Killing of Will [family name unknown] in Arkansas in 1936
Incident
Will, last name unknown, a sharecropper, may have been killed in 1936 by a mob of white planters in Crittenden County, Arkansas. Frank Weems, a Black 56-year-old former tenant farmer, was a member of the Southern Tenant Farmers’ Union. According to his affidavit, Weems had witnessed a gang of white planters armed with guns and clubs violently invade a Union meeting. A month later, Union members marching from Earle to New Earle, Arkansas, attempted to scatter based on warnings of impending attacks by the planters. Some marchers were intercepted by five cars full of white planters armed with guns and clubs, who proceeded to beat them. Among the planters were Old Man Bam, Birdie Decker, Floyd Roberts, Percy Mangus, Tom Thomas, Clifford Thorgmartin, Boss Delaine, “Bedford,” and Jerome Hood. Weems believed that Will was beaten to death by the planters.
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