By Rene Childress

By the beginning of the twentieth century some African-Americans had begun to accumulate land as independent farmers.  They began to compete with the more well established white farmers. Many of them began to prosper and would not work for  impoverishing wages. They were looked upon as uppity “Niggers”.

This is where we find ourselves for our next episode of “The Worst Story Ever Told”. 

We find ourselves in the “Grand Old Bluegrass State” of Kentucky.  During the beginning of early planting season in1908 poor white farmers in Fulton County,Kentucky and Lake and Obion counties became a bastion of Klu Klux Klan activity. They initially organized in opposition to the Western Tennessee Land Company which had purchased a majority of the Reelfoot Lake with plans to use it for cotton planting. 

The family owned farmers were opposed to the introduction of corporate farms that would put them out of the cotton business.  The locals who had been using this lake for fishing and cultivating around its verdant soil shoulders would no longer have access to this free entity. 

The night riders in their zeal to keep this land in local use decided that they would not only keep Western Tennessee Land Company off this land. They decided that their uppity “Nigger” problem could be addressed as well. Thus began a reign of terror stretching from southeast Kentucky through the western Tennessee. There  were numerous beatings,burnings and lynchings aimed at driving the African-americans from their lands. 

By the Dawn of the twentieth century a Mr.David Walker had acquired 22 acres outside the hamlet of Hickman.  He worked this farm with his wife and family. The Walker family included five children of varied ages including an infant in arms. 

One day, Mr. Walker came into conflict with a white male while conducting business in Hickman. This altercation did not go unnoticed by the Kluxers. They arrived at his home in short order. 

Fifty white sheeted and armed men presented themselves to the doorstep of the Walker domicile demanding that Mr. Walker had to go with them. He refused to cede to their demands. The cowardly menagerie of outlaws proceeded to torch the Walker homeplace with coal oil. 

Walker came out in hopes of saving his family.  The mob laughed and cursed him as they riddled his body with bullets. Hearing her husband's entreaties the wife rushed out with her baby in her arms hoping against hope that maybe seeing an infant might cull their blood lust. She was grossly mistaken about any sense of humanity in this craven crowd of cowards. 

They opened fire upon her personage, ripping her and her young child to shreds. As the flames of fire began to lick and crackle three more of the Walker children rushed from the burning house to be met with a fusillade of gunfire. The final Walker child, the eldest son, was coaxed to come out by the mob. 

He refused to come out, understanding that it would be better to be consumed by flames than being delivered into the hands of men known for sadistic and depraved proclivities. Several hundred black families were driven out of their  properties never to be allowed to return or be compensated for their losses. The murderers of the Walker family were never charged or convicted as was the custom of whites killing blacks in our history. 

Another story in a long litany of stories that we should not forget. I believe we should take up the confederate slogan “Lest We forget “ and give it a new life truth about the real South and not the Antebellum Fairy Tales of the benevolent  plantation life.