Springfield News & Observer 2001
If you lived in Pierce City in
1901, there is no way you wouldn’t have known about the Aug. 19 riot and
lynching of a black man downtown after a young white woman was found near railroad tracks.
Everyone would know the name of
the 23-year-old woman, Gisela E. Wild. The name Godley
would be on every on s lips too. Will Godley, 32, was the man hanged over
a second-floor hotel porch banister for the crime. The charred remains of his
mother's husband French Godley, and Pete Hampton were
found after the homes of black residents were set abase
After 100 years, however, names
have a way of becoming lost. When they are associated with events
rather forgotten, they have way of vanishing completely.
Monett Times editor Murray
Bishoff didn’t want to let that happen. He knew that “you
can’t come to grips with this story by forgetting about
it.” Ten years ago, Bishoff began compiling what would become the
first official history of that horrendous night and the consequent exodus of
the town’s established black community.
The story is a sickeningly familiar
one in Springfield where in 1906 a mob lynched three black men on the
town square and black families fled. Here, the
incident will be marked by a mural at Founders Park. In Pierce City
today, a plaque with the men’s names will be placed in the cemetery where they
are buried. It reads, “May community be restored.” By not
forgetting, the plaque and the mural are a step toward that end.
===================================================
Pierce City, Missouri vigil
remembers 3 Black men killed during 1901 lynchings
Published Aug. 22, 2023
at 5:00 a.m. CDT
Pierce City, a town of about
1,277 people in southwest Missouri, once had a sizeable African-American
population.
Murray Bishoff, a writer and
longtime reporter for The Monett Times, said the Black residents traced their
roots to Judah Godley who was brought to the area as a slave in 1848 along with
her five children – the property of Mary Godley Jameson and her husband
Achilles.
But that all changed on August
19, 1901.
Bishoff said a young woman,
24-year-old Gisela Wild, was assaulted and murdered the day before in a culvert
under railroad tracks in Pierce City, and Black men who lived in the town were
blamed.
“A lack of evidence directed
people towards suspecting African Americans," said Bishoff, "and the
town was whipped up into a frenzy over the next 35 hours and ultimately
resulted in a five-hour riot against people who had lived here since the earliest
days of the town.”
Town residents formed a mob, and
they were joined by more people who had heard the news of the murder and who
departed from trains going through Pierce City.
When the night of August 19, 1901
had turned to dawn the next day, three Black men were dead: 32-year-old Will
Godley whose neck was tied with a rope and who was pushed by white men from a
second story balcony that stood above the entrance of the Hotel Lawrence at
Commercial and Walnut. When Godley went over the railing, other white men on
the ground below fired multiple bullets into him.
Two other Black
men — Pete Hampton who was believed to be in his 30s and 70-year-old
French Godley — were killed when white men fired into a house and then burned
it down. Other Black-owned homes were burned that night as well. Pierce City’s
Black residents fled the city, never to return.
"This was the one place
where they actually forced an established Black community to leave,"
Bishoff said.
There were five lynchings in
southwest Missouri in a period of 12 years, he said. The first one was in
Monett in 1894. Then there were others in Pierce City and Joplin as well as
Pittsburg, Kansas. The last was in Springfield in 1906. Bishoff said they largely
caused the Black community to abandon the area.
Bishoff has been writing about the lynching in Pierce City since the
early 1990s, and he said it’s become a personal story for him. He continues to
search for photos and artifacts and people who might have information that’s
never been recorded.
"And, I started coming to
this spot and lighting a candle about 30 years ago just 'cause," he said.
"And, when my wife moved here in '97, she started coming with me, and
every now and then I'd have somebody come along."
In 2001, for the centennial of
the riot, he held a public presentation where he read a couple of chapters from
an historical novel he wrote about the incident – that he’s never sought to
have published.
In the last decade or so he said
he’s been more public about the candlelight vigil.
Bishoff said for a long time he
was nervous about letting anyone know about the annual event. According to
Bishoff, some area residents haven’t been very happy about him telling the
story.
"There's some collective
feeling of guilt, which 100 years later it's like 'why?' But there's some
discomfort there, and I've always been a little reluctant to be terribly verbal
about it, and after a certain point it's like, 'oh, what the heck?' Every town
that has had an incident of this nature needs to talk about it," said
Bishoff.
It’s important to remind people
about the lynching, he said, so they can try to understand why these things
happened and so they can do better.
Just before the candlelight vigil
began on Saturday night in downtown Pierce City in front of city hall, a Black
man approached Bishoff and introduced himself. He was Selwyn Jones, the uncle
of George Floyd who was killed by a Minneapolis police officer in May of 2020.
Jones said his nephew’s death
wasn’t in vain. Because of it, he now travels the country talking to people
about Floyd’s murder and about race relations – things that are often
uncomfortable to talk about. He said he wanted to be at the vigil to show respect
for those who died and to be there for progress.
"Because the things that
happened hundreds of years ago we obviously can't do anything about," said
Jones, "But thanks to people like him (Bishoff), we're sort of kind of
changing that narrative of how things used to be, and, granted, things could
get better, but with young people like this in the world that are trying to
make them better, they will get better, you know?"
Jones produces a podcast with
Harrison, Arkansas city councilperson Elizabeth Darden, and they heard about
the vigil from Darden’s mother.
Darden said it was an honor to be
there to commemorate individuals who were lynched and falsely accused of
something they didn't do because of the color of their skin.
"And it's important for us
to be here because that's what we do — we travel around the country," she
said. "People seek out Uncle Selwyn for solace to overcome tragedies
because their families have been impacted by police brutality, and it's about
continuing the conversation to educate one another, and that's very
important."
Jones said, when he heard about
the event in Pierce City, he knew he had to be there to try to make a
difference.
"You know, there's a lot of
people that have trauma and disarray from the colors of one's skin, from their
religion, and we just set out on the road to show people we're all the
same," he said. "We're absolutely all the same. We are of the human
race. And, we can combat this because for three days everybody in the world
with the exception of a couple of places stood up and hollered my big sister's
baby boy's name, you know? Because it made everybody open their eyes and say,
'wow' — just like Mr. Murray's opening eyes right here. So, that's the reason
why I'm here."
The event in Pierce City ended
with the lighting of candles.
"So, friends, thank you for
coming," Bishoff told the crowd, "and let us hold our candles in a
moment of silence in remembrance for those who have gone before us, those who
fell on this night, and those whose memory we cherish by coming together to
hear their story."
Bishoff will continue to host the
vigil. The tornado that roared through downtown Pierce City in May of 2003
didn’t stop him. He said he and his wife Joy had to sneak in to get to the
site. There were no lights, and the old buildings, whose walls are full of
history – both good and bad -- were creaking as they stood there, creating an
eerie scene.
If you lived in Pierce City in
1901, there is no way you wouldn’t t have known about the Aug. 19 riot and
lynching of a black man downtown after a young white woman was found
near railroad tracks.
Everyone would know the name of
the 23-year-old woman, Gisela E. Wild. The name Godley
would be on every on s lips too. Will Godley, 32, was the man hanged over
a second-floor hotel porch banister for the crime. The charred remains of his
mother's husband French Godley, and Pete Hamp ton were
found after the homes of black residents were set abase
After 100 years, however, names
have a way of becoming lost. When they are associated with events
rather forgotten, they hava way of vanishing completely.
Monett Times editor Murray
Bishoff didn’t want to let that happen. He knew that “you
can’t come to grips with this story by forgetting about
it.” Ten years ago, Bishoff began compiling what would become the
first official history of that horrendous night and the consequent exodus of
the town’s established black community.
The story is a sickeningly familiar
one in Springfield where in 1906 a mob lynched three black men on the
town square and black families fled. Here, the
incident will be marked by a mural at Founders Park. In Pierce City
today, a plaque with the men’s names will be placed in the cemetery where they
are buried. It reads, “May community be restored.” By not
forgetting, the plaque and the mural are a step toward that end.
Pierce City, Missouri vigil
remembers 3 Black men killed during 1901 lynchings
Published Aug. 22, 2023
at 5:00 a.m. CDT
Pierce City, a town of about
1,277 people in southwest Missouri, once had a sizeable African-American
population.
Murray Bishoff, a writer and
longtime reporter for The Monett Times, said the Black residents traced their
roots to Judah Godley who was brought to the area as a slave in 1848 along with
her five children – the property of Mary Godley Jameson and her husband
Achilles.
But that all changed on August
19, 1901.
Bishoff said a young woman,
24-year-old Gisela Wild, was assaulted and murdered the day before in a culvert
under railroad tracks in Pierce City, and Black men who lived in the town were
blamed.
“A lack of evidence directed
people towards suspecting African Americans," said Bishoff, "and the
town was whipped up into a frenzy over the next 35 hours and ultimately
resulted in a five-hour riot against people who had lived here since the earliest
days of the town.”
Town residents formed a mob, and
they were joined by more people who had heard the news of the murder and who
departed from trains going through Pierce City.
When the night of August 19, 1901
had turned to dawn the next day, three Black men were dead: 32-year-old Will
Godley whose neck was tied with a rope and who was pushed by white men from a
second story balcony that stood above the entrance of the Hotel Lawrence at
Commercial and Walnut. When Godley went over the railing, other white men on
the ground below fired multiple bullets into him.
Two other Black
men — Pete Hampton who was believed to be in his 30s and 70-year-old
French Godley — were killed when white men fired into a house and then burned
it down. Other Black-owned homes were burned that night as well. Pierce City’s
Black residents fled the city, never to return.
"This was the one place
where they actually forced an established Black community to leave,"
Bishoff said.
There were five lynchings in
southwest Missouri in a period of 12 years, he said. The first one was in
Monett in 1894. Then there were others in Pierce City and Joplin as well as
Pittsburg, Kansas. The last was in Springfield in 1906. Bishoff said they largely
caused the Black community to abandon the area.
Bishoff has been writing about the lynching in Pierce City since the
early 1990s, and he said it’s become a personal story for him. He continues to
search for photos and artifacts and people who might have information that’s
never been recorded.
"And, I started coming to
this spot and lighting a candle about 30 years ago just 'cause," he said.
"And, when my wife moved here in '97, she started coming with me, and
every now and then I'd have somebody come along."
In 2001, for the centennial of
the riot, he held a public presentation where he read a couple of chapters from
an historical novel he wrote about the incident – that he’s never sought to
have published.
In the last decade or so he said
he’s been more public about the candlelight vigil.
Bishoff said for a long time he
was nervous about letting anyone know about the annual event. According to
Bishoff, some area residents haven’t been very happy about him telling the
story.
"There's some collective
feeling of guilt, which 100 years later it's like 'why?' But there's some
discomfort there, and I've always been a little reluctant to be terribly verbal
about it, and after a certain point it's like, 'oh, what the heck?' Every town
that has had an incident of this nature needs to talk about it," said
Bishoff.
It’s important to remind people
about the lynching, he said, so they can try to understand why these things
happened and so they can do better.
Just before the candlelight vigil
began on Saturday night in downtown Pierce City in front of city hall, a Black
man approached Bishoff and introduced himself. He was Selwyn Jones, the uncle
of George Floyd who was killed by a Minneapolis police officer in May of 2020.
Jones said his nephew’s death
wasn’t in vain. Because of it, he now travels the country talking to people
about Floyd’s murder and about race relations – things that are often
uncomfortable to talk about. He said he wanted to be at the vigil to show respect
for those who died and to be there for progress.
"Because the things that
happened hundreds of years ago we obviously can't do anything about," said
Jones, "But thanks to people like him (Bishoff), we're sort of kind of
changing that narrative of how things used to be, and, granted, things could
get better, but with young people like this in the world that are trying to
make them better, they will get better, you know?"
Jones produces a podcast with
Harrison, Arkansas city councilperson Elizabeth Darden, and they heard about
the vigil from Darden’s mother.
Darden said it was an honor to be
there to commemorate individuals who were lynched and falsely accused of
something they didn't do because of the color of their skin.
"And it's important for us
to be here because that's what we do — we travel around the country," she
said. "People seek out Uncle Selwyn for solace to overcome tragedies
because their families have been impacted by police brutality, and it's about
continuing the conversation to educate one another, and that's very
important."
Jones said, when he heard about
the event in Pierce City, he knew he had to be there to try to make a
difference.
"You know, there's a lot of
people that have trauma and disarray from the colors of one's skin, from their
religion, and we just set out on the road to show people we're all the
same," he said. "We're absolutely all the same. We are of the human
race. And, we can combat this because for three days everybody in the world
with the exception of a couple of places stood up and hollered my big sister's
baby boy's name, you know? Because it made everybody open their eyes and say,
'wow' — just like Mr. Murray's opening eyes right here. So, that's the reason
why I'm here."
The event in Pierce City ended
with the lighting of candles.
"So, friends, thank you for
coming," Bishoff told the crowd, "and let us hold our candles in a
moment of silence in remembrance for those who have gone before us, those who
fell on this night, and those whose memory we cherish by coming together to
hear their story."
Bishoff will continue to host the
vigil. The tornado that roared through downtown Pierce City in May of 2003
didn’t stop him. He said he and his wife Joy had to sneak in to get to the
site. There were no lights, and the old buildings, whose walls are full of
history – both good and bad -- were creaking as they stood there, creating an
eerie scene.
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