Whitney
Whitney was held in the jail at Hermann, Missouri, when a mob came for him on June 5, 1883. The Bourbon News reports that a crowd of about two hundred men battered down the jail doors shortly after midnight, took him from the jail and hanged him from a tree a short distance away, while the Panola Weekly Star estimates the crowd at about a thousand and says the mob forced the jailer to lead them to Whitney's cell. The papers differ on the size of the crowd and the hour, and the Staunton Spectator reports only that he was taken out by a mob and lynched.
Cause of death, as reported: Killed by another person in custody (disputed). The Bourbon News and a newspaper dispatch say a mob broke into the Hermann jail and took Whitney out to be hanged, while the short item reports only that he was lynched; the accounts differ on the jail's entry and the jailer's conduct, so the cause of lynching is not disputed but the circumstances are.
Reported by: The Bourbon News (reporters); newspaper dispatch from Hermann, Mo. (reporters).