A HOLOCAUST.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 821, 19 May 1910, Page 7

A HOLOCAUST.

LEASING OF CONVICTS. IN A BURNING STOCKADE. NEGROES PERISH BETWEEN TWO FIRES. DRIVEN BACK BY VOLLEYS OF THE GUARDS. By TclecrraDh—Press Association—Copyright. (Rec. May 18, 11.30 p.m.) New York, May 18. Details of the burning of negro convicts in the Centreville stockade, AlaI bania, show the convicts had been leased by the State to tho Red Feather Coal, Company, and were confined in a large stockade, with armed guards. A negro applied a match to tho stockade, hoping to escape in tho confusion. The convicts tried to rush out when the fire broke out, but the guards shot on© of thein, and the others, appalled, huddled back in the stockade. As the flames encroached the negroes made another dash for safety, and another volley was fired,, which wounded several. Many of tho negroes were burned to death while struggling through tho blazing timbers. Gruesomo details aro given of the blasphemous shrieks and the writhings of tho convicts in the death-trap. Thirty-five were burned to death. Several wore shot, and many wcro wounded. HORRORS OF CONVICT-LEASING SYSTEM. WORSE THAN SLAVERY. Prisons aro scanty in the. southern States of the United States; the demand for labour is groat; and one State after another has drifted into tho practice of hii'ing out convicts as labourers to companies, who profit greatly at the expense of the convicts. It is said that twelve States pursue this practice. In the very State of Alabama, where tho abovedescribed atrocity has occurred, Dr. Bragg, in a report to the Governor of Alabama, says:— Labour Which Means Death.

"The county convict system is worse than ever-before in its history. The demand for labour and fees has become so great that most of them go now to the mines whore many of them are unfit for such labour, consequently it is not long before they pass from earth. ... If the State wishes to kill its convicts it should do it directly ami not indirectly. . . . If the convict develops tuberculosis or any other disease lie has ■ to stay in camp until it means death to a largo proportion." Of the working of the convict-leasing system in Tennessee it has been written: The felony convicts were first leased in 1570." Some years after the adoption of the'.system the convicts were leased for a term of years to the Tennesseo Goal,' Iron,, and Railroad Company, one of the wealthiest corporations in the South with, as was alleged; two-influential politicians of.the North at its head. The State received annually 101,000 dollars from the labour of the convicts, and the profits realised by the corporation were estimated to be about the-same amount.

... In February, 1889, the Legislative Prison . Committee investigated the prisons at the . mines where the male convicts were worked, u'lid the buildings where the men were housed at night were reported by members of the committee to be "rough board shanties unfit for the habitation of human beiri'gs."Thcy were constructed of rough board planks, spiked up and down, aud unplastered anJ unsealed. The beds were ticks filled with filthy straw, and the covering scant'and filthy. Bough boards formed the platform for the continuous rows of beds. Inhuman Whippings. Tho Committee reported "cruel and inhuman whippings with a heavy strap on the naked backs of the convicts for failure to get out tasks," and "for nearly everything." Convicts were poorly fed and scantily clothed, some having on no socks in winter. .... The method of punishment was to lay the convict flat on his stomach, and whip him on his naked back with a heavy leather strap attached to a handle. The number of licks varied from ten to sixty laid on sometimes with both hands, by a stalwart guard. Tho punishment was inflicted for all breaches of rules 2nd for failure to do the task assigned, which was about four tons of coal per day.