Claude Neal (b. 1911
– d. October 26, 1934) was a 23-year-old
African-American
African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American ...
farmhand who was arrested in
Jackson County, Florida, on October 19, 1934, for allegedly raping and killing Lola Cannady, a 19-year-old white woman missing since the preceding night. Circumstantial evidence was collected against him, but nothing directly linked him to the crime. When the news got out about his arrest, white
lynch mobs began to form.
In order to keep Neal safe, County Sheriff Flake Chambliss moved him between multiple jails, including the county jail at
Brewton, Alabama
Brewton is a city in and
the county seat of Escambia County, Alabama, Escambia County, Alabama, United States. At the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, the population was 5,276. Brewton is located in south central Alabama, just north of ...
, away. But a lynch mob of about 100 white men from Jackson County heard where he was, and brought him back to Jackson County.
The time and place of the lynching were provided to the news media in advance and reported on nationwide, attracting a huge crowd.
The spectacle lynching had been announced to take place at the Cannady farm, but the crowd had grown unruly, and a smaller group murdered Neal in secret. He was tortured and mutilated before being hanged by the instigators at a site along the
Chattahoochee River
The Chattahoochee River forms the southern half of the Alabama and Georgia border, as well as a portion of the Florida - Georgia border. It is a tributary of the Apalachicola River, a relatively short river formed by the confluence of the Chatta ...
, near
Greenwood, Florida. They tied his body to the back of their truck and dragged his corpse to the Cannady farm, where a white crowd estimated at 2,000 attacked the corpse by stabbing it with sticks and knives.
Later that night Neal's body was hanged from a tree in the courthouse square. When the sheriff discovered it in the morning, he cut it down.
A large group of white people went to the courthouse in
Marianna, demanding that the body be hanged again so they could see it. When the sheriff refused, they began rioting, assaulting the courthouse, attacking black people in the area, injuring 200, and looting and burning houses. The body was displayed on the courthouse steps so that anyone interested could see it.
In the next few days, white people rioted in an attempt to drive black people from the county, injuring an estimated 200 persons, including two police, and destroying black-owned property. Eventually, Governor
David Sholtz
David Sholtz (October 6, 1891 – March 21, 1953) was the 26th Governor of Florida. Prior to serving as Governor he would be a state attorney serving Florida's 7th Judicial Circuit Court and previously as a member of the Florida House of Repres ...
called in more than 100 troops of the
National Guard to suppress the white rioting.
Murder of Lola Cannady
Lola Cannady (also spelled Cannidy), a 19-year-old white woman from a farming family, was missing on the evening of Thursday, October 18, 1934, after going to a water pump to water the family's hogs.
Friends and neighbors helped the Cannady family in their search for Lola in the fields behind the family's land. At 6:30 A.M. the next day, they found her body poorly hidden in the woods, under the cover of two logs and a pine tree branch.
Cannady had been bludgeoned to death with a hammer that had been taken from the Cannady field.
She may have been raped.
County Sheriff Flake Chambliss became focused on two suspects: Claude Neal, a 23-year-old black farmworker who lived about a quarter mile away, and Calvin Cross, who was white.
Sheriff Chambliss had received reports that Neal had been in the field near the same water pump that Lola had gone to and that he was gone for about two hours before going home.
Neal and Cannady had known each other since childhood; there were some suggestions that they were lovers.
Neal was arrested about two hours after the discovery of Cannady's body.
Because the evidence gathered against Neal was circumstantial at best, it was not enough to prove that he was guilty of the crime.
The evidence included bloody clothes that were found at the home he shared with his mother, as well as a bloody piece of fabric which Sheriff Chambliss claimed fit a tear in Neal's shirt.
Neal reportedly had cuts on his hands and was inconsistent in his descriptions as to where they had come from; he gave three different explanations for the cuts, with one being that he had gotten them while fixing a fence, one being that he had cut his hands in a fight, and one being that he had cut them jumping a fence.
In addition, Neal was missing a ring on his pocket watch. A common, standard watch ring had been found near the spot where Cannady had been murdered.
No tests were done on the murder weapon to determine if Neal's fingerprints were on it.
The sheriff moved Neal's mother Mrs. Annie Smith and aunt Sallie Smith to an undisclosed jail to prevent them from being harmed by a lynch mob. The prosecution told the coroner's jury that the women said they had washed Neal's bloody clothes.
Howard Kester
Howard Kester (1904–1977) was an American preacher, organizer, and activist based in the South. He is noted for his work organizing the Southern Tenant Farmers Union (STFU) beginning in 1934. His work was inspired by a radical version of Christi ...
, a white preacher and activist, was investigating the case on behalf of the
NAACP
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is a civil rights organization in the United States, formed in 1909 as an interracial endeavor to advance justice for African Americans by a group including W. E.&nb ...
. He learned other accounts of Cannady's murder from members of the black community.
One was that she had been murdered by a white man, who later asked Neal's mother and aunt to wash his clothes and possibly offered them payment.
Another was that a white man from
Malone
Malone is an Irish surname. From the Irish "''Mael Eóin''", the name means a servant or a disciple of Saint John.
People
* Gilla Críst Ua Máel Eóin (died 1127), historian and Abbot of Clonmacnoise, Ó Maoil Eoin
* Adrian Malone (1937–2 ...
, in Jackson County, had already confessed to killing Cannady, and that he had given Neal money in exchange for trading clothes with him afterward.
Neither of these rumors was ever proven, nor was Kester able to discover more helpful evidence.
Kester said that perhaps Neal and Cannady had had a secret, consensual love affair. He suggested that maybe Neal had killed her out of anger if their relationship ended. He had no evidence for this, and such an affair was denied by the Cannady family.
Jailing of Claude Neal
Before the coroner's jury had charged Neal and before much evidence had been found, lynch mobs began forming and searching for Neal.
Newspapers contributed to agitation by running stories about him as a suspect a day after the crime was discovered.
Due to lynch mobs trying to find and capture Neal, the sheriff moved him multiple times to different jails:
from the Bay County Jail in
Panama City
Panama City ( es, Ciudad de Panamá, links=no; ), also known as Panama (or Panamá in Spanish), is the capital and largest city of Panama. It has an urban population of 880,691, with over 1.5 million in its metropolitan area. The city is locat ...
, to
Camp Walton, then to
Pensacola on the morning of October 20.
In Pensacola, Sheriff Herbert E. Gandy did not want to keep him in the
Escambia County, Florida
Escambia County is the westernmost and oldest county in the U.S. state of Florida. It is in the state's northwestern corner. At the 2020 census, the population was 321,905. Its county seat and largest city is Pensacola. Escambia County is incl ...
jail because it was not believed to be sturdy enough to withstand an attack. A lynch mob had already recently attempted to raid the jail for Neal.
Neal was moved briefly to
Fort Barrancas at the
Pensacola Naval Air Station
Naval Air Station Pensacola or NAS Pensacola (formerly NAS/KNAS until changed circa 1970 to allow Nassau International Airport, now Lynden Pindling International Airport, to have IATA code NAS), "The Cradle of Naval Aviation", is a United State ...
, before finally being moved to the
Escambia County, Alabama jail in
Brewton, Alabama
Brewton is a city in and
the county seat of Escambia County, Alabama, Escambia County, Alabama, United States. At the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, the population was 5,276. Brewton is located in south central Alabama, just north of ...
.
In order to keep Neal's location a secret, he was booked on charges of
vagrancy
Vagrancy is the condition of homelessness without regular employment or income. Vagrants (also known as bums, vagabonds, rogues, tramps or drifters) usually live in poverty and support themselves by begging, scavenging, petty theft, temporar ...
under the alias of John Smith.
On Monday October 22, after being interrogated by Sheriff Gandy on October 20 and 21, Neal confessed that he and another black man named Herbert Smith had raped and murdered Lola Cannady. He had no defense counsel. He later made another confession and said that he had acted alone. Given what is known about conditions at the time, it is likely that he was physically abused to coerce a confession.
Lynching of Claude Neal
On October 26, an estimated 100 white people arrived in Brewton in about 30 cars.
While one group distracted Sheriff G.S. Byrne of Escambia County,
others went to the jail, searching the cells and taking Neal.
This abduction of Neal was well planned and carried out.
The group took Neal back to Marianna and Jackson County. They reassured each other about their actions, saying that Neal did not deserve a trial because of the heinous nature of his crimes.
The group told the newspapers that they intended to lynch Neal; they believed their decision was justified.
This report was published by the Dothan ''Eagle'' and announced on the
Dothan, Alabama
Dothan () is a city in Dale, Henry, and Houston counties and the Houston county seat in the U.S. state of Alabama. It is Alabama's eighth-largest city, with a population of 71,072 at the 2020 census. It is near the state's southeastern corner, ...
radio station. The
Associated Press
The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. newspa ...
sent a reporter to Marianna, and a reporter from the
International News Service
The International News Service (INS) was a U.S.-based news agency (newswire) founded by newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst in 1909. also covered the story. The governor of Florida was apprised, but said local officials had to request his aid in order for him to send in the National Guard, and they had not. The abductors announced that Neal would be lynched that night between the hours of 8 o'clock P.M. and 9 o'clock P.M. at the Cannady farm.
A large group gathered at the farm formed to witness the Neal lynching; estimates of the crowd's size ranged from hundreds to several thousand.
The leaders in the group of spectators attempted to calm the group so that Neal could be brought to the property for the lynching, but became apprehensive as the group became impatient and unruly.
The leaders, who had promised the Cannady family that they could be the first to attack Neal, tried to move the family away from the crowd to the site where Lola's body was found, in order to allow her father, George Cannady, to kill Neal.
When they learned that the Cannady family was on the move, the crowd quickly caught up, but when Neal was still not shown, the group grew increasingly restive.
The committee of six in charge of Neal's lynching were worried that a riot could break out if Neal was brought in front of the crowd, and decided they would have to kill him in private.
The men holding Neal took him to a spot in the woods near Peri Landing along the
Chattahoochee River
The Chattahoochee River forms the southern half of the Alabama and Georgia border, as well as a portion of the Florida - Georgia border. It is a tributary of the Apalachicola River, a relatively short river formed by the confluence of the Chatta ...
for the murder.
Claude Neal was tortured and subjected to castration, his genitalia were stuffed in his mouth,
he was stabbed, burned with hot irons, and he was raised and lowered in hanging before he finally died. The men then tied his corpse to an automobile and drove to the Cannady property about 1 A.M.
After the body was delivered, George Cannady, upset at being deprived of vengeance, shot Neal three times in the forehead.
The crowd kicked the body, stabbed it, and ran over it with cars. Some people cut off toes or fingers for souvenirs. Children were encouraged to stab the body with sharpened sticks.
The crowd turned outward, burning shacks in the area known to be owned by black people.
Marianna riots
The body of Claude Neal was hanged from a tree outside of the county courthouse at 3 o'clock A.M. Photographers took souvenir photos of the body. When Sheriff Chambliss discovered Neal's body at 6 A.M., he cut it down and buried the man.
A mob formed outside the courthouse, with over two thousand people having arrived by noon, but they were too late to see Neal's body. Some purchased picture postcards of the corpse from photographers for fifty cents each.
The mob demanded that the sheriff hang Neal's body again outside the courthouse, but he refused.
In response to the sheriff's decision, the crowd started to riot.
They attacked black people that day, October 27, 1934, injuring about 200 innocent black people making their way on the street. The mob also attacked and injured two white police officers, who were among those trying to suppress the disorder.
Some white people took great risks by protecting black people during the riots, often aiding people with whom they worked. The mob headed into black areas of town, looting and burning houses. Florida Governor
David Sholtz
David Sholtz (October 6, 1891 – March 21, 1953) was the 26th Governor of Florida. Prior to serving as Governor he would be a state attorney serving Florida's 7th Judicial Circuit Court and previously as a member of the Florida House of Repres ...
called in 129 troops of the
Florida National Guard, which managed to suppress the riots.
Effects
The brutal lynching of Claude Neal generated outrage throughout the country. According to historian James R. McGovern, this reaction contributed to mass lynchings losing some of their previous social acceptance.
There is not a consensus on this conclusion.
At the same time,
Jessie Daniel Ames
Jessie Daniel Ames (November 2, 1883 – February 21, 1972) was a suffragist and civil rights leader from Texas who helped create the anti-lynching movement in the American South. She was one of the first Southern white women to speak out and ...
was organizing Southern white women to oppose lynchings, and had obtained 40,000 signatures toward this goal. Neal's lynching was covered by the national press and provoked strong opposition across the nation.
This lynching demonstrated the ineffectiveness of state and federal policies against the practice, which were especially limited in the South.
While some Americans sought to establish lynching as a federal crime, the
Solid South block in Congress, which derived its power from having
disenfranchised most black people across the South since the turn of the century, consistently defeated any federal anti-lynching legislation.
See also
*
List of lynching victims in the United States
This is a list of lynching victims in the United States. While the definition has changed over time, lynching is often defined as the summary execution of one or more persons extra-judicial, without due process of law by a group of people orga ...
*
The National Memorial for Peace and Justice
The National Memorial for Peace and Justice, informally known as the National Lynching Memorial, is a national memorial to commemorate the black victims of lynching in the United States. It is intended to focus on and acknowledge past racial te ...
*
False accusations of rape as justification for lynchings
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Neal, Claude
1934 deaths
1934 in Florida
1934 murders in the United States
October 1934 events
Lynching deaths in Florida
Riots and civil disorder in Florida
Rapes in the United States
People from Jackson County, Florida
Crimes in Florida
Jackson County, Florida
Arson in Florida
White American riots in the United States
Racially motivated violence against African Americans
African-American history between emancipation and the civil rights movement
1934 riots
History of racism in Florida
African-American history of Florida
People murdered in Florida
Prisoners murdered in custody
Anti-black racism in the United States
Murdered African-American people