January 28, 1864 to 1864

BROOKE, Virginia

African-Americans, Arts/Leisure, Crime/Violence, Law, Race-Relations, Urban-Life/Boosterism

The crime was reported in the newspaper with a bit of contempt, as if it was a mildly amusing diversion in the late days of the Civil War. According to the Wellsburg Herald, the black population of Wellsburg had been meeting nightly at societies or parties at the residences of other free blacks. But on this particular night something went wrong, or as the local white-owned newspaper mused, [the party]...