ker. He claimed that he demanded
something to eat. The women claimed that he attempted to assault them.
They gave such an alarm that he ran away. At once the dispatches spread
over the entire country that a big, burly Negro had brutally assaulted two
women. Crowds began to search for the alleged fiend. While hunting him
they shot another Negro dead in his tracks for refusing to stop when
ordered to do so. After a few days Lee Walker was found, and put in jail
in Memphis until the mob there was ready for him.

The _Memphis Commercial_ of Sunday, July 23, contains a full account of
the tragedy from which the following extracts are made:

At 12 o'clock last night, Lee Walker, who attempted to outrage Miss
Mollie McCadden, last Tuesday morning, was taken from the county jail
and hanged to a telegraph pole just north of the prison. All day rumors
were afloat that with nightfall an attack would be made upon the jail,
and as everyone anticipated that a vigorous resistance would be made, a
conflict between the mob and the authorities was feared.

At 10 o'clock Capt. O'Haver, Sergt. Horan and several patrolmen were on
hand, but they could do nothing with the crowd. An attack by the mob was
made on the door in the south wall, and it yielded. Sheriff McLendon and
several of his men threw themselves into the breach, but two or three of
the storming party shoved by. They were seized by the police, but were
not subdued, the officers refraining from using their clubs. The entire
mob might at first have been dispersed by ten policemen who would use
their clubs, but the sheriff insisted that no violence be done.

The mob got an iron rail and used it as a battering ram against the
lobby doors. Sheriff McLendon tried to stop them, and some one of the
mob knocked him down with a chair. Still he counseled moderation and
would not order his deputies and the police to disperse the crowd by
force. The pacific policy of the sheriff impressed the mob with the idea
that the officers were afraid, or at least would do them no harm, and
they redoubled their efforts, urged on by a big switchman. At 12 o'clock
the door of the prison was broken in with a rail.

As soon as the rapist was brought out of the door calls were heard for a
rope; then someone shouted, "Burn him!" But there was no time to make a
fire. When Walker got into the lobby a dozen of the men began beating
and stabbing him. He was h