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The Rail
This is a work of historical fiction based on actual events surrounding a vicious murder of a white women and the eventual lynching of the accused, a black man, in 1901 in Corsicana, Texas. The author makes use of a narrator, an incognito Pinkerton detective interviewing fictional and actual participants, who makes periodic reports to his superiors. While the dialog between the narrator and his subjects is made up, it supposedly reflects the opinions of east Texas residents of the time period. Interspersed are actual newspaper clippings describing the crime, pursuit of the accused, execution, and aftermath.
Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1995
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June 10, 2013
After the Civil War, the South was not a safe place to live if you were a Black American. The effects of Reconstruction and the politics of the time were very hard on citizens of African ancestry and they were mostly treated as subhumans. If you were a black man accused of raping and/or murdering a white person, especially a woman, you were pretty much guilty as charged. If the legal system worked too slowly or showed too much deference for black defendants, lynchings were common.
This book tells the story behind an actual event - the lynching of a black man named John Henderson - that took place in Corsicana, Texas in 1901, some 36 years after the Civil War. In my mind, I had always thought of lynching as being synonomous with hanging but in East Texas, it usually meant burning at the stake. John Henderson was burned at the stake on the Navarro County Courthouse lawn in front of a large crowd.
The history of this event is enough to make one cringe on its own but the author chose to use a fictional "narrator" interviewing fictional characters which generated fictional dialog and feeble attempts at humor. At times I was confused as to the chronology of events when fiction was mixed with actual newspaper articles.
This is a story of racial tension and mob violence. Based on my reading of this story, there is plenty of "reasonable doubt" that may have led to a different outcome had cooler heads prevailed.
This book tells the story behind an actual event - the lynching of a black man named John Henderson - that took place in Corsicana, Texas in 1901, some 36 years after the Civil War. In my mind, I had always thought of lynching as being synonomous with hanging but in East Texas, it usually meant burning at the stake. John Henderson was burned at the stake on the Navarro County Courthouse lawn in front of a large crowd.
The history of this event is enough to make one cringe on its own but the author chose to use a fictional "narrator" interviewing fictional characters which generated fictional dialog and feeble attempts at humor. At times I was confused as to the chronology of events when fiction was mixed with actual newspaper articles.
This is a story of racial tension and mob violence. Based on my reading of this story, there is plenty of "reasonable doubt" that may have led to a different outcome had cooler heads prevailed.
Displaying 1 of 1 review