A Lynching in Shelby County in 1901: Louis McAdams

In September last year we visited the Legacy Museum and the National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery. You can read about that visit in a blog post here.

The National Memorial documents over 4000 racial terror lynchings in twelve Southern states and over 300 elsewhere in the United States from 1877 until 1950. Each county where such lynchings have occurred has a monument hanging in the open air memorial. A second monument for each county, which will hopefully be claimed and erected there, forms the rows on the Memorial grounds. Since we live in Shelby County, I naturally paid close attention to that monument.

Further comments are below.

The National Memorial is impressive inside and out. 

Here's a transcription of the nine documented lynchings in Shelby County:

1.

August 31, 1889: Two people, names unknown

UPDATE: In late August 2019 the Montevallo City Council approved an historical marker about these lynchings. 

2.

June 7, 1890: unknown

3.

March 24, 1893: John Dances 

4.

July 10, 1900: John Jennings

5.

January 2, 1901: Louis McAdams

6.

August 8, 1908: unknown

7.

May 26, 1910: Jesse Matson

8. 

April 30, 1923: John Morton King

In doing a bit of research myself, I've found some interesting details about the January 2, 1901, lynching of Louis McAdams. This post shares that information. 

I found five distinct items about the lynching in contemporary newspapers. I'll discuss those below. 

I also found some information about McAdams in the U.S. Census. He appears as a one year-old child of Jackson and Fannie McAdams of Wilsonville in the 1880 count. Jackson was about 65 years old and from South Carolina. His occupation was listed as farmer. The 1880 non-population agricultural census noted Jackson owned ten acres in Beat 9 of Shelby County. Fannie, 45, was an Alabama native. Four other children ranged in age from four to 17.

The 1900 Census finds Louis at age 25 living with his mother Fannie, then 70. Louis' birthday is listed as May, 1875, with no day given. Oddly, Louis could read but not write. That birthdate, his age and his mother's age do not mesh with the 1880 Census, but such discrepancies are common in census records. McAdams' occupation is given as farm laborer. 

Thus we know that Louis was in his early or mid-twenties and living in Wilsonville at the time of his lynching. Fannie later appears in the 1910 Census, age 85 and widowed, living on Teague Bridge Road in Wilsonville. Two young people, Homer and Luanna Blakey ages 21 and 19 were living with her. She had had 18 children; nine were then living. She could neither read nor write. 

McAdams was the only lynching victim in Shelby County for which I found information in my initial research. Perhaps I can further document others in the future. 

The Columbia [Tenn.] Herald., January 11, 1901, Page 8

The first item above identifies the man McAdams was accused of "cutting and seriously injuring" as J. M. Ray, "a merchant of that place", i.e., Wilsonville. I found several J.M. Rays in Shelby County in census records between 1880 and 1910, but none listed as a merchant.

Note the last item in the extract above describing outrages by "white-cap" activity in Poplar Bluff, Missouri. You can read more about the vigilante whitecapping movement here.

Ameryka. (Toledo, Ohio)

[weekly published in Polish] 1893-1902, January 12, 1901

The Abbeville Press and Banner. (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, January 16, 1901

In this item we learn some more details. Louis was taken from the sheriff's office by "a mob of one hundred men" who hanged him and then quietly dispersed. "Every man wore a mask." I wonder if Louis was just left hanging from a tree branch?

The Appeal. [St. Paul, Minn.] September 14, 1901

Front page articles on lynchings & a list of 101 lynchings thus far in 1901. McAdams is included in the listing. 

Bourbon News [Paris, KY] January 04, 1901

This account is the longest one I found and gives us additional details. We learn that the altercation with Ray [misspelled "Rey" here] took place on Christmas Eve, 1900. McAdams was arrested in Childersburg on Tuesday, January 2, 1901, and seized by the mob the following day. He was hanged from a tree four miles from Wilsonville and "As the Negro's body swung in the air the contents of 50 shotguns and rifles were emptied into it." 

Since there were 100 masked men, I wonder why only half supposedly fired their guns at McAdams. A sudden attack of restraint on the part of half the mob? This story was apparently filed in Birmingham, as "a special" from Wilsonville. Did these extensive details come from an eyewitness?

Louis McAdams' lynching was also noted briefly in four other papers I located:

Watertown [Wisconsin] Republican., January 09, 1901

The Hope [ND] Pioneer., January 10, 1901

Willmar [Minn.] Tribune., January 09, 1901

The Bolivar [Tenn.] bulletin., January 11, 1901

Another general resource on lynching in the United States is the "American Lynching" site. This source gives 347 total lynchings in Alabama from 1882 until 1968, with 299 black victims & 48 white. In the "Explore" section you can get a list of Alabama's victims by county.

Monroe Work was an African-American sociologist who spent much of his career at Tuskegee. One of his many projects there documented lynchings. A web site devoted to him has an extensive bibliography on the subject. A 1931 map of lynchings based on his research can be found here.

Wikipedia has a long article on the subject here.

Source: Project Gutenberg


In its report on lynching in America, the Equal Justice Institute in Montgomery  gives the following description of its sources and results:


Racial terror lynching was much more prevalent than previously reported. EJI researchers have documented several hundred more lynchings than the number identified in the most comprehensive work done on lynching to date. The extraordinary work of E.M. Beck and Stewart E. Tolnay provided an invaluable resource, as did the research collected at Tuskegee University in Tuskegee, Alabama. These sources are widely viewed as the most comprehensive collection of research data on the subject of lynching in America. EJI conducted extensive analysis of these data as well as supplemental research and investigation of lynchings in each of the subject states. We reviewed local newspapers, historical archives, and court records; conducted interviews with local historians, survivors, and victims’ descendants; and exhaustively examined contemporaneously published reports in African American newspapers. EJI has documented 4084 racial terror lynchings in twelve Southern states between the end of Reconstruction in 1877 and 1950, which is at least 800 more lynchings in these states than previously reported. EJI has also documented more than 300 racial terror lynchings in other states during this time period.

Allan Cemetery in Northern Shelby County

Heading east on Alabama 119 between I-65 and toward U.S. 280, you'll pass Oak Mountain Elementary and Middle Schools on your left. Not far beyond is Allan Cemetery and what looks like the shell of a former church. Let's investigate.

Back in 2011, Barry Wise Smith wrote an article for AL.com, "Hidden Haunts: Small, local cemeteries reveal Birmingham's early history." The Allan Cemetery is included in that group, so let me quote the text there which is a good introduction: 

"Located on Alabama Highway 119 in north Shelby County is the Allan Cemetery, established in 1835. Originally known as the Johnson Cemetery, for one of the first families to settle in the area, the name changed in the early 1900s. The land belonged to Rollin Johnson's great, great, great grandfather Col. Isaac Francis Johnson, who owned 400 to 500 acres. A doctor, Col. Johnson started the cemetery when his wife and two sons died in a yellow fever epidemic in 1835.

The old cemetery features names that are well known in Shelby County historical circles: Johnson, Bishop, Cross, Allan, Brasher, Gilbert and more. The oldest readable stone in the cemetery features a birth date of 1808. The graveyard has been surveyed and mapped by the Shelby County Historical Society and still is active with burials ongoing. The shell of the building that sits adjacent to the cemetery, often thought to be a church, is actually an old meeting hall that was built to host funerals, memorial services and revivals. "I remember going there as a kid," Johnson recalls. 'I even helped lay some of the floor boards.'

Down the road, hidden behind several residential developments, is an almost-forgotten graveyard that is home to a number of graves belonging to African-American descendants of slaves. The last names on the gravestones, a number of which are hand-carved, feature the same last names found in the Allan Cemetery. Many of the graves here are unmarked or simply marked with stones. Due to neglect, many of the sites are buried further under waist-high weeds."



The Heritage of Shelby County, Alabama, published in 1999 has an entry on the Allan Cemetery written by Rollin L. Johnson, Jr. [page 123]. In addition to the details in the Smith article, Johnson notes that for many years a "memorial day" was held at the cemetery on the second Sunday in June. The event actually began the previous Wednesday when the cemetery was cleaned. The gathering included dinner on the ground on Sunday and afterward a singing in the chapel. Children could play in Hooker Springs, the source of nearby Bishop Creek. Johnson writes that that "memorial day" and the scheduled cleaning no longer occur, but the cemetery is still worked by individuals with relatives and ancestors buried there.

I've passed by the cemetery many times, and recently Dianne and I stopped late one afternoon. A few of the photos I took are below, along with some further comments. Maybe another time I can locate the African-American cemetery nearby. 

Here's the cemetery sign today, not as well kept as in the photo below

Sign photo from Find-A-Grave taken by Bridget Slade

Front view and entrance of the meeting house

Right side view

View through a window of the raised stage area

Another view inside

Rear views of the buidling

Various Brashers are buried in the cemetery; here's a recent grave

The cemetery is nestled among a number of large trees. Once located in a very rural area distant from Birmingham, northern Shelby County's growth in recent decades now surrounds the cemetery. 

There are several Wrights buried here, but I don't think any are from my family lines.

Man's best friend is on alert at this grave.

You can sometimes find the Masonic symbol, the square and compass and often a letter in the center, on gravestones.  

Late afternoon sun illuminates some older graves

The cemetery has a single mausoleum that we found. 

Several gravestones include photographs of the deceased. Although still unusual, such photos are also seen today on new interments. 

One gravestone is a large cross.

This gravestone takes the form of an archway.

And of course there is a Woodman of the World headstone. This fraternal organization was founded in Omaha in 1890 and provides life insurance to members. An early benefit of membership was these markers, which were discontinued around 1930 due to cost. However, so many were created that they can be seen in cemeteries across America.

Montevallo is Missing! [My 350th blog post!]

Well, sort of. And only on a map. Sort of....let's investigate.

On September 9th, the city of Montevallo had a festival to celebrate it's bicentennial. Like Pelham, once known as Shelbyville and Shelby County's original seat of government, Montevallo predates Alabama statehood in 1819. 

The first white settler in the county, Jess Wilson, arrived in 1814 and others followed as the Indian threat diminshed. The area became "Wilson's Hill" by 1822 and Montevallo in 1826 according to Clark Hultquist and Carey Heatherly's Montevallo [Arcadia Images of America series, 2011, p. 11]. You can read some more early history here. Montevallo was incorporated by the state legislature in 1848 when almost 1000 people lived there. 

Columbia in the southern part of the county became the seat in 1826 and a post office was established. The town became Columbiana in 1832 and incorporated in 1837.

I was perusing some old Alabama maps recently and noticed something interesting related to this early history. Excerpts are below; all map portions are taken from the state maps at the University of Alabama's Historical Map Archive. You'll note some mysteries as you look at these maps and read my comments. Montevallo appears on a map as early as 1823, then an 1824 map lists "Wilson Hill" but no "Montevallo". 

These maps from the 1820's and 1830's vary in the towns shown. Making maps in those days was hardly a standardized business. Did mapmakers in Philadelphia or Baltimore actually visit these places or copy from previous maps or what?

Feel free to leave insights in the comments section!

On John Melish's 1818 map of Alabama, we see Shelby County in its earliest form. The county was created by the legislature of the Alabama Territory in February 1818. The only named locations in Shelby at this time were Fort Strother and Fort Villanos, Camp Wills and Camp Bradley and Littafuchee. All but Fort Villanos would become part of St. Clair County when it was created in November.

Fort Strother was constructed during the Creek War by several thousand of Andrew Jackson's Tennessee Militia  just before the Battle of Talladega on November 8, 1813. Presumably the other fort and camps were also a part of that war. Littafuchee was an Upper Creek town; the name means "making of arrows." In October 1813 some of the Militia captured the town 

Portion of Fielding Lucas' 1822 map of Alabama that shows two towns in Shelby County at that time. A post office was established at the current Wilsonville in the same year; the town wasn't incorporated until 1897. But this map shows a weirdly shaped Shelby County; is this Wilsonville supposed to be Wilson's Hill? Montevallo is in southern Shelby County, after all, and today's Wilsonville is in the eastern part near the Coosa River.

On this section of Henry S. Tanner's 1823 state map, we find Shelbyville and Montevallo as well as Kelley's Village in the northeastern corner of the county.

Anthony Finley's 1824 state map lists only Shelbyville and Wilson Hill. What happened to "Montevallo"?

Henry S. Tanner's 1825 map again lists not only Shelbyville and Montevallo, but  also Kelley's Village. That third place is a mystery; it doesn't appear in Virginia Foscue's Place Names in Alabama [University of Alabama Press, 1989]. However, there are a Kelley Mountain and Kelley Creek in Shelby County.

Taken from David Burr's 1836 map of Alabama. Notice there are still only two towns noted in Shelby County, Shelbyville and now Montevallo. Poor Columbiana, the country seat, is getting no recognition here.