Horace Maples
Horace Maples, a Black man, was held in the Madison County jail in Huntsville, Alabama. On the night of September 7, 1904, a mob took him from the jail and hanged him from a tree on the courthouse lawn. Testimony before a court of inquiry said Sheriff A. D. Rodgers called to the soldiers guarding the jail to let the mob in, and the Attorney General filed impeachment charges against the sheriff for failing to order the militia to resist and to protect the prisoner. A federal grand jury stated its opinion that Maples would not have been taken from jail had he not been Black, and it indicted several alleged members of the mob.
Cause of death, as reported: Taken from custody and lynched (neglect alleged). The Attorney General says a mob took Horace Maples from the Madison County jail and hanged him, and his impeachment filing alleges that Sheriff Rodgers failed to order the militia to resist and failed to protect the prisoner; the sheriff has not yet answered.
Reported by: Attorney General Massey Wilson (outside investigators); United States grand jury (court); The Montgomery Advertiser, reporting on the Governor's inquiry (reporters); special dispatch from Huntsville (reporters).
News reports (12)
- The Montgomery Advertiser, September 8, 1904, page 1
- The Courier-Journal, September 8, 1904, page 1
- The Montgomery Advertiser, September 9, 1904, page 4
- Palestine Daily Herald, September 9, 1904, page 3
- The Montgomery Advertiser, September 16, 1904, page 1
- The Birmingham Age-Herald, September 20, 1904, page 1
- The Birmingham Age-Herald, September 23, 1904, page 1
- The Montgomery Advertiser, October 13, 1904, page 7
- The Birmingham Age-Herald, October 13, 1904, page 3
- The Starkville News, November 4, 1904, page 3
- The Tupelo Journal, November 4, 1904, page 2
- The Montgomery Advertiser, January 12, 1909, page 10