human
would be to kill some of the leading whites in each community as a warning to others. The council in Tuscumbia received advice from Memphis to use the torch, that the blacks were at war with the white race. The advice was taken. Three men went in front of the council as an advance guard, three followed with coal-oil and fire, and others guarded the rear. The plan was to burn the whole town, but first one negro and then another insisted on having some white man's house spared because