Autobiography of a People by Herb Boyd

Author:Herb Boyd [Boyd, Herb]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-307-75493-6
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2010-06-30T00:00:00+00:00

JAMES CAMERON

From A Time of Terror

MARION, INDIANA, 1930S

I COULD HEAR THE MOB TRAMPING UP THE jail stairs. In another moment, they would be at the door of my cell block. They would open the door, walk inside, and all hell would break out. Time was running out for me. Outside the door, the corridor was fast becoming jammed with violent men, ruthless men, black-people-hating white men. The leaders held back until they quieted down. The men carried ropes, shotguns, knives, clubs, swords, and rifles. One of the men held a submachine gun in the cradle of his arm. He acted like he knew how to use it. He was a big, burly, bushy-haired man with coldlooking gray eyes, glassy-looking, like he was high on some kind of a “fix.” It was frightening to look at him.

The men gathered around the door of my cellblock. They were the elite group of black intimidators. Their act now was to complete the path of destruction, death, and tyranny. While they were deciding on the kill, I closed my eyes for a moment to will my disappearance. I opened them again when I heard the eerie jangling of keys on the key ring. I was still in the cell block. There was no time to hide. There was no place to hide. Events happened so fast there was not even time to pray.

At the sight of the mobsters, the black prisoners began jumping around, apparently searching for cover in their miserable mental agony. Even the white prisoners were nervous. All of them were just plain scared.

I was standing in a corner with seven or eight other black prisoners. Big John was among them. Somehow, I felt a small measure of security with them so near. I believed with all my heart, perhaps, because I wanted to believe it, that they would have fought the mob to their deaths had they anything with which to fight.

The man with the submachine gun entered the cell block first. Oddly, a young white girl, very pretty, still in her teens, followed closely behind. Her eyes were wide, like a frightened and startled doe. They seemed to me to be full of question marks and uncertainty. While the machine gunner held us inmates in our tracks, several other men dressed in the deadgear of the Ku Klux Klan flooded the cell block with the others. The corridor inside the cell block was jammed tight with mobsters. They stood around awhile peering at the cowering knot of prisoners.

Sheriff Campbell shouldered his way through the crowd. One of his pearl-handled revolvers dangled limply from his right hand. He was breathing hard and perspiring profusely. He paused, uncertain of his next move. There was a harried look about him.

Meanwhile, two men with drawn pistols had separated me and Charles, the other sixteen year old, from the rest of the prisoners.

“What’s your name?” Charles was asked.

“Charles Haynes,” he answered, shakily.

“Mine’s Henry Burton,” I lied to them.

Sheriff Campbell made his way over to the small group surrounding me and Charles.

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