Lynching of Winston Pounds

Winston Pounds Jr. was an African-American farmhand born around 1906 to Winston and Florence Pounds. He was 20 years old when he was lynched near Wilmot, Arkansas, on August 25 or 26, 1927. One contemporary newspaper described him as "a good young man, who was never known to be in any kind of trouble with anyone."

Accounts of the events leading to the lynching differ sharply depending on the source. The Arkansas Gazette, a white-owned newspaper, reported that Pounds broke into the home of J. W. McGarry while McGarry and his wife were asleep, and assaulted McGarry's wife before fleeing when she screamed. However, other accounts state that McGarry was not in town at the time, and that his wife had been staying at the house with his sister, who was the one who allegedly alerted neighbors. The Indianapolis Recorder, a Black newspaper, reported a different narrative entirely: it stated that there was long-standing bad blood between the Pounds and McGarry families, stemming from an incident years earlier in which Pounds's father had gotten the better of McGarry's father, and that McGarry had nursed a grudge and sought revenge. The Recorder further reported that there was no evidence against Pounds beyond bloodhounds supposedly tracking a scent, and that no other evidence was sought.

Bloodhounds led authorities to Pounds's home, and he was arrested at 2 p.m. on August 25, 1927. Reports conflict as to whether he confessed; some accounts claim he immediately admitted the assault and said he had wanted to assault the first white woman he could find, while the Indianapolis Recorder disputed that any such confession occurred. Sheriff John C. Riley took Pounds into town and left him in a car while conferring with deputies about preventing mob violence. During this interval, a group of men seized the sheriff's car and drove Pounds out of town, followed by a mob in other vehicles. Accounts vary on the mob's size and methods, with some describing around fifty armed men who "covered the officers with pistols." Sheriff Riley reportedly could not locate them afterward. Nancy Snell Griffith, writing for the Encyclopedia of Arkansas, suggested it appears likely the sheriff and deputy intentionally left Pounds vulnerable to abduction.

The mob hanged Pounds from a tree about a mile and a half from town, apparently leaving him there while still alive; his body remained hanging into the evening, with reports noting the streets were quiet afterward. His body was cut down the next day. An inquest held by Justice W. N. Wilhite called no witnesses, and the sheriff did not appear. A circuit judge, Turner Butler, said he had not been formally notified and did not plan an investigation. One of the sheriff's deputies stated he had not heard Pounds confess or say anything about assaulting a white woman. The inquest concluded that Pounds died "at the hands of persons unknown." Reporting also indicated that Pounds was subjected to torture during the hanging, including having acid poured into his eyes and mouth and his lower abdomen stabbed with knives, details omitted from the Arkansas Gazette's coverage.