Lloyd Clay

Thousand of white man bashed down three sets of steel doors to get into the county jail in down town Vicksburg, Mississippi. The mob over powered the sheriff and twelve deputies and dragged a black prisoner, Lloyd Clay, from his cell. The mob marched him to the heart of the city and hanged him from an elm tree. According to a news account,”At the same time placing a bonfire under him, after saturating his head with oil, the negro died while a fusillade of shots were being fired into his body.” One white onlooker was fatally shot in the head by a rioter firing at Clay. Another white was shot in the arm. Clay was accused of attempted rape of a white woman. The woman, who was not injured in the alleged attack, later told authorities she was not sure her assailant was Clay. No one was ever charged in the lynching.

A white mob attempts to abduct a black man during the July race riot.