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| Great Hanging at Gainesville, Texas 1862 |
The Confederate Citizens Court was not an established legal authority and consisted of a majority of slaveholders. Seven of the twelve jurors during Gainesville lynchings were slaveholders and they insisted on a simple majority rule in the decisions for execution. The slaveholder jurors alone could condemn a person to death! The wealthy slaveholders exerted power and influence far out of proportion to their numbers. Two of the largest slaveholders in Cooke County were Colonel James Bourland and Colonel William C. Young.
Men were also killed in neighboring counties: Grayson, Wise, and Denton counties.
Most of the men killed during this time, were accused of treason or insurrection, but very few had actually conspired against the Confederacy, and many were innocent of the charges for which they were tried.
The Great Hanging at Gainesville, Texas 1862 has been called the largest mass lynching in American history by some historians.
Related Posts:
Great Hanging at Gainesville, Texas by Richard McCaslin
List of men who were killed in the Great Hanging at Gainesville
List of the wives of the Great Hanging victims
Bringing in Union Men
Hanging Union Men
Lynching or Hanging
Note:
The illustration above is from the Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper, 20 Feb 1864. Several smaller illustrations comprised a double-page centerfold, about 22X16 in size and entitled "Rebel Barbarities in Texas." The illustration can be found at Fold3.
16 comments:
this is bad
Why is that they are considered "Victims" when they acknowledged participation in a society that would kill people amd buy their own admissions were guilty. It is a very sad event they even considered murder and thievery to gain more for their own. It was not because they were Unionists. But greedy men. All of these families should be ashamed they consider them victims.
You must be insane. Some of those men were innocent of any wrongdoing....they were grabbed up and hanged just to appease the mob. Do some research before you start spouting trash!
I think the more important piece here is that this shows quite starkly how ununited the South was over secession. The Southern myths is about a united South, but when Southern leaders talk about "the South" they mean only slave owners of the South. A good example is the writings and speeches of John C. Calhoun who claimed that the federal government was not allowing southerners to settle in the western territories, but most southerners did not own slaves (something they love to point out when discussing the causes of the war), therefore the government was only prohibiting slave oweners from bringing their "job-killing" slaves into the West.
Please study your history a little more before commenting. One of these men was my husband's 1st great grand uncle and was only 24 years old. Ask people who have family knowledge of what went on back then and look around your own life and see if anything you participate in could be, in another time, mistaken for something it's not. Vigilante violence whether under the command of "the law" or "the people" is still vigilante violence.
Kudos! Hey...Thanks for all the excellent info. You have done a great job and achieved your primary goal -- providing resources to those who want to find more about the men who died in the hanging.
I am sharing this site with all my family. We just found a connection thru our great aunt's family.
My Great Grandfater was a part of the piece party. The party stood for equal rights for everyone. He had to go in hiding for fear he would be hung. In fact his brother in law was hung for this reason.
I am just started on this subject, so have a lot of reading to do. It is a very complicated situation with a lot of conflicting information that will require a lot of study. I have ordered two of the books, one can be read online, and I will go to the library for the Thomas Barrett book since it is out of print and priced at $121 on the internet. But I have one question so far. Where did the hanging and mass burial take place? Some reports indicate it was on the banks of Elm Creek, and others say the banks of Pecan Creek about 1/2 mile east of town. It would seem there should be some evidence in the record to ID the exact spot. I know that a Historic Park has been set up on the east side of town, but one citizen commented that a few years ago, the historic marker was on the west side of I-35 which would make it on the west side of town. Does anyone know the exact location?
Hanging:
According to McCaslin (pg 69) the hanging took place at "a large elm tree on nearby Pecan Creek, about a quarter mile east of town" and on page 76 states the following, "conveyed the prisoners away from the makeshift jail down California Street, and to the elm tree outside of town where they were hanged."
Burial:
McCaslin, page 90: "...most were left for the county to bury. Slaves were detailed to build rude coffins for the executed men. Frank Foreman tore down an empty house for lumber, and when that was exhauted, wrapped the remaining bodies in blankets and buried them in shallow grames on the banks of Pecan Creek, near the site of their execution."
my husbands great great grandfather, Richard Martin was one of the 40 men killed. Fact is we can never know who was innocent and who wasn't. Of course family members of those killed will say their loved ones were innocent but unless you were there you don't really know. All around it was an insane event. Im sure innocent people were caught up in it.
If you can't do the time, don't do the crime. It's hard to believe some folks are still blubbering about an event that occurred 140+ years ago. Y'all sound like another group of individuals who whine all the time about how bad they were treated a long time ago. sheesh
to the last anon on dec 2012. you are a complete idiot. you should keep your mouth shut about things you dont know. My family lost 2 that day.
Is there any list of names or other info. of those in the jury, witnesses etc against the men hanged? My greater grandfather was William H. Fanning a Judge and lived in Montague Co. Texas at the time of the hangings. A sad affair.
The marker is behind a paint & body shop on 801 East Main Street (I am not sure if this is the exact location where it all went down.. as the marker has been moved from a different location) http://www.forttours.com/pages/hmcooke.asp#Hanging
No, you should feel ashamed for suggesting it. It was a kangaroo court, formed by the treasonous slave holding military leaders, who murdered them, just like the German immigrants were murdered. The vast majority of VOOJE County residents were pro Union.
The multiple references to James Bourland above prompt me to mention that on 17 Aug. 1908 The Daily Express of San Antonio has a long article titled "MEN FIGHTING UNDER CAPT. JAS. BOURLAND." It supplies two muster rolls, one for Oct 28 1858 - Jan. 28 1859, the other for Jan 28 1859-April 28 1859. The first contains a good eighty names (I didn't count them exactly) and the other about sixty. I'm not sure it would be appropriate to try to post this long article here, but a search for it on the Texas Portal will quickly find it. It could answer some who's who questions for men sharing a common surname.
Prof. McCaslin doesn't cite these muster rolls.
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