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Springfield’s population in 1908 totaled about 47,000, with approximately 5.5% of those black. Although this low percentage did not facilitate a large uprising against the black population here, relations were becoming more strained in large cities such as Chicago and New York were blacks were competing with whites in the same job market. Riots had occurred in the North as early as the first half of the 1800s, but news coverage remained relatively quiet and the violence seemed to be contained in the North… until now.
On August 14, 1908, tension filled the air as two black men sat in the county jail, accused of unrelated sexual assault and murder crimes against whites. A large white crowd had gathered outside the hail, wanting to take matters in their own hands, chanting for vigilante justice.
Sensing the eminent danger for the two prisoners, police secretly took them out through the back door and put them on a train to a jail 60 miles away. Learning that they had been tricked and that the prisoners were gone, the now-angry mob erupted in violence, destroying buildings, looting, and eventually lynching two prominent members of the black community. The rampage continued until Governor Charles Deneen called in the Illinois National Guard to control the situation.
People across the nation were shocked by racial riots and it was bitter irony that one had occurred in Springfield, Illinois, the hometown of Abraham Lincoln, Activists believed that if it could happen in Springfield, it could happen anywhere.
This is where our journey begins… on the corner of 7th & Jefferson