmost Indignity, often besmearing their Faces and Clothes with Tar, and sprinkling them with Feathers.... The Magistrates interposed, but were for some Time unable to stop the Cavalcade, till the Populace had in some Measure satiated their Resentment.”[102]
The Boston Chronicle for October 26–30, 1769,[103] contained the following under the heading of “Boston”: “Last Saturday evening, a person suspected to be an informer, was stripped naked, put in a Cart, where he was first tarred, then feathered, and in this condition, carried through the principal streets of the town, followed by a great concourse of people.”
During the year 1770 there was much popular feeling against merchants who imported goods contrary to the non-importation agreement. Such importers were threatened with many dire punishments including tar and feathers, and in several instances the threatened punishments were administered.[104]
At Philadelphia, in October, 1773, a certain Ebenezer Richardson, accused of “seeking an opportunity to distress the Trade of Philadelphia,” was publicly notified, by “Tar and Feathers,” of the punishment which was in store for him, a punishment which he narrowly escaped by leaving the city “closely pursued by many well-wishers to peace and good order.”[105]
On November 1, 1773, John Malcolm who had rendered himself obnoxious “by being an Informer” was “genteely Tarr’d and Feather’d” by “about 30 Sailors” at Pownalborough (Mass.).[106] On January 25, 1774, Malcolm was in Boston, and when some taunting remarks were made to him to the effect that he had been tarred and feathered but not in the proper manner, he dared any one to do it better and assaulted one man, slightly injuring him. In the evening a number of people took Malcolm out, stripped him, tarred his head and his body, feathered him, set him in a chair in a cart, and thus carried him through the streets, finally whipping and beating him before they let him go.[107] On the morning of January 30 the following handbill[108] was found pasted up in the most public places:
This is to Certify, That the modern Punishment lately inflicted on the ignoble John Malcolm, was not done by our Order—We reserve that Method for bringing Villains of greater Consequence to a Sense of Guilt and Infamy.
☞ If any Person should be so hardy as to tear this down, they may expect my severest Resentment.
During the years 1773 and 1774 tea commissioners and tea consignees, in addition to customs informers and importers of British goods, fell into popular disfavor, and thus became subjects for tarring and feathering. “Tiewaghnodago” in the Boston Gazette, December 20, 1773,[109] said that he had been informed that “some little Shopkeepers in this Town,” finding that tea was not likely to be used, had raised the price of coffee a few coppers per pound, and he asked “whether Tar and Feathers would not be a constitutional encouragement for such eminent Patriotism.”
In the period 1765–1775 there were likewise cases of mob violence where houses were attacked and damaged by having missiles thrown at them and where property was destroyed.[110] In one instance at least the owner of goods which were destroyed by a mob recovered damages in the courts. Early in the year 1772, according to S. G. Arnold,[111] there occurred “a memorable instance of the triumph of law over popular prejudice.” One David Hill was detected in selling goods included in the non-importation agreement, and the goods were seized and destroyed by a mob. Hill brought action in the Rhode Island courts, and the superior court confirmed the judgment of the inferior court and gave the plaintiff two hundred and eighty-two pounds damages and costs.
Tarring and feathering was not reserved for certain informers and importers or for tea consignees alone, however. This punishment was administered in at least two instances for offenses other than those growing out of the political controversies of the time.
The Boston Gazette for November 6, 1769,[112] contained the following item: “Last Thursday Afternoon a young Woman from the Country was decoyed into one of the Barracks in Town, and most shamefully abused by some of the Soldiers there:—the Person that enticed her thither with promises of disposing of all her marketing there (who also belonged to the Country) was afterwards taken by the Populace and several times duck’d in the Water at one of the Docks in Town; but luckily for him he made his escape from them sooner than was intended;—however, we hear, that after he had crossed the Ferry to Charlestown, on his return home, the People there being informed of the base part he had been acting, took him and placed him in a Cart, and after tarring and feathering him (the present popular Punishment for modern delinquents) they carted him about that Town for two or three Hours, as a Spectacle of Contempt and a Warning to others from practising such vile Artifices for the Delusion and Ruin of the virtuous and innocent: He was then dismissed, and permitted to proceed to the Town where he belonged, for them to act with as they should see fit.”
In January, 1774, smallpox became prevalent in Marblehead, Massachusetts, and an inoculating hospital was erected on Cat Island as a private enterprise. This hospital, however, was popularly regarded with suspicion and disfavor, for it was thought to be a source of contagion. When four men were detected in the act of stealing clothing from the hospital, they were promptly tarred and feathered, and, after being placed in a cart and exhibited through the principal streets of the town, were carried to Salem, accompanied by a procession of men and boys, marching to the music of a fife and several drums. A number of new cases of smallpox developed soon after this affair, and popular indignation ran so high against the proprietors of the hospital that they were openly threatened with personal violence and were finally compelled to close its doors. Subsequently a rumor that the hospital was to be opened again awakened fresh opposition, and on January 26 a party of disguised men visited the island, and as a result of their visit the building was completely destroyed by fire. Two men were arrested as being implicated in the incendiarism and were confined in the Salem jail, but a large number of men from Marblehead marched to Salem, surrounded the jail, broke open the doors, overpowered the jailer and his assistants, released the two prisoners and conducted them home in triumph. A force of citizens was later organized by the sheriff for the purpose of going to Marblehead to recapture the men, but when it became known that an equally large force was organizing and arming in Marblehead to protect them, the sheriff abandoned his purpose and no further effort was made to prosecute the incendiaries. Before the trouble connected with the hospital was finally ended, however, one of the four men who had been tarred and feathered was again the subject of popular indignation because of his bringing away clothing from Cat Island. He was taken from his bed one night by a mob and carried to the public whipping-post where he was severely whipped and beaten.[113]
During the year 1775, when the spirit of rebellion rose to the height of armed resistance and open warfare, there was increased occasion for recourse to summary procedure. In that year mobs gathered in many places,[114] riots were numerous and cases of tarring and feathering occurred in several of the colonies.
In June, 1775, Laughlin Martin and James Dealy were stripped of their clothes, tarred and feathered, and carted through the Streets of Charleston, South Carolina, by order of the “Secret Committee,” one of the committees which had been formed to carry on an independent government in that Province.[115] In August of the same year, this committee had another man, “a Mr. Walker, Gunner of Fort Johnston,” treated in the same way.[116]
In September, 1775, James Smith, a judge of the Court of Common Pleas for Duchess County, New York, together with Coen Smith of the same place, were “handsomely tarred and feathered” for acting in open contempt of the resolves of the County Committee. “The judge undertook to sue for, and recover the arms taken from the Tories by order of said committee, and actually committed one of the committee, who assisted at disarming the Tories, which enraged the people so much, that they rose and rescued the prisoner, and poured out their resentment on this villanous retailer of the law.”[117]
In December, 1775, “at Quibbletown, New Jersey, Thomas Randolph, cooper, who had publicly proved himself an enemy to his country, by reviling and using his utmost endeavors to oppose the proceedings of the continental and provincial conventions, in defence of their rights and liberties; and being judged a person not of consequence enough for a severer punishment, was ordered to be stripped naked, well coated with tar and feathers, and carried in a wagon publicly around the town—which punishment was accordingly inflicted. As soon as he became duly sensible of his offence, for which he earnestly begged pardon, and promised to atone, as far as he was able, by a contrary behavior for the future, he was released and suffered to return to his home, in less than half an hour. The whole was conducted with that regularity and decorum that ought to be observed in all public punishments.”[118]
In the later years of the Revolution, also, there were cases of tarring and feathering. At Charleston, South Carolina, in 1776, “John Roberts, a dissenting minister, was seized on suspicion of being an enemy to the rights of America, when he was tarred and feathered; after which, the populace, whose fury could not be appeased, erected a gibbet on which they hanged him, and afterwards made a bonfire, in which Roberts, together with the gibbet, was consumed to ashes.”[119]
During the campaign of April to December, 1776, for the possession of the Hudson River, Tryon, who when governor of North Carolina had led the militia against the Regulators, was “fomenting plots of a most dastardly character against the persons and property of patriots. One of these was the seizure of Washington himself. The plotters were sometimes discovered, and, when they were, such was the exasperation of the New York patriots that they did not hesitate to cruelly maltreat them, a coat of tar and feathers being among the lightest penalties.”[120]
In Virginia the manner of punishing by tarring and feathering was likewise sometimes followed. According to Wirt, “The name of ‘British tory’ was of itself enough, at that period (the close of the Revolution), to throw almost any company in Virginia into flames, and was pretty generally a signal for a coat of tar and feathers; a signal which was not very often disobeyed.”[121]
The practice of tarring and feathering was thus mainly confined to cases in which popular indignation was aroused against Tories, or against persons expressing Tory sentiments and conspiring to injure the American cause. It is this fact that makes tarring and feathering particularly characteristic of Revolutionary times. It is to be remembered, however, that summary punishment was also administered in other ways. Various other forms of corporal punishment, as well as the occasional infliction of capital punishment, were very frequently adopted during the period of the Revolution.
In the preceding chapter, in the discussion of the origin of the term lynch-law, the legislative act was cited which indemnified Charles Lynch and some others for the part which they had taken in suppressing a conspiracy. A similar act of indemnification was passed by the legislature of Virginia in the year 1779. This act reads as follows:
“Whereas divers evil disposed persons on the frontiers of this commonwealth had broke out into an open insurrection and conspiracy, and actually levied war against the commonwealth, and it is represented to the present general assembly, that William Campbell, Walter Crockett, and other liege subjects of the commonwealth, aided by detachments of the militia and volunteers from the county of Washington, and other parts of the frontiers did by timely and effectual exertion, suppress and defeat such conspiracy: And whereas the necessary measures taken for that purpose may not be strictly warranted by law, although justifiable from the immediate urgency and imminence of the danger: Be it therefore declared and enacted, That the said William Campbell, Walter Crockett, and all other persons whatsoever concerned in suppressing the said conspiracy and insurrection, or in advising, issuing or executing any orders or measures taken for that purpose, stand indemnified and clearly exonerated of, and from all pains, penalties, prosecutions, actions, suits, and damages on account thereof: And that if any indictment, prosecution, action, or suit, shall be laid or brought against them, or any of them, for any act or thing done therein, the defendant or defendants may plead in bar, or the general issue, and give this act in evidence.”[122]
In the year 1836 the editor of the Southern Literary Messenger said that frequent inquiry had been made in the preceding year as to the origin of Lynch’s law. After an allusion to the historical interest of the subject, he answered the inquiry in the following words:
“It will be perceived from the annexed paper, that the law, so called, originated in 1780, in Pittsylvania, Virginia. Colonel William Lynch, of that county, was its author; and we are informed by a resident, who was a member of a body formed for the purpose of carrying it into effect, that the efforts of the association were wholly successful. A trained band of villains, whose operations extended from North to South, whose well concerted schemes had bidden defiance to the ordinary laws of the land, and whose success encouraged them to persevere in depredations upon an unoffending community, was dispersed and laid prostrate under the infliction of Lynch’s law. Of how many terrible, and deeply to be lamented consequences—of how great an amount of permanent evil—has the partial and temporary good been productive!
“‘Whereas, many of the inhabitants of the county of Pittsylvania, as well as elsewhere, have sustained great and intolerable losses by a set of lawless men who have banded themselves together to deprive honest men of their just rights and property, by stealing their horses, counterfeiting, and passing paper currency, and committing many other species of villainy, too tedious to mention, and that those vile miscreants do still persist in their diabolical practices, and have hitherto escaped the civil power with impunity, it being almost useless and unnecessary to have recourse to our laws to suppress and punish those freebooters, they having it in their power to extricate themselves when brought to justice by suborning witnesses who do swear them clear—we, the subscribers, being determined to put a stop to the iniquitous practices of those unlawful and abandoned wretches, do enter into the following association, to wit: that next to our consciences, soul and body, we hold our rights and property, sacred and inviolable. We solemnly protest before God and the world, that (for the future) upon hearing or having sufficient reason to believe, that any villainy or species of villainy having been committed within our neighborhood, we will forthwith embody ourselves, and repair immediately to the person or persons suspected, or those under suspicious characters, harboring, aiding, or assisting those villains, and if they will not desist from their evil practices, we will inflict such corporeal punishment on him or them, as to us shall seem adequate to the crime committed or the damage sustained; that we will protect and defend each and every one of us, the subscribers, as well jointly as severally, from the insults and assaults offered by any other person in their behalf: and further, we do bind ourselves jointly and severally, our joint and several heirs &c. to pay or cause to be paid, all damages that shall or may accrue in consequence of this our laudable undertaking, and will pay an equal proportion according to our several abilities; and we, after having a sufficient number of subscribers to this association, will convene ourselves to some convenient place, and will make choice of our body five of the best and most discreet men belonging to our body, to direct and govern the whole, and we will strictly adhere to their determinations in all cases whatsoever relative to the above undertaking; and if any of our body summoned to attend the execution of this our plan, and fail so to do without a reasonable excuse, they shall forfeit and pay the sum of one hundred pounds current money of Virginia, to be appropriated toward defraying the contingent expenses of this our undertaking. In witness whereof we have hereunto set our hands, this 22d day September 1780.’”[123]
The only indication of the source from which the editor obtained this agreement is found in the reference to “a resident, who was a member of a body formed for the purpose of carrying it into effect.” It is upon this reference that its authenticity depends. The agreement sounds genuine and is not out of harmony with the condition of affairs at that time in Virginia. Nothing is known, however, of any Colonel William Lynch in the county of Pittsylvania, Virginia.[124] It is possible that the man referred to was Colonel Charles Lynch of Bedford County.
An instance of summary corporal punishment occurred in Virginia on October 10, 1783, as is shown by the following act entitled “An act of indemnity to certain persons”: “Be it enacted by the General Assembly, That all and every person or persons who either directly or indirectly committed any insult or injury against the person of a certain Joseph Williamson, on the tenth day of October, in the year one thousand seven hundred and eighty three, or breach of the peace on that occasion, and which was previous to the ratification of the definitive treaty between Great Britain and America, shall be, and they are hereby respectively indemnified for the same, and shall be exonerated and discharged of and from any fines, penalties, or forfeitures, which they might have incurred thereby.”[125]
Judge Roane’s statement that there were many suits in 1792 for inflicting Lynch’s law indicates that there were many cases of its infliction in the years preceding that date. It seems probable, therefore, that the practice of administering corporal punishment in a summary manner was very prevalent in Virginia from 1780 to 1792.
During the period 1792–1819 accounts of lynch-law procedure are very rare. There are but few sources of information on the subject during that period. Indeed, it is true that the chief source of information on the subject from 1792 to 1830 is the writings of travelers who have chanced to witness or hear of instances of such procedure.
Under the date of November 29, 1819, W. Faux describes the treatment given a young Yankee, of the name of Williams, near Princeton, Indiana, two years earlier. He was suspected of having robbed a store, but only circumstantial evidence could be adduced against him and he was acquitted. “The people of the place, however, prejudiced against him, as a Yankee, deputed four persons to inform him, that unless he quitted the town and state immediately, he should receive Lynch’s law, that is, a whipping in the woods. He departed, with his wife and child, next day, on foot; but in the woods, four miles from Princeton, they were overtaken by two men, armed with guns, dogs, and a whip, who said they came to whip him, unless he would confess and discover to them the stolen money, so that they might have it. He vainly expostulated with them; but, in consideration of his wife’s entreaties and cries, they remitted his sentence to thirteen lashes. One man then bound him to a tree and lashed him with a cow-hide whip, while the other held and gagged him; the alarmed wife, all the time, shrieking murder. He was then untied, and told to depart from the state immediately, or he should receive another whipping on the morrow, as a warning and terror to all future coming Yankees.
“This poor fellow was of respectable parents at Berlin, in the state of New York, and possessed a well-informed mind. He quitted the state, and returning, soon after, to prosecute his executioners, died at Evansville, before he had effected so desirable an object.”[126]
In “Letters from Illinois,” the second edition of which was published in London in 1818, Morris Birkbeck writes:
“There is nothing that I anticipate with so much satisfaction and security as the rapid development of society in our new country. Its elements are rude certainly, and heterogeneous. The first settlers, unprotected, and unassisted amid dangers and difficulties, have been accustomed from early youth to rely on their own powers; and they surrender with reluctance, and only by halves, their right of defence against every aggression, even to the laws which themselves have constituted.
“They have been anxiously studious of mildness in the forming of these laws, and when, in practice, they seem inefficient, they too frequently proceed with Indian perseverance to acts of vengeance, inconsistent with the duty of forbearance essential to social man. Hence deeds of savage and even ferocious violence are too common to be viewed with the abhorrence due to them.
“This disposition is evinced continually, and acted on without any feeling of private or personal animosity.
“If a man, whom the public voice has proclaimed a thief or a swindler, escapes from justice for want of a legal proof of his guilt, though the law and a jury of his fellow citizens have acquitted him, ten to one but he is met with before he can quit the neighborhood, and, tied up to a sapling, receives a scourging that marks him for the rest of his life.
“In Kentucky, whose institutions have acquired greater maturity, such events have taken place some years ago; but now they would scarcely be tolerated, and they will soon be matter of history only, in Indiana and Illinois.
“No crime but murder ‘of the first degree’ is punished with death, in any of the western states, nor, I believe, in the Union. In Kentucky there is a general penitentiary, for the punishment of other offences by imprisonment and labour.”[127]
William Newnham Blane, who traveled through the United States and Canada in the years 1822 and 1823, described the lynch-law procedure of that time as follows:
“After leaving Carlyle, I took the Shawnee town road, that branches off to the S. E., and passed the Walnut Hills, and Moore’s Prairie. These two places had a year or two before been infested by a notorious gang of robbers and forgers, who had fixed themselves in these wild parts, in order to avoid justice. As the country became more settled, these desperadoes became more and more troublesome. The inhabitants therefore took that method of getting rid of them, that had been adopted not many years ago in Hopkinson and Henderson counties Kentucky, and which is absolutely necessary in new and thinly settled districts, where it is almost impossible to punish a criminal according to legal forms.
“On such occasions therefore, all the quiet and industrious men of a district form themselves into companies, under the name of ‘Regulators.’ They appoint officers, put themselves under their orders, and bind themselves to assist and stand by each other. The first step they then take, is to send notice to any notorious vagabonds, desiring them to quit the State in a certain number of days, under the penalty of receiving a domiciliary visit. Should the person who receives the notice refuse to comply, they suddenly assemble, and when unexpected, go, in the night time, to the rogue’s house, take him out, tie him to a tree, and give him a severe whipping, every one of the party striking him a certain number of times.
“This discipline is generally sufficient to drive off the culprit; but should he continue obstinate, and refuse to avail himself of another warning, the Regulators pay him a second visit, inflict a still severer whipping, with the addition probably of cutting off both his ears. No culprit has ever been known to remain after a second visit. For instance, an old man, the father of a family, all of whom he educated as robbers, fixed himself at Moore’s Prairie, and committed numerous thefts, &c. &c. He was hardy enough to remain after the first visit, when both he and his sons received a whipping. At the second visit the Regulators punished him very severely, and cut off his ears. This drove him off, together with his whole gang; and travellers can now pass in perfect safety, where it was once dangerous to travel alone.
“There is also a company of Regulators near Vincennes, who have broken up a notorious gang of coiners and thieves who had fixed themselves near that place. These rascals, before they were driven off, had parties settled at different distances in the woods, and thus held communication and passed horses and stolen goods from one to another, from the Ohio to Lake Erie, and from thence into Canada or the New England States. Thus it was next to impossible to detect the robbers, or to recover the stolen property.
“While I was staying at the house of a Mr. Mulligan in Illinois, thirty miles from St. Louis, one of the men, who had belonged to the gang near Vincennes, was taken up on the charge of passing counterfeit money....
“This practice of Regulating seems very strange to an European. I have talked with some of the chief men of the Regulators, who all lamented the necessity of such a system. They very sensibly remarked, that when the country became more thickly settled, there would no longer be any necessity for such proceedings, and that they should all be delighted at being able to obtain justice in a more formal manner. I forgot to mention, that the rascals punished, have sometimes prosecuted the Regulators, for an assault. The juries however, knowing the bad characters of the prosecutors, would give but trifling damages, which divided among so many, amounted to next to nothing for each individual.”[128]
In a book entitled “Letters from the West,” which was published in London in 1828, Judge James Hall wrote on the subject of lynch-law as follows:
“Among the early settlers there was a way of trying causes, which may perhaps be new to you. No commentator has taken any notice of Linch’s Law, which was once the lex loci of the frontiers. Its operation was as follows: When a horse thief, a counterfeiter, or any other desperate vagabond, infested a neighborhood, evading justice by cunning, or by a strong arm, or by the number of his confederates, the citizens formed themselves into a ‘regulating company,’ a kind of holy brotherhood, whose duty was to purge the community of its unruly members. Mounted, armed, and commanded by a leader, they proceeded to arrest such notorious offenders as were deemed fit subjects of exemplary justice; their operations were generally carried on in the night. Squire Birch, who was personated by one of the party, established his tribunal under a tree in the woods, and the culprit was brought before him, tried, and generally convicted; he was then tied to a tree, lashed without mercy, and ordered to leave the country within a given time, under pain of a second visitation. It seldom happened, that more than one or two were thus punished; their confederates took the hint and fled, or were admonished to quit the neighborhood. Neither the justice nor the policy of this practice can be defended; but it was often resorted to from necessity, and its operation was salutary, in ridding the country of miscreants whom the law was not strong enough to punish. It was liable to abuse, and was sometimes abused; but in general, it was conducted with moderation, and only exerted upon the basest and most lawless men. Sometimes the sufferers resorted to courts of justice for remuneration, and there have been instances of heavy damages being recovered of the regulators. Whenever a county became strong enough to enforce the laws, these high-handed doings ceased to be tolerated.”[129]
In the above extracts we have a fair description of the operation of lynch-law as it was carried westward by the emigrants from Virginia and the neighboring States. The weakness and inadequacy of the civil regulations, and the presence of such criminals as the horse-thief, the counterfeiter, the robber, and the desperado, who find the frontier both a retreat from the consequences of past crime and a new theater for the perpetration of crime, gave a constant justification for recourse to lynch-law.
The usual manner of proceeding was for the settlers to consult together and in a more or less formal way to establish “the institution of Regulators.” Sometimes the Regulators were small bodies of men chosen by the people to look after the interests of the community—in effect, they were committees of safety. At other times, the Regulators were bodies of men who voluntarily assumed the duty of policing a district. The duties of such companies, whether known as Regulators or as Rangers or by some other name, were to ferret out and punish criminals, to drive out “suspicious characters,” and to exercise a general supervision over the interests of the settlements in which they lived. Their statute-book was the “code of his honor, Judge Lynch”[130]; their order of trial was similar to that of a “drum-head court-martial”; the principles of their punishment were certainty, rapidity, and inexorability. They were in themselves judges, juries, witnesses, and executioners.
These bodies of men bound themselves by a regular compact, to the people and to each other, to rid the community of all thieves, robbers, plunderers, and villains of every description. Such compacts were usually verbal but they were sometimes in writing.[131] The compact entered into by the Regulators of North Carolina has already been cited. If the agreement of 1780 in Virginia, to which the editor of the Southern Literary Messenger gave his indorsement, be accepted as genuine, we have a record of another such compact. There is recorded, also, a compact entered into by a company of Regulators in Illinois in 1820. It reads as follows: