In Colfax, Louisiana, just 16 miles southeast of Montgomery, the Colfax Chronicle of January 3, 1914 discussed the Colfax Riot of Easter Sunday, April 13, 1873 as follows:

The Louisiana governor had given the Negro party and white party commission to take office in Colfax (judge, lawyers, clerk of court, etc.). The whites took office first but were driven out by 200 Negroes. Whites fled. The Negroes took over and rioted, rifled homes, and said they were going to kill all the white men and take their white women and start a new race. The Negroes then carried out rape, robbery and murder. They took white judge Rutland's deceased son's casket out of the judge's home and threw it on the ground.

Alarm over the Negro's action spread into the surrounding Parishes and 200 white men responded to the call for help. They demanded the Negroes give up the offices and records. The Negroes said no. The Negroes also threw up breastworks from trenches they dug around the courthouse. The whites told the Negroes to remove their women and children, which they did. Some Negroes went home due to the delay in fighting, just a standoff. Several days passed.

On Easter Sunday about 150 whites had gathered. They again told the Negroes to go home, which they refused to do. Some of the whites deployed to approach from the rear and surprised the Negroes, many Negroes fleeing down the river, but many entered the courthouse. The whites made a Negro prisoner set fire to the courthouse at the end with no windows. When the Negroes inside could not put out the fires, they put out several white flags. Gray-haired Mr. Hadnot, Frank Moses, Sidney Harris (white men) went to see about capitulation of the Negroes but were treacherously fired upon killing Hadnot, Moses, and Harris, and wounding two others in the party. Firing began again. Many Negroes tried to escape and were shot down. Others were run down in the fields by men on horseback and shot down without mercy. Forty prisoners were taken. By 4:00 o'clock all firing was over.

The prisoners were taken to a cistern of water to get a drink. They were not bound and no guard was put over them. Some whites had left, others had begun drinking whiskey and became infuriated over the dastardly actions of the Negroes. They opened fire on the Negroes, killing 20. The others ran. The bodies were buried in the trench the Negroes had dug around the courthouse.

  Right or wrong, it is all history now!