From “White Too Long: The Legacy of White Supremacy in American Christianity” by Robert P. Jones
One of the most chilling demonstrations of the compatibility of white Protestant Christianity with the racial violence of Redemption was the lynching of Samuel Thomas Wilkes, a black Georgia farmhand, on the third Sunday after Easter in 1899. WIlkes, who was referred to as Same Hose or Sam Holt in contemporary news accounts, was accused of murdering Alfred Cranford, a prominent white planter, without cause as he ate dinner with his family. According to white newspaper accounts – each of which seemed motivated to outdo the other with shocking details – Wilkes snuck into the Cranford house, buried an ax deeply in Alfred Cranford’s head, then tore an infant from Mattie Cranford, dashed it to the floor, and subsequently raped her multiple times in a puddle of her husband’s blood.
Wilkes himself never denied killing Cranford but gave a very different account of the events. According to Wilkes, he and Cranford had a dispute after Wilkes asked to be paid for work completed and permission to go see his ailing mother. Cranford refused the request for pay and leave and told WIlkes if he pursued the matter, he would shoot him. The next day, while Wilkes was chopping wood in the yard, Cranford approached WIlkes, and they began arguing again. Cranford pulled out a revolver, and Wilkes threw his ax at Cranford, wounding him mortally in the head. He then fled directly into the woods, hiding and heading for his mother’s Marshallville cabin, near which he was eventually captured. He denied assaulting Mrs. Cranford until his last breath.
On April 13, a day after the alleged crime, the Atlanta Constitution ran the headline, “Determine Mob After Hose: He Will Be Lynched If Caught.” The article also included a subhead suggesting just how the lynching might proceed: “Assailant of Mrs. Cranford May Be Brought to Palmetto and Burned at the Stake.” With WIlkes still at large a week later, Governor Allen Candler, a member of one of Georgia’s most prominent Methodist families, offered a $500 reward for his capture. The paper put up another $500 and ran another article declaring, “When Hose is caught he will either be lynched and his body riddled with bullets or he will be burned at the stake..the mob which is in pursuit of him is composed of determined men…wrought up to an unusual degree.”
The word the Wilkes had been captured and was to be lynched in the nearby town of Newnan reached Atlanta on a Sunday morning. The scene ws surreal. When the city’s white churches emptied from morning services, many worshippers streamed straight from church to the train station, hoping to participate in the much-anticipated lynching. To meet demand, the Atlanta and West Point Railroad put together a special run with six coaches; conductors roamed the platform shouting, “Special train to Newnan! All aboard for the burning!” But that train was soon overwhelmed, with people hanging on to the outside of the cars and climbing onto the roofs to ensure they didn’t miss the spectacle. Police had to be called in, and the railroad commissioned a second ten-car train behind the first. Packed with approximately two thousand Atlanta citizens, both trains sped toward Newnan.
Meanwhile, church was also letting out in Newnan just as Wilkes was escorted off the train by his captors, who were delivering him to jail to collect their reward. The Atlanta Journal noted that a spontaneous and solemn procession formed behind Wilkes and his captors “as church people were leaving their churches.” Wilkes made it safely to jail, but before he was locked in the cell, the crowd threw the bailiff aside, seized the suspect, put a chain around his neck, and brought him back outside. The scene abruptly shifted from solemn order to enthusiastic cheering chaos.
Before the awful carnivalesque violence erupted, there was one moment of truth. Although there is no record of any Christian clergy addressing the crowd, as they reached the town square and courthouse, they were confronted by two community leaders: former governor William Yates Atkinson and Judge Alvan D Freeman. Both had probably also just come from worship services. Atkinson from the Prescyterian church and Freeman from the Baptist church. From the courthouse steps, Atkinson pleaded with the crowd not to disgrace their state by circumventing the courts and taking the law into their own hands. This appeal created a momentary silence, but when someone yelled “Burn him!” mayhem ensued. Atkinson managed to regain a hearing for one final fallback plea. Conceding that he could not deter the mob from their plans, he pushed for a change of venue. Atkinson threatened to testify against everyone he knew if the crowd carried out the lynching “in the midst of our homes here in the city.” With a roar of agreement, the mob lurched into action.
Given that these events occurred on a Sunday just as worshippers were leaving church, it is striking to note the conspicuous absence of religious opposition to the mob violence. Central Baptist Church was a prominent, newly built structure, and its central location provided a viewing area for many of the swirling events. Historian Edwin Arnold noted the flow from church benedictions to the lynching processional: “members who had attended the Sunday morning services now stood on its steps watching or joined the procession as it passed by.” Certainly local clergy would have been aware of what was happening Yet there is no record that any clergyman addressed the crowd.