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Siblings Jamie and Bambi Chambers conclude the story of all-black Buffalo Soldiers sent guard a training camp for new recruits for the war effort in Houston, Texas where Jim Crow laws and white supremacy were in full effect. After enduring constant racism and disrespect, a young soldier tried to intervene in an unfair arrest of a local mother—the resulting police abuse set off a chain reaction that led to over a hundred professional soldiers marching into the city with the intention of killing as many white cops as possible. It’s a challenging story of racism, fear, rage, retribution, and injustice that took over a century to be addressed by the United States and its armed forces.

In this episode we hope you'll consider donating to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund in their fight for racial justice through litigation, advocacy and public education. We also express support and solidarity with the Atlanta Forest Defenders and encourage you to learn more and help stop Cop City.

I know, I just must've seen this is.

It's your birthday.

Yeah, it's about to be my birthday.

It's the saddest part is when I was realizing more and more of these quote unquote historical

topics are things I can remember.

They were just the news at some point.

Well, that sucks.

I got you something for your birthday.

Oh dear.

I got you a script.

Oh, you got it.

You're done.

Yeah, cool.

I'm pretty much I need to finish just the last writing part of it because it's a labor

of love because my hand really hurts.

Well, I appreciate all the low effort content that we can make where I don't have to do

well because today's script is the longest one I've ever written in the history of the

show.

All right, well, I'll buckle up.

Yikes.

Cool.

Yeah, we got to get back to our story of what happened on a hot summer night in Houston,

Texas in 1917.

So last episode we set the stage for violence and tragedy, got everything kind of ready

and now you get to actually find out how it all played out.

Yep.

We sat in the shit stew and now it's time to fucking eat this bitch, I guess.

Welcome everybody to Chainsaw History.

This is the podcast where my sister and I ride down the road of American history and

take out mailboxes with a baseball bat.

So far, it's just me listening to horrific stories.

Yep.

While you tell them.

I am your host, Jamie Chambers, and this is my horrified sister Bambi.

Hello.

And she's going to be only more horrified.

Yeah, this one's a rough ride.

You have no idea.

A disclaimer, we are a comedy podcast.

I'm not a historian, but I took just enough college classes to be really smug at parties.

I've been trained to listen to Jamie since I was a small child.

Just corner you.

Yeah, I didn't, I don't have a choice in this.

Which to be fair, my own son does to me now and I just sort of have to take it as penance

for doing this to other people.

If you want to help our show grow and succeed, be sure to subscribe to rate us on Apple podcasts

or whatever podcast platform you prefer.

We also write a review.

It really helps us out and kind of gets us up on people's like new to listen to feeds

now that we're getting our act back together.

Share episodes, clips with your friends on social media and visit ChainsawHistory.com

so you can find out how you can help the show and check out our bonus content like the value

of series where Bambi reads me kids books from the 1980s and No Time for Love, Dr. Jones,

where we talk about Indiana Jones adventures through history.

All right.

Warning up top, everybody.

Today we're going to discuss racial bigotry, extreme violence and state executions.

Yikes.

So if you don't want to hear that kind of content, this is definitely not the episode

for you.

Bambi has no choice.

Yeah, I just have to sit here.

We also want to reiterate from last time that Bambi and I are incredibly white and have

also never served in the military.

So we're looking at this from a very outsider point of view and we encourage you to check

out, you know, people who have a lot more of that intimate perspective from these issues.

So there is a lot of material I pulled this episode from like a lot, a lot, including

a lot of like court transcripts from way back in the day and official reports released through

the Freedom of Information Act.

But the two main sources I started with were the book Mutiny of Rage by Jamie Salazar and

Jeffrey Korn, which came out back in 2020 and the documentary Mutiny on the Bayou, the

Camp Logan story, which was put out by KHOU out of Houston.

Those and all of our sources will be linked to on the full show notes.

You can find it chainsawhistory.com.

So now these episodes are only going to be like a couple of weeks apart.

But because of podcast production in our lives, it's been like a little bit longer for me

and you since the last time we sat and talked about a month.

So a refresher will help us all.

Plus if a new listener jumps in, like in the middle right here and wants to skip, we'll

just do a little quick recap.

We jumped back in time to the wholesome apple pie year of 1917, which was the year America

entered World War I.

We went over some like little fun facts, and then we jumped into the non-fun facts, such

as intense racism enforced by Jim Crow laws in the southern states.

So we talked about segregation and how it affected things like transportation, schools,

drinking facilities.

They restricted voting rights, banned interracial relationships, and basically upheld white

supremacy across the board.

We talked about the race riots that had led up in the like decades leading up to 1917,

which usually started with false accusations against black men assaulting white women.

And so like racial tension was on the country's mind right as World War I is breaking out.

Next we talked about the proud history of black soldiers in the United States military

starting in the civil war, but focusing on the Buffalo soldiers, all black US army cavalry

and infantry regiments.

These guys face discrimination, but they saw military service as a path to getting broader

respect from society.

They built a reputation for bravery and discipline.

All were receiving little trust or recognition in return, including some shitty notes from

Theodore Roosevelt who fought alongside these men in Cuba and then immediately talked shit

about them when it helped him politically.

But when Uncle Sam wanted to rapidly expand the military to fight in World War I, the

Bayou City of Houston wanted to host the training camp so they could get those federal funding.

So even though there were objections from both the like pro civil rights and anti black,

you know, sides of the equation, both realized it was kind of a bad idea.

The army sent the Buffalo soldiers to guard the camp's construction just out this side

of the segregated city.

So we have, you know, these these proud men with this history of service to the country,

a lot of times fighting out west because they were in the Indian Wars.

They're fighting against the Mexicans.

Yeah, we sent our African American soldiers to go shit on our Native Americans and our

friends over in Mexico, which used to just be parts of America.

Well, actually, part of America used to be Mexico.

Yeah, that's California, Tejas, didn't get those.

New Mexico might be a slight hint for anybody.

But that's a whole completely different podcast that maybe we'll get to one day.

Maybe we'll talk about Pancho Villa at some point.

I know we will on young when we do know we do any Dr. Jones.

He's a character in there.

But anyway, getting back to the recap, we're getting back to Houston, Texas, which had

a history of violent racist cops.

We have we talked about their new chief of police who's kind of a progressive reform

guy who wants to make things better.

But nobody his men don't respect him can make him from the Parks and Rec service.

So that's the formula for disaster we're like going into the situation with.

So that Chris Pratt is in charge.

Yeah.

So with all that terrible buildup, it seems like something just awful was bound to happen.

And maybe that's true.

Or maybe it went down the way it did only because of the specific people involved in

the decisions that they made.

So a lady named Angela Holder has worked tirelessly to preserve the memory of the Buffalo Soldiers

As a little girl, she became really fascinated with the mystery of what happened to her great

uncle Jesse.

Like, it was like generally like, they didn't even know he just went back into the service

and just vanished.

They didn't even notify them of what happened.

Yeah, it's it's really messed up.

That's fucked up.

So this is Angela from the documentary Mutiny on the Bayou.

One thing I remember my mother was saying that he may have been in the service before

and that he was a bugler, and that that he wanted to go back into the service, but his

mother didn't want him to do it, that there might have been some type of premonition that

something bad was going to happen to him.

Yeah, I'm having that same premonition.

Yeah, it's anxious whistling Dixie.

Here we go.

So we've got this ugly situation in Houston, you know, these these soldiers, some of whom

have seen combat, are being forced into the back of streetcars, not allowed to go to certain

public places, and aren't even allowed to drink from the same water barrels as white

construction workers.

And everywhere they went, they would hear insults, racial slurs.

Last episode, I call it a pressure cooker.

But if I wanted to chase a cheap metaphor, I would have called it a powder keg.

Because if there's one asshole we could blame for starting this entire mess, it would be

a guy named Sparks.

So literally the spark that lights this whole thing off.

You're not going to find many clear cut good guys in this story.

But Lee Sparks is definitely a villain.

And if there's one guy who's going to clash with black soldiers, can you guess what his

job what his profession might be?

Please.

Ding, ding, ding, you are correct.

He was mounted patrol this.

So Sparks actually volunteered his own horse for the cause of being a cop riding around

the streets of Houston.

Mr. Sparks was so aggressive in his enforcement of white supremacy that he had a reputation,

even in 1917, in Houston among his fellow police officers.

So he's extra racist.

Yes.

It's like among the racist cops.

They're like, Jesus, why don't you calm down, buddy?

Perhaps this is because he was from a Texas county that had once been a center of plantation

slavery.

He just wore his racism out on his sleeve and was quick to get abusive and violent from

mutiny of rage, quote, as an officer.

He made it a point to always let black suspects know that whites were squarely in charge as

an aging municipal policeman.

He was likely unhappy with his lot in life, enraged that younger, fitter, more virile

black men in uniforms with medals were issued Springfield rifles and set to fight on his

behalf.

He was suspended previously for 10 days by police chief Brock for verbally assaulting

a woman as he arrested her son, unquote, joy, Dr. Robert Haynes, a scholar who wrote one

of the most comprehensive accounts of the right one that I wanted to get, but it costs

like $120 and it was not available electronically.

I had this to say about Sparks from the KHOU documentary, quote, Sparks was very proud

of the fact that he could beat blacks over the head and get there as he always put it,

get there hot, right.

And he always put a notch on his gun every time he shot one, unquote.

So this guy literally keeping score.

Yeah.

Yeah.

He's just sounds like an ass.

He's this middle age.

He's an asshole among the other assholes.

He's a standout asshole.

All right.

So this well-established piece of shit with a badge officer, Lee Sparks was patrolling

Houston's fourth ward with his partner, a big dude named Rufus Daniels.

The pairs established Sparks and Rufus.

Sparks and Rufus are fucking shit villains.

Okay.

Or starter villains, but there'll be many more to come.

So the pairs established routine was generally hassling the street hustlers and sex workers.

And this day they were specifically looking for gambling rings run by black teen.

So there's like, there's word on the street was that they were running dice games and

you know, got to run these kids out.

So people were having fun and we can't stand it.

Hell no.

Well, that was the whole protest too, is that, you know, these soldiers coming to town was

going to increase dancing and drinking and gambling, you know, people having fun times.

We can't have that.

So it was in the morning of Thursday, August 23rd, already the hottest day of the year

humidity already damn near a hundred percent when all this started.

And sure enough, they come and they spot two teenage boys shooting dice in an alley.

And there's no ever any report that even they even saw like any money involved, but just

saw some kids rolling dice on the ground.

And the moment these kids see like they hear the horses, they see these guys come at them,

they take off like you do when you see the cops again from mutiny of rage, quote, Sparks

pursued one of them, the chase leading into the home of a black resident, Mrs. Sarah Travers,

a mother of five.

She was ironing clothes when Sparks barged in alone and not expecting guests.

She was woefully underdressed.

Did you see a racial slur jumping over that yard?

Officer Sparks barked at Travers.

She had seen nothing of the sort, not satisfied with her response.

He proceeded to turn the house inside out, searching for the culprit.

Officer Daniels waited outside in his horse.

Still, with no sign of the suspects, Sparks vented his fury on Travers, calling her a

liar among other slurs.

Since these sons of bitches of N-word soldiers came here, you're trying to take the town,

he exclaimed.

We do not allow N-word to talk back to us.

We generally whip them down here, unquote.

Fun.

So this dickhead kicked down a mother's door while she's basically in her underwear, ironing

clothes on a hot morning.

Then he searches her place without permission, just heaping abuse on her.

And yeah, while his dickhead fucking cop buddy was outside, what, keeping watch?

She's on his horse at the moment, just standing there like, he's not needed at the moment

and seeing if somebody else is going to run.

Well, Sarah wasn't the kind of lady to take this shit kindly.

She told Sparks he had no right to come into her house and wanted his racist ass to leave.

And you can guess how well that went.

Sparks slapped Mrs. Travers across the face.

And when she screamed, Daniels came into the house, not to help her, but to help Sparks

drag her out into the streets where she's screaming.

She's not dressed.

Sparks yelled that he'd arrest her.

I'm very triggered right now, just so you know.

This is the gentlest this is going to get.

Now the good news is there's not much more violence against women in this story.

I can at least give you a little bit of that.

It's not even, I'll tell you later.

Sparks said he'd arrest her even if she was naked and officially charged her with and

tell me if this sounds familiar, abusive language.

Hey, now I'm double triggered.

From Mutiny of Rage, quote, for being a quote within the quote, biggity slur woman.

They intended to give her 90 days on the pea farm, referencing the practice of leasing

slaves to other landowners.

Sparks official account of the incident differed as he denied slapping Travers and insisted

that she was adequately dressed when he entered her home, unquote, fucking hate this so much.

So with all the yelling and commotion, the neighbors all step out to see what's going

on.

So this is, you know, this is a very, you know, tightly packed in, you know, poor black

community in the fourth ward of Houston.

So all the neighbors kind of step out onto their stoops, but they all know better than

to interfere.

They know these guys and how that would go.

So the best thing you can do is bail her out and clean her up.

So they dragged this poor woman to the closest police box.

And sadly, this does not mean that the doctor showed up to write this historical injustice.

You know, back then, police call boxes were all over the place so that you could call

in a car to come pick up suspects or to other call for backup or whatever, because this

is, you know, pre radio, pre anything.

This is telephone only days.

And we were lucky to have them.

So Sarah's still yelling and protesting her modesty because she's like in her, you know,

her house dress, which in 1917 is like half naked, wouldn't be quite as scandalous these

days.

But one guy actually stepped out of the crowd to actually do something to help her.

Private Alonzo Edwards was in town on a 24 hour pass and probably had been drinking all

night and may have still had a good buzz going on.

So he stepped forward and went to talk to Sparks and Daniels and asked like what was

wrong and begged them to let him pay any fine that she owed so that she could go back

in her house and put some damn clothes on.

Being a reasonable man, Officer Sparks rode up to Private Edwards with his service revolver

in his hand.

Edwards just stood there.

So Sparks pulled out his signature move, a pistol whipping.

He beat Edwards over the head five times.

Really fuck this young man up.

That's horrible.

Then the racist limp dick cop was later quoted as saying, quote, I was not going to wrestle

with a big N word, like that, unquote, didn't seem like anybody wanted to wrestle him.

I can't help but remember that Derek Chauvin used the exact same justification for his

murder of George Floyd and Alonzo Edwards was also like this big guy.

So this middle aged shitty cop just beat him over the head, knocked his ass clean up.

I dislike police officers.

Yeah.

And Sparks and Daniels are two of the worst.

So Sarah Travers didn't stay in jail long and was released without any charges.

Meanwhile, Edwards was held in charge with interfering with an arrest, left to bleed

in a local jail cell.

So now it's time to meet another important figure in our story of the Buffalo Soldiers.

His name is Charles W. Baltimore Corporal.

So this guy is like your nephew's age, 23, 24 years old when all this went down.

This is what an overview document presented at his murder trial had to say about Baltimore.

Quote, Major Snow, who was the newly promoted and inexperienced camp commander, testified

that he was in command of I company for several months and considered the accused Corporal

Baltimore, a very good man.

He was on special duty at the regimental post exchange, was considered an excellent man

and recommended to be appointed corporal.

He would have given the accused a character, excellent.

He had been recommended for officers training school, unquote.

So quick note about Major Snow, the guy who gave that quote about Baltimore, he had previously

been the captain of I company, the Buffalo Soldiers, and he was considered fair to the

men.

He also didn't have much to do with them.

He was very kind of distant and spent most of his spare time in Houston golfing with

a rich businessman.

Now, Captain James was another figure that kind of in the background of this story, he

was in charge of L company.

And we need to remember later, he was the duty officer on the following night when things

go really wrong.

James was known for being hardworking, natural leader with a sensitive side.

But back to Baltimore.

So Corporal Baltimore was highly regarded and was military police.

So he was used to having to deal with disorderly men and keep them in line.

So he's the one who got roped into dealing with the situation with Private Edwards getting

beaten and arrested in the street.

Here's how it's described in Mutiny of Rage, quote, Corporal Charles Baltimore was known

throughout camp as a model soldier and mentor to many new privates.

He was also a senior military police with authority over the soldiers.

Baltimore happened to be in the fourth ward that afternoon.

As he exited a streetcar, he was met by an excited soldier who witnessed the arrest and

beatings.

Baltimore then approached Officer Sparks and Daniels to get a complete picture of the situation.

Sparks did not like the tone in which he was questioned.

Baltimore explained to the officer that he customarily had arresting authority over his

men in these matters, quote, within the quote, I don't report to no

inward sparks, retorted unquote, oh, this is fun.

So a guy's like, yeah, this guy's literally MP.

And he's like, no, if my guys did something wrong, I'm the one who's supposed to arrest

them and deal with them because we're in the army.

Uncle Sam owns their ass and I am, this is under my purview.

And that did not go well with this racist cop.

I mean, that's just, fuck him so hard.

As the two men exchange words, Sparks went for his signature move again and pistol whipped

Baltimore on the head.

Oh my God.

The unarmed, because remember, these guys were not supposed to carry their sidearms

in town because of racism, even though he's an MP and technically should have a pistol

on him.

He should.

But he was unarmed.

And he's not wrong.

And he got hit in the head once, but didn't stick around like Edwards did.

So he ran for his life.

The cowardly racist cop fired three rounds toward his back, even though there was a street

full of people.

Jesus Christ.

Baltimore tried to hide under a bed in an empty house, but was hauled out and beaten

over the head a few more times with Spark's service pistol and fucked him up so badly.

I think he was unconscious because he was like dragged back into the street and they

would explain some of the phone calls that Major Snow started to receive back at camp.

So once again, this is from the overview of Corporal Baltimore that was used at his

murder trial quote on the afternoon of August 23rd, 1917, he approached policeman Sparks

about the arrest of private Edwards Sparks struck him.

He ran, was pursued into a house, hauled out, struck twice in the head and arrested Major

Snow received a telephone message that Baltimore had been killed unquote fuck.

That's the whole thing.

Major Snow, the guy in charge of the camp has been reported that Baltimore was beaten

to death by a cop.

Yeah.

So while Major Snow was getting information about the incident that happened in town,

two police detectives showed up in camp to investigate reports of shoplifting committed

by some of the Buffalo soldiers.

Now these are just like these allegations and these cops show up saying, we're checking

out the shoplifting.

So Snow's like, yeah, go through, um, you know, you're welcome to search through all

of these guys stuff.

So the enlisted men's personal belongings were all being rifled through and nothing

to do with any of the stuff that happened with Edwards in Baltimore, but the men saw

cops going through all their shit just as they're hearing news about one of their own

getting killed by a cop.

Oh, that's fucked.

So can you see this is starting to turn into a really bad situation?

Yeah.

And we're not done yet.

One that they started.

So if you need more proof that Snow was bad at his job, it wasn't long before he received

official confirmation that Baltimore was totally and completely alive and he didn't

bother to tell the men right away.

So the rumors were just like drifting through camp about what had happened, like the world's

scariest game of telephone.

While they told increasingly exaggerated and gruesome stories about how corporal Baltimore

been beaten to death by a gang of Houston police, they all were sharing their own stories

of harassment and disrespect.

Like ever since they got into town, every single one of these guys at least got some

low grade racism and had to deal with the cops being shitty to them.

So they got angrier women visiting the camp, warned commanders that the boys were talking

about going to town or complained about how their officers weren't doing shit to protect

them.

Yeah.

A visitor named Edna Tucker testified.

She heard a soldier say, quote, no white son of a bitch is going to keep us from going.

I will kill every one of them if they don't let us go into town.

Unquote.

Yeah.

While the Buffalo soldiers, they're getting, they're getting fucking fired up.

Yeah.

And this is still the early stages.

While the Buffalo soldiers in camp talk quietly and angrily among themselves, Battalion Adjutant

Captain Haig Shekurjian, he's an Armenian American.

We actually have a great uncle named Haig, went into town to meet with police chief Brock

and resolve this situation.

And the chief was all about making this go away as quickly as possible.

In a mutiny of rage, quote, Brock broadly agreed that officer Sparks actions run lawful.

He preemptively assured captain Shekurjian that no charges would be brought against his

men.

He also vowed to suspend officer Sparks long enough to allow major snow the opportunity

to press charges on the errant cops.

He even offered to personally visit the camp the following day to discuss their ultimate

objectives.

Unquote.

So, so far police chief Brock doing all the right things.

He was like, yeah, fuck this guy.

I've already suspended him once for being an ass.

Yeah, this guy sucks.

So the captain saw for himself that corporal Baltimore was definitely still alive.

He also decided that Baltimore's swollen face and bloody clothes probably wouldn't help

the mood back at camp.

So Shekurjian made the call to leave Baltimore stuck in the holding cell overnight to heal

and so they could get him some fresh clothes before they brought him back.

This of course left plenty of extra time for all the rumors about what happened to him

to simply grow and spread.

Shekurjian told the corporal that when he got back to camp that he needed to play down

the incident as if it were no big deal.

And initially Baltimore agreed.

It's worth noting that later when he does go back to camp, the moment he was away from

the white officers, his tune changed quite a bit and he didn't appreciate being beaten,

arrested and left in the cell.

Yeah, I'm sure he didn't for doing his fucking job.

Yeah.

And then yeah, being assaulted for this by a piece of shit.

Charles Baltimore was enraged and wanted some measure of justice.

Meanwhile, our racist buddy officer Sparks screamed at his own boss, police chief Brock.

He refused to go home.

He refused to surrender his service pistol and said this to his boss.

You don't know better than a, guess what?

That word he used because it's his favorite word.

So now he's just like going against what the white cops are telling him to do?

His own.

Yeah.

His own.

The police chief.

Nah dude, you suck.

No, I'm keeping my badge in my weapon.

Both in camp and in town, rumors were swirling that something was going to go down.

I'm sure.

A white lady named Mrs. Moy had been letting all of the Buffalo soldiers use her telephone

on the regular.

So she had a house near camp and she had a phone and so she's like, yeah, you guys are

welcome to come and use my phone whenever she also liked to eavesdrop on them because,

you know, yeah, it's, I mean, what are you gonna do?

It's 1917.

It's boring.

So tonight she started to overhear them warning their girlfriends to stay indoors or just

don't stay out of camp tonight.

She quoted one as telling his lady friend, quote, Houston is about to be set alight at

eight o'clock, unquote.

Yikes.

In other words, there was plenty of warning for anyone taking this seriously.

Wasn't like this just came out of nowhere.

Well, I hope that nice lady's house is all safe next to camp.

Several white visitors to Camp Logan got chased away by a group of angry black soldiers.

So it's like these guys were just walking around camp and then these guys, the soldiers

run into them and they just started screaming at them and chase them and they, these like

get in their car.

They're having trouble starting the car, but finally they peel off.

Nobody got hurt yet.

Yeah.

Well, I'm sure it's hear the shit out of them.

Oh yeah.

Major Snow doubled the number of guard posts and sent MPs to make sure no one slipped out

of camp to catch a street car.

So for all the racist reasons earlier, these MPs were not allowed to carry sidearms.

So if they, if they ran into trouble, they're literally just bare handed and they're stuck

there on the edge of town.

And then corporal Baltimore finally made it back to camp.

And since his death was the source of the outrage, Major Snow seemed sure that his return

like Lazarus would put everything back to normal.

That's not how any of this works.

And Baltimore had been ordered just to say, Oh no, it was no big deal.

Just misunderstanding.

Oh shucks.

Uh, but as like I said earlier, the moment, very Rodney King, the moment he was talking

to his own, can't we all just get along?

Yeah.

He was, he was very angry.

Snow determined that morale in the camp was getting back on track and decided there was

no reason that the camp commanders had to cancel their dinner plans in town.

So they just, what a dumb.

So they just left that guy, James is the, is the duty officer.

However, they don't quite leave.

Not everybody leaves because things continue to get worse.

From a memorandum drafted on September 13th of the same year, 1917 from the inspector

general of the army to the adjutant general of the army quote, the police authorities

in the afternoon were fearful that there might be trouble, but these fears appeared to have

been entirely dispelled by the statement of battalion commander, major snow, that he could

handle the situation and that there was no possibility of trouble.

The police department therefore took no steps whatsoever to meet any trouble that might

arise.

About four o'clock in the afternoon on August 23rd, Albert Wright company, I 24th inventory

on guard at the gate, told a deputy sheriff and gatekeeper at camp Logan in effect that

there was going to be serious trouble that night.

This was reported to major snow, but appears not to have been taken seriously unquote.

Everyone is telling everybody that this is about to go down as a goddamn problem.

Somebody needs to fix it.

Nobody's doing shit.

We've got dinner plans with, with rich Houston businessmen are going to buy us.

You know, another man who reported potential trouble to the camp was first Sergeant Vida

Henry.

Pay attention to this name because he will become very important later in this Vida Henry

Sergeant Henry and the two maid rounds throughout the camp.

So Henry and his boss, the camp commander snow start roaming around camp and noticing

a bunch of dudes hanging outside specific tents and it wasn't long before they glimpsed

men snatching ammunition and running off into the night shit.

So that's the point where snow decides that maybe he should actually, you know, do something,

do something.

So he issued orders to account for every man and make sure every weapon and round of ammunition

was where it was supposed to be.

Even while there were bullets laying all over the damn ground and men were busy arming themselves

here and there all over the damn place.

A phone call came in from the chair of the Houston chamber of commerce telling major

snow about rumors of the Buffalo soldiers planning a rampage that night.

The duty officer desperately tried to follow orders to get a confirmed count on all the

men and weapons, but under the chaotic conditions at night, it wasn't an easy job.

Yeah.

I could imagine again from mutiny of rage quote major snow instructed the boys to form

a semicircle around him by his side where captain Chicago and their trusted first Sergeant

Henry snow's manner was far less authoritarian and formal as he posited a fatherly tone that

men were stealing ammunition in an attempt to take the law into their own hands.

He assured the rankers that the detested officer sparks had been suspended from the police

force and awaited formal punishment and that police chief Brock would give the wrong men

of camp Logan a square deal and a question that would resound throughout the camp black

community for decades to come.

One soldier spoke up and asked, what are we going to do when a policeman beats us up like

this?

Another broke his silence and lamented.

We're treated like dogs here unquote.

Yeah.

Things got worse and fast.

I'm sure while snow and first Sergeant Henry were going through the camp cajoling them

in to follow orders, some of the rank and file troops started directly disobeying them.

They held onto their rifles and urge their fellows soldiers to do the same.

One man shouted, I'm tired of seeing soldiers come in there with all their heads beat up

unquote.

These guys are literally saying like when they're being ordered to disarm, like even

just privates will say, not a damn man, let their weapon go.

Like there's the loyalty is shifting from the officers to their, you know, enlisted

men, which is not a great command structure situation to be in.

Well, a few minutes later, snow and Henry ran into 30 armed men who ordered them to

instantly extinguish their lanterns so they couldn't be seen.

They threatened to shoot the major who at first remained calm, but with more than two

dozen rifles locked, loaded and pointed at his face, uh, the decorated officer decided

to beat a hasty retreat.

Yeah.

He was like, all right, see ya.

So he ran to the phone, he fucked right off, he ran as straight to the phone to try to

call for help, but then the line went dead as you could hear rifle shots, just expertly

cutting the phone lines.

As marksman said, uh, fuck this.

Yeah.

You just shoot the telephone box.

So he kept running until he could get to a phone.

He wasn't so calm when he made it to the local fire station and finally called the police

and in fact was so shaken up that someone drove him to a nearby drug store.

A lot of these quotes, again from mutiny of rage quote, the pharmacist recalled seeing

snow unarmed, very pale, painting heavily and very distressed.

He continued, I was alarmed at his appearance and gave him aromatic spirits of ammonia to

quiet his heart action.

Leaders recalled that snow was not in physical or mental shape to take command unquote.

So yeah, nearly getting shot by his own dudes.

Yeah.

That'll scare the shit out of you.

Cut off the phone lines to the camp.

It was still quiet anger back at campus.

More men joined the growing mutiny and armed themselves, but so far there's no like leadership.

It's just, yeah, it's a bunch of angry fucking people and it's just this, this just roiling

situation and then somewhere someone thought they heard something from the tree line and

shouted, get your guns boys.

Here comes the mob unquote.

So they think that a right mob is coming to kill them and then someone fired a shot.

We don't know who it was or where it came from, but it was a shot that everyone in camp,

everyone in Houston could hear.

The men started screaming that they were about to get rushed.

The supply tents were raided and just about everybody had a weapon and plenty of ammunition.

They started firing into the sky, others directly at distant houses and buildings and plenty

of men just fired straight into the darkness.

Fuck them all.

But no, they, yeah.

When the first cluster of shots died down, Private Wiley Strong fell over with a stomach

wound shot by his own friends.

The first casualty, not the last.

Then the shooting resumed, absolute chaos with men diving behind buildings and even

into latrines to avoid getting shot by their friends in the dark.

I and M companies were basically attacking each other with K and L caught in the middle

for a good 10 minutes while officers screamed and tried to calm the situation back down.

One of the stray bullets hit the driver of a car going down the road and before he could

receive medical attention, Mr Ek Thompson lost too much blood and died.

So it wasn't even like just literally our stray bullet just flying out of the darkness

hits this guy in the leg and he bleeds out.

Another shot hit a Mexican laborer named Manuel Gerardo while he lay in a bench in the back

of a boarding house, killing him instantly.

This guy had been at a long day's work.

He was hot inside, so he went to lay down outside on this August night and closes his

eyes and gets shot in the fucking head by somebody, by somebody who didn't even know

he was there.

Yeah, you shouldn't just fucking shoot into darkness.

That's bad.

Then the company bugler sounded the call to cease fire and the gunshots quieted and a

man shouted, quote, let's go clean up the damn city unquote.

It's like in my head, it's, it's like the LA riots.

You know, cause that's the only visual that I have.

So remember first Sergeant Henry that we talked about a minute ago, only minutes before he

was the loyal NCO to the camp commander attempting to disarm the men.

But after the confrontation that sent major snow running away, shitting his pants, something

like change, he definitely picked his side.

He started yelling, fall in to every man with an earshot.

Now it's worth noting that Henry was in his thirties.

He was over a decade older than a lot of these other guys.

Some of these are teenagers are in their early twenties and he's in his thirties.

He's he's got combat experience, literal scars on his body.

So he's, he's like this sort of paternal fatherly figure and he's about to take the fuck over

trial testimony quoted.

The first Sergeant is saying, quote, get plenty of ammunition and save one for yourself.

Fill your canteens.

We are in it now, unquote.

Henry shouted right face.

And just like that, a column of more than 100 soldiers armed with Springfield rifles

marched into the city of Houston.

The mission lay siege to police headquarters in downtown and kill as many white cops as

possible.

That seems extreme, but okay.

The first Sergeant organized his men and chose some of the most trusted corporals to guard

the rear of the column and gave them a simple order, quote, kill the first man who falls

out of ranks, unquote.

One of the rear guard was none other than corporal Charles Baltimore.

Yeah.

Beat up and pissed off.

And yeah, ready for some payback.

After confronting L company in the streets and not backing down, the mutineers continued

their march toward police HQ while L and M companies set to guard the camp.

Captain Shakurjian ordered another accounting of all men at the camp, but it wasn't completed

until near the middle of the night and it revealed 151 men were unaccounted for.

Yeah.

Men on guard duty heard about the insurrection and some decided to join.

One of them had previously been beaten by none other than officer sparks and had this

to say, quote, I will shoot every white son of a bitch on Washington street, unquote.

So the night of August 23rd, the Houston chamber of commerce had organized festivities in emancipation

park to welcome the Buffalo soldiers.

Oh, that was dumb.

They didn't call that off.

And I shit you not, they wanted to welcome the Buffalo soldiers with a watermelon party.

I, our sound engineer just that literally made Kevin make it a painful sound.

Yeah.

That's okay.

As the column approached a group in the street, two of them were Illinois national guardsmen

in uniform.

And one of the, one of the men set out from the crowd, quote, it's a damn good thing you've

got on a uniform, unquote.

So professional respect among soldiers saved everyone there at the watermelon party who

shoveled away quickly, but others were not nearly so lucky.

A few minutes after the national guardsmen led a group of civilians to safety, a car

pulled up in the headlights, spilled over dozens of armed men who immediately raised

their rifles.

And Mr. E.M.

Jones, father of six was killed in a hail of gunfire and a passenger in the backseat

was severely wounded and eventually lost his arm.

From here, the group split into multiple directions, causing terror as they marched.

All of the commotion caused a man named Charles Wright to rush out thinking he was needed

to help put out a house fire.

At trial, his brother testified what happened next, quote, they phoned me and told me that

my brother had been shot and that he was at St. Joseph's infirmary.

They told me that they had surrounded him, that he had said, they hollered halt.

And when he raised both his arms, they shot him through both arms.

And as he fell, they shot him again through his side.

And when they were done shooting, they said, we've got this white son of a bitch and went

marching on, unquote.

Next two locals stepped off a streetcar and walked along Washington Street when they heard

gunshots but were very unlucky when they went for cover.

Both men threw themselves into a ditch.

One of them shot dead.

A guy named Butcher was riding his horse nearby and he was shot but survived to tell the tale,

but his horse was not so lucky.

So this guy's just riding him and his horse both gets shot.

And we'll see Butcher again in a minute.

Just people.

It wasn't just murder, though.

They wanted the white men of Houston to be afraid from mutiny of rage, quote, one unfortunate

white laborer made a wrong turn and came face to face with a group of rebels.

They advised him to run in the opposite direction.

He did so whereupon the gang fired over his head and near his feet, having a jolly time

terrorizing him.

His flight back to safety was not over yet.

God, this guy's so unlucky.

He encountered another group of soldiers.

Like the Aztecs of centuries past, he was forced to run the gauntlet in order to save

his life.

They stood him against a wooden fence and practiced tracing his body's silhouettes with

bullets.

After plenty of hooting and hollering, the soldiers allowed him to scamper to safety

as long as he did so with his hands up.

Though humiliated, he survived, unquote.

Jesus Christ.

As they continued their march into Houston, First Sergeant Henry ordered his column to

affix bayonets to their rifles, preparing for hand to hand combat.

Word of trouble had spread to the neighborhood and most of the houses on the street turned

their lights off and hunkered down until the trouble had passed.

That's what you do in that situation.

You just do not call attention to yourself in any way whatsoever.

Unfortunately, three local teenagers named Winkler were curious about the marching men,

so they stepped out and decided to turn on the porch lamp.

An NCO barked out in order to shoot out the lights, and within seconds the light was shot

out, one teenage boy was dead, and another's arm was almost completely blown off.

That sucks.

Next, Henry's column spotted a new group under a bright streetlight.

Uniformed police.

Oh, well these fuckers are dead.

They're super dead.

So remember the man named Butcher who'd been shot on horseback a minute ago?

Three cops and a civilian were trying to load this guy who was like, they had an improvised

stretcher and they were trying to like load him into a car to get him to the hospital.

The soldiers didn't hesitate and fired from the darkness.

The driver heard the gunshots and hit the gas, so suddenly he speeds off.

That poor fucker.

He speeds off, which caused the guys on the road to drop Butcher right onto the street.

The cops dove for cover and Butcher just lay there in the road and got shot right in the

groin.

This poor fucking dude.

He gets shot on his horse, his horse is dead, then he gets shot in the dick.

And at this point he hopes he dies.

One of the cops took a bullet in the knee.

The civilian was hit in one of his arms.

One family in a car was stopped and searched, but allowed to leave.

Two teenagers in another vehicle were told to crawl on their bellies and the male driver

was shot through the hat, but thankfully not the head.

He just played dead and waited for everybody to leave.

Henry's column crossed the bridge and entered the San Felipe district of Houston.

This is the fourth ward.

This is where the whole mess began with Daniels and Baltimore earlier.

Yeah, this is the poor black neighborhood, so.

They took a rest in College Park Cemetery where conversation and argument began.

Some men ducked out into the shadows already done with the violence.

Henry challenged the remaining men to form up and once again ordered Corporal Baltimore

to shoot the first man to fall out.

They resumed their march.

Meanwhile, the white residents of Houston were busy losing their goddamn minds.

I'm sure.

Understandably, it's upsetting.

This is the one time the pitchforks and the torches are almost justified.

And at the very least the panic is justified because literally over a hundred armed men

are marching through town shooting lots of people.

And at this point they just want to murder everybody, so you need to defend yourselves.

So this is where even just fucking normal casual ass people have to fucking arm up.

It's worth noting that the only significant looting and property destruction were caused

by locals stealing guns and ammunition.

Police Chief Brock was shot at at his drive toward headquarters and it did not help his

grip on the situation.

He put together a posse of locals to assist the police, even handing out guns to anyone

who didn't bring their own.

So yeah, the cops are arming mobs of civilians.

At this point they have to.

More well, I don't know, I question the, the, the necessarily the, whether it's a good idea

to just arm random people who just show up.

Well, no, absolutely not.

But at this point, I mean, this isn't peace.

This isn't a peaceful protest.

This is fucking armed violence.

This is a terrified angry mob of more than a thousand white Houstonians who were assembled

right in front of the police station, the place where the soldiers are going.

But as the Texas national guard arrived to assist the police chief, they found him confused

and ranting about how his car was being shot at with military grade rounds.

The assisting Colonel begged the mayor to dismiss Brock, but it was ignored because

the parks and rec guy was not really cut for this situation, despite the fact his heart

was in the right place.

That prat wasn't up for the job.

Yes.

Now that's image is not going to get out of my head.

No, not ever.

All right.

General Hewland of the national guard received authority from the governor to restore order

by any means necessary.

So Houston was immediately placed under martial law, as you saw in that newspaper headline.

And he took other steps to seize full control of both the military and civilian authorities.

Additional troops from Galveston were called in to help captain Joseph Mattis from the

Illinois national guard decided someone needed to find these soldiers and talk them down.

So a civilian volunteer offered to drive.

So he hopped in the car with three other guardsmen and a local cop driving off into the night.

Someone's got to talk some sense into these guys.

This is all while angry white mobs whipped themselves into a frenzy with calls for lynching

ringing out through the racist air.

One group was confronted by a national guard captain.

He begged these idiots not to go up against professional soldiers with military grade

kits.

Rednecks with mostly pistols and shotguns and little, you know, little hunting rifles

versus these trained experienced men with Springfield's.

No, they're all going to get mowed down.

The rebellious soldiers in the fourth ward finished a snack and smoke break at a local

eatery, which was almost certainly a black owned business, and then terrorized a street

car, the conductor barely making it out alive.

So you can imagine why they were angry at street car conductors.

Yeah.

Hi.

Then they saw headlights, a car moving toward them rather slowly.

A local businessman was driving, but the passengers were for Houston cops.

Well, this is going to be great.

And by a twist of fate, one of them was officer Daniels, the partner of, uh, you know, officer

shithead.

Yes.

This is the partner of the guy who started all this.

And he's part of the two guys that started this whole situation with Sarah Travers and

Alonzo Edwards only the day before this guy can get dead.

So these guys were rolling up slowly in their car.

And so Henry ordered his man into ambush position.

And when the first shots rang out, the car stopped and the police inside decided they

were going to get out.

Oh, that that's smart quoting again for mutiny of rage.

Officer Daniels was armed with nothing more than a borrowed Pearl handled pistol showing

extreme heroism or folly.

Daniels charged the entrenched soldiers.

He stood not a chance and was mowed down instantly by a volley.

The three other officers ran for cover into a garage.

They might've survived uninjured if they had not fired back, giving away their position.

Instantly the soldiers returned to the favor and hit one, my leg is shot off.

He cried his companion applied a tourniquet, but the policeman died from his injuries.

The officers offered no more resistance unquote.

Yeah, cause they, most of them were dead.

When the soldiers approached Daniels, some instantly recognized him as the abusive racist

partner of sparks.

So they looted his body, bashed his face in with their rifle, butts and stabbed him over

and over again with their bayonets.

Yeah.

So we're very angry young men that tracks Henry's group stopped another car.

This time, a teenager giving some cops a ride, going to look for the rebels.

They found them.

Everyone was ordered out of the car and a soldier recognized one of the cops as an abusive

mounted patrolman.

So he cracked the guy in the face with the butt of his Springfield.

The others ran and then they just shot all of them.

At that moment, another vehicle approached.

So Henry ordered his men back into position.

This car held captain Mattis of the Illinois national guard who stood up.

You know, he's in, he's standing up inside the car with his hands up, hoping he had talked

to the man and convinced them to stand down.

Instead, he gets shot in the face a bunch of times.

Unfortunately, the, uh, the uniform color of the Illinois national guard was olive drab,

the same color as the Houston cops.

So with the headlights on the darkness, the way he's at, it makes it possible to recognize

faces.

So one of the soldiers started shouting for the vehicle to stop, but for whatever reason,

the driver just kept on going forward slowly.

Mattis yelled, wait, but it was too late.

Raised men opened fire and blew the captain's head open like an overripe cantaloupe.

Yep.

Shot his face off.

The police officer next to him was also torn to shreds and then a second volley of rounds

erased a corporal whose nickname was Happy.

Oh, bye-bye corporal Happy.

The driver was sad.

Yeah, it did not work out for him.

The driver crashed the car into a building and the two men ran out into the streets with

pistols.

One poor bastard was dead before he even knew what was going on.

Then the other ran for his life, but then it only took moments for the men to realize

what they had done.

They had executed a high ranking officer who'd come to them unarmed.

And this changed the entire mood.

Killing fellow soldiers.

Wasn't part of the plan.

Meanwhile, their leader first Sergeant Henry had become wounded during the exchange of

gunfire.

So he's like shy to like, they said he had a silver dollar size gunshot in his shoulder

and he wasn't the only one wounded.

He ordered the men to regroup down to the South Pacific railroad line.

Despite his bleeding wound, Henry tried to urge his men not to forget their original

purpose.

But at this point, most of the men wanted to return to camp and face the music.

Others wanted to just hide, run and take their chances.

Only some were still on board with assaulting the city jail.

The first Sergeant reminded them what had happened to corporal Baltimore, who was still

on board for killing cops.

But after arguing, Henry realized that the mutiny had just run out of steam.

They didn't have enough men to finish the job.

As most of the men got to their feet and prepared to make the slow walk back to camp, Henry

asked for a few of his men to shoot him dead.

But no one had the heart again for mutiny of rage.

First Sergeant Henry asked to shake the hand of every one of his men.

They all solemnly gave his non injured hand a warm, firm clasp.

One tepid rookie had a last request of his own, asking that Henry not do what he was

determined to do until the men were far enough away.

Their resolute NCO granted this request, at 2.05 a.m. as the ragtag remains of the once

grand mutinous army marched silently and reverently along the desolate tracks, they heard a blast

from Henry's rifle, unquote.

Yeah, I mean, better than being...

He did not want to be captured.

I mean, even if he made it back to camp, he was so dead at this point.

Well, I'm convinced that he when he made the decision to leave camp, I mean, even just

the fact that he was telling anybody who fell out just to get shot like this was a suicide

mission that they were going on.

And so and he after he got hurt, he's like, no way am I going to get this?

Yeah.

So he went out on his own terms.

Some of the mutineers simply snuck back into camps and back into their own bunks, while

others tried to discard their uniforms and gear and blend in among the local black population.

But martial law was declared and a thorough sweep was conducted.

Pretty much anyone possibly involved, plus a bunch of innocent locals, were all swept

up in the dragnet.

Like I showed you that newspaper headline that was kind of like right in the middle

of this post.

Yeah.

Period.

Well, I hope the innocent bystanders who were just happened to be there got it's like, I'm

not military.

I wasn't doing anything.

The first battalion of the 19th infantry arrived to fully disarm the 24th infantry camp.

And once that was complete, Major Snow finally had the balls to return after running away

after being shot at the night before.

Yeah.

That Pratt finally returned.

No, that was the, that was the other guy.

Yeah.

He got his face shut off.

That's right.

Major Snow was just the guy who wanted to have rich dinners with businessmen and for

whatever.

And now, um, in the Hunger Games, President Snow.

Oh God.

Yeah.

Now that's how that dude, Donald Sutherland, Sutherland is now how I'm picturing this guy.

No, but he was in MASH, the original movie.

And that doesn't work for me.

Anyway.

It wasn't long before the 24th was shipped off entirely.

Some of the soldiers dropped notes as they took the train out of town.

One read quote, take Texas and go to hell.

I don't want to go there anymore in my life.

Let's go East and be treated as people unquote.

The people of Houston wanted blood and demanded jurisdiction to arrest and try the men who'd

shot up their town and citizens.

They'd formed a board of inquiry filled with all kinds of conflicts of interest and subpoenaed

Major Snow, but the war department decided that letting him tell the story to a civil

board was a bad idea and backtracked, uh, which pissed off the city government even

more.

So the people of Houston are having all the, like, yeah, the people of Houston are understandably

pissed.

They're understandably pissed.

They're upset.

And not only that, but they're having this, this continual like coverage or having this

board of inquiry.

And so there's, you know, constant newspaper stories are dead a hundred percent, but uncle

Sam owned these men's asses and they decided they wanted to deal with this matter swiftly

and decisively.

This is already a long episode.

So just understand that I'm giving you the highlights on just how fucked things get from

here.

An investigation quickly placed the blame solely on the soldiers and recommended they

be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

Despite many, many white witnesses interviewed, only a single black suspect was positively

identified.

The very dead first Sergeant Henry, you can't punish him anymore.

So he's the only one they could literally directly say this guy did the thing.

A few young men wanting to escape execution were granted immunity in exchange for their

testimony against the others.

So they get some immunity witnesses from the ranks of the soldiers and, but among the others,

I didn't actually put this in my script, but one phrase that goes even for decades after

this was the phrase conspiracy of silence, saying that all these, you know, there's these

immunity witnesses who spilled their guts and had lots to say, and then everybody else

didn't really want to talk about much of anything.

Yeah, I'm sure.

So just before the court martial moved forward, the prosecution star witness captain James,

remember we mentioned him earlier, he was found dead on October 15th, 1917 from an apparent

self-inflicted gunshot wound prompting conspiracy theories that persist to this day.

So, I mean, but it just seems like he shot himself and quite possibly haunted by his

own memories of like, he was back at camp during all this stuff, but he was lots of

people were messed up by this whole experience.

I mean, cause honestly, except for that one cop, they fucking just murdered innocent people.

For the prosecution, the JAG office chose Colonel John Hall, an ambitious up and comer

from Chicago.

Assisting him was reserve officer, a major Dudley Sutphin, a corporate shark lawyer with

experience as a superior court judge.

So prosecution has these, a really strong team on their side.

Their investigation caused them to shave the suspect list down from 156 to 64 that

they felt had sufficient evidence where they could press charges.

So we're down to 64 guys, more on sufficient evidence in a minute.

The defendants had the right to choose their own attorney, but these were poor black men

who didn't have the resources.

So the Southern department chose for them major Harry Greer.

Here's Robert Haynes from the KHOU documentary quote, you didn't have to be an attorney to

defend under the military code of justice and Greer was not Greer was just an officer

who at one time had been associated with the 24th infantry.

And he understood, I think the black soldier may be better than some of the other officers

would have, but he had no training unquote.

So untrained officer, he taught law, but was not a practicing attorney.

Yeah.

And then they were like, Oh, let's pull in this like heavy duty prosecutor.

Well, and this guy was, well, yeah, the heavy duty prosecutor prosecution team.

I hate American justice system.

I just, I just want to say this is military American justice.

I hate it.

I hate it.

I hate it.

I hate it.

And yeah.

And they recruited major Greer, but I think he did it voluntarily.

Like it looks like this guy's heart was in the right place, but he wasn't necessarily

qualified and the deck was completely stacked against him.

So he showed up at Fort Sam Houston where the men of the 24th were being held on October

19th.

He was given until the first week of November to prepare for trial, a trial.

The prosecution had been working on for months already.

That's fucked up, but it tracks, but it's fucked up.

Just like the other side was able to have an assistant to the prosecution.

He was able to get an assistant and he, he chose the willing, uh, confident and very

familiar officer captain.

But if things weren't already fucked enough, uh, after captain James, apparent suicide

which was now the prosecution's star witness, forcing him to resign due to a conflict of

interest.

Yeah.

Lots of conflicts of interest.

From mutiny of rage quote, all was not well with security.

After the trauma of the writing and the death of his respected colleague captain James,

he resigned his commission and left the army altogether.

For reasons unknown Greer requested neither a postponement nor an appointment of a replacement

Doubtless Greer was doing all he could to placate his superior officers unquote.

So he just threw a wrench in it.

So like my read on this is that this guy Greer, on one hand, his heart was in the right place.

I feel like he genuinely wanted to do his best to defend the soldiers, but he also didn't

push back because all the people making these decisions were his superiors.

Yeah.

And so he was trying to keep everybody happy.

So it's kind of, you kind of end up with mixed feelings about him.

Like I said, his heart was in the right place, but he certainly didn't fight as hard as he

could have for these men.

Yeah.

In other words, this left Greer a couple of weeks to come up with a defense for dozens

of men with zero help.

Sucks but tracks.

The jailed men didn't seem willing to believe that a white officer was actually on their

side so they weren't even very cooperative with their own defense counsel.

Yeah, that also tracks.

So on November 1st, 1917, United States versus Sergeant William C. Nesbit et al began.

Some people objected to the location of the trial, the brand new Gift Memorial Chapel

at Fort Sam Houston because it was held there because it was the only building big enough

to fit a trial with that many people involved.

But some people said that having a murder trial in what's basically a church seems to

be in poor taste.

Yeah.

And you can go there to this day if you visit Fort Sam Houston.

Because the US had declared war earlier that year, the men were accused under four articles

of war, the most serious charge being the equivalent of the first degree murder of 14

people.

Yeah.

The other charges were disobeying direct orders, mutiny, and attacking civilians.

63 soldiers, one guy was excluded because he caught pneumonia just before trial, like

the luckiest case of pneumonia ever.

They all pled not guilty.

You know, it's like, I'm sure there are plenty that were guilty that escaped this and some

of them were not guilty and are just going to get guiltified anyway.

That's exactly what we're about to talk about.

The prosecution made the case that the reasons for the mutiny were unimportant, only the

actions of the men as related to the military code of justice.

While Major Greer tried to make it clear that you can't separate the actions of the men

from the actions that have been taken against them since they first showed up in Houston.

He also pushed that the charges were ridiculous since no one could identify any of the suspects

directly, not even the superior officers like Major Snow, and that the roll calls done in

the chaos and darkness, not exactly proof of who was in the camp and who was marching

into Houston.

Yeah.

You know.

The evidence isn't there.

That whole reasonable doubt.

Yeah.

I mean, that's, that's a, that's an issue.

I mean, reasonable doubt is the reason why OJ Simpson is still fucking free.

And you always got to remember too, this is not an American courtroom.

This is a military tribunal, which means there's no like singular judge or jury, but rather

a panel.

Yeah.

No, it sucks even worse than the regular American justice system.

You got to watch like JAG and some episodes of NCIS if you want to get a clue.

But yeah, but don't do that because that's, that's complete horseshit.

Please don't.

Um, Colonel Hall called some Houston cops and Illinois national guardsmen to identify

men who were arrested after the riot with the argument that these arrests were good

enough to identify the suspects and establish guilt.

So these were like, you know, guys who had been hiding in town, caught by the cops.

Dozens of Houstonians were called to testify though.

Again, no one could make an individual identification like some of them literally tried, but the

defense was immediately able to show these guys couldn't tell these men apart.

So, and they, and they play at night when all this shit was happening, there's no way

they could know who was who.

No.

And unfortunately, racists also have a bad hard time telling black people apart.

Yeah.

Especially when they're like all young men in uniform.

They looked alike.

Yeah.

So, so nobody directly identified even in trial.

Yeah.

Greer did his best to punch holes in the prosecution's case, including the idea that some of the

men joined the March out of fear and were told they'd be shot if they fell out of the

column.

So it's like, you can't prosecute all of them because literally they were being told if

they decided to change their mind five minutes later, they couldn't Baltimore would have

shot them dead.

Yeah.

But some of the prosecution witnesses, you know, these, these immunity guys who had flipped

and exchange for their own asses being saved, they painted the picture that every man involved

did so willingly with murderous intent.

It's like, yeah, yeah, those guys all were there and they all wanted to kill and they

totally did.

All of them were shooting everybody.

What a bunch of horse shit.

I didn't quote any of these guys, but it was just very clearly, you know, I, I, I am not

going to judge them too harshly because again, they were terrified for their own lives and

it's a complicated situation.

I'm not in a position to judge these men, but it still sucks.

Here's the problem is neither were they, he shows a muddy, muddy, muddy situation.

So Greer showed inconsistencies in testimony presented some witnesses who swore men such

as private TC Hawkins had never left the camp that night.

So they literally, there's like one bit of testimony where they got direct testimony

from a guy who had let Hawkins sleep in his bed roll.

So he's like, no Hawkins didn't, wasn't even there.

And yet he was one of these, these defendants based on this roll call situation.

That sucks.

When it came time to summarize the prosecution's case, major Sutphin presented the legal theory

of collective guilt quote where a number of persons conspire and death happens and the

prosecution of that common design, all in each one of the conspirators is guilty of

murder unquote.

They're all there.

They all did it.

They're all guilty.

The same, no matter who actually fired the guns.

Major Greer argued the Blackstone ratio.

That's the old chestnut that says it's better that 10 guilty people go free than a single

innocent person be wrongfully convicted.

Yeah, but these are, but these are black soldiers doing me.

So their lives don't really matter anyway.

So Greer reminded the panel of the racism and violence these men had suffered since

they'd come to honorably perform their duties.

He emphasized the men were convinced a white mob was coming to attack them and that the

immunity witnesses for the prosecution did all the same stuff that these other men were

supposed to hang for.

On November 27th, the court martial adjourned and it took the panel less than a day to reach

its decision.

Yup, they're all guilty firing squad.

I feel like it's like I have premonitions.

Well, here, we're ready to get into that 54 of the 63 men were found guilty of all charges.

Three were found guilty of willfully disobeying the orders of a superior officer.

Five were acquitted.

Oh, that's good.

Then they read the sentences.

13 of the men were determined culpable of masterminding the events or leading the column

and would be executed.

One of them was Private Hawkins.

You know, the one who another witness swore never even left the camp.

Yeah, poor dude.

Another was Corporal Charles Baltimore.

That tracks, but yeah, I mean, as pissed off as he was, he was heavily involved in the

it's, it's muddy.

This is a bad situation.

There's also no evidence that Baltimore shot anybody ever.

Yeah, but he was ordered to.

Forty one were sentenced to a life of hard labor, but one guy was granted clemency, Private

First Class John Hudson.

And even their reasons for granting clemency are racist.

The court wrote, quote, he impressed us as being an ignorant man, rather stupid and not

of high mentality, yet not vicious.

We believe that he was puzzled and bewildered unquote.

So Hudson was spared because they thought he was a simpleton because he's stupid for

the defendants received less than 30 months in prison.

The army was worried about more trouble.

So it handled things in an incredibly shady manner.

Of course it did.

The order was given that the first execution take place on December 11th at Fort Sam Houston,

but they spread the rumor that it would take place in a location some 20 miles away.

The press weren't told about it until after hours after it already happened.

Those forced into a life of hard labor were sent to Leavenworth in Kansas.

So in the middle of December, 13 men were roused and told to dress at five in the morning.

They had requested that any execution be carried out by firing squad, a soldier's death, but

when they were led to the site, they saw a large gallows and they were hit with the smell

of fresh cut mesquite.

They didn't want to be lynched, but that's what was going to happen to them anyway.

They're going to get hung like witches.

From the documentary Mutiny on the Bayou, quote, despite great security from officers

expecting the worst, the men surrendered to their fate peacefully and with dignity.

As they awaited their death, no one wept and none of the men begged for mercy.

Over 200 soldiers and law enforcement officers were assembled to prevent any trouble at the

execution.

After the men mounted the platform, a black minister and two white chaplains led a short

prayer.

The officer in charge set attention and the men began singing a hymn.

Their final words were a farewell to their guards saying, goodbye boys of company C.

As the men stood at attention, looking straight ahead, the officer brought his raised arms

down.

The trap door swung open and the men dropped nine feet, meaning their death in the words

of a witness with neither bravado or fear, unquote.

The scaffolding was quickly torn down and burned.

Mexican workers had to work to remove the hangman's knots from around each soldier's

necks.

Each man was put in a simple wooden coffin with a soda water bottle holding a slip of

paper that just listed the name, rank, and date of death.

Stone markers without names were placed at the head of each grave, noted only with the

noose number of the executed men.

That's fucked up.

Isn't it?

On the day before, when Frederick Baltimore, back East, received a letter from his brother

Charles, quote, dear brother, I write to you for the last time in this world.

I am to be executed tomorrow morning.

I know it's shocking news, but don't worry too much as it is God's will meet me in heaven.

I was convicted at the general court Marshall held here last month was tried for mutiny

and murder.

It is true.

I went down town with the men that marched out of camp, but I'm innocent of shedding

any blood, but it is God's will.

So don't worry for God.

So loved the world.

He gave his only begotten son.

That's who, whoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

I am going to meet father and mother and all the rest of the family gone before goodbye.

Meet me in heaven, your brother in Christ, Charles W Baltimore, unquote.

That's fucking sad as shit.

Isn't it?

Yeah.

I've read that letter a bunch of times.

I'm bummed.

And, uh, yeah, it sucks.

The number of graves were forgotten until 1937, when Fort Sam Houston wanted to use

the land.

It was at this point, they realized that the army had been in such a hurry to execute the

men.

They had never been dishonorably discharged.

So they quickly and quietly relocated the remains to the closest national cemetery ironically

desegregating the graveyard for the first time.

Just like the first man who died in the riot desegregated a local cemetery inside of Houston.

Gotta put them somewhere.

But unlike every other grave marker in the national cemetery, these only included the

name and date of death.

This was done so quietly that for decades, the family couldn't find any information about

the location of their own relatives remains.

One small positive that came out of this incident was the establishment of the Houston branch

of the NAACP.

One that would grow to be one of the most important and influential in the country.

This was the root of the activism to clear the names and restore the honors of the soldiers

who were betrayed by the country they'd served.

Yeah.

In 1921, a delegation met with president Harding asking for pardons or at least clemency for

the men still serving these long prison terms.

There's still lifers, you know, and hard labor in Leavenworth at this point.

You know, only like four years in.

He was very polite and did precisely jack and shit.

Yeah.

So they tried Congress, but the secretary of war wrote a committee report stating that

the trial had been above board and that quote, the evidence of guilt was overwhelming and

stands without explanation or contradiction.

The defendants had a fair and impartial trial.

No soldier was guilty merely because he was absent from roll call, unquote.

Bullshit.

Okay.

And then Colonel Hall, you know, the prosecutor?

Yeah.

He became the acting judge advocate general of the army.

Of course.

But in a twist, it seems like a few years had softened his heart and opened his mind

a little bit.

He became convinced that certain men were innocent and noted that the Buffalo soldiers

had been both model soldiers and considered model prisoners, not exactly the image of

writers and mutineers.

So he ultimately recommended the early release of six men writing that second chances should

be offered to quote a prisoner who is willing to work for his own salvation, unquote.

Yeah.

Years went by and more of the man either served out their time or were granted early release.

The work of the activists shifted from freeing the men who were alive to clearing the names

of the dead.

And in some cases locating the dead.

Yeah.

Got to find them.

There had never been a posthumous presidential pardon in the United States until one William

Jefferson Clinton made it happen.

Funny enough to another wronged African American of the United States military from mutiny

of rage quote in 2016, 100 years after the riots, the descendants of corporal Nesbit

and private Moore and Hawkins petition for the U S government for posthumous pardons

arguing.

They suffered grave injustices at the hands of the United States when they were executed

by hanging after a defective trial, unquote does 2016 and they didn't get anywhere with

president Obama's outgoing justice department.

And they said they didn't deal with posthumous pardons.

So they tried the Trump administration.

How'd that go?

All discussions were had, but ultimately things fell apart and in very Trumpy and fashion,

Trump instead did a posthumous pardon of a guy we mentioned very briefly last episode,

Jack Johnson, the black heavyweight boxing champion.

And because that had all these celebrities involved, like Mike Tyson, Sylvester Stallone,

he loves celebrities.

That's his people.

And uh, you know, Jack Johnson didn't him can murder anybody.

His, he had been convicted for carrying a white woman who had been his girlfriend over

state lines.

So, you know, back, he trafficked a white woman, even though it was just his girlfriend

because you know, yeah, early 19 hundreds and it was racist as fuck.

Even when you're the world heavyweight boxing champion.

But so Trump righted this horrible injustice, you know, after all this time, but didn't

do shit for the families of these soldiers.

Of course, work continued to correct things.

Even from inside the JAG Corps, an attorney who prosecuted terrorists at Guantanamo Bay,

Colonel Frederick Borch had this to say, quote, while everything about the trial was legal,

it was not a fair trial, not a fair trial then certainly not a fair trial now, unquote

legal don't mean right.

Yeah.

Very clearly.

In 2017, the gravestones were finally placed in college park cemetery in Houston for those

first three soldiers killed.

Remember that one guy took a gut wound in the very beginning of things.

He was one of them.

So I would literally 100 years before that guy got a tombstone in his grave.

Wasn't months later before racist locals had vandalized it, of course.

It was November 13 2023 just months before we're recording this right now that the United

States Army finally reversed the injustice done to the men who had served it faithfully

from the New York Times quote, Christine E. warmth.

The army secretary said in a statement on Monday that the army board for correction

of military records had found that these soldiers were wrongfully treated because of

their race and were not given fair trials by setting aside their convictions and granting

honorable discharges.

The army is acknowledging past mistakes and setting the record straight.

She said at the ceremony on Monday, the soldiers names are read aloud as a white glove soldier

rang a bell for each one.

After a moment of silence, a staff sergeant saying amazing grace.

Mr. Holt called it a day of atonement for the Jim Crow era South and legalized segregation,

unquote.

So it took over 100 years, not over 100 years, not even but over.

So the closest you'll get to any kind of justice was that.

This story sucks ass.

I don't like it.

So we'll close out by reading part of the last letter.

We read it.

We read Baltimore's letter to his brother.

This was the letter written to private by private Hawkins, the very likely completely

innocent guy to his parents shortly before his execution.

Just reading a bit of it, quote, I'm sentenced to be hanged for the trouble that happened

in Houston, Texas.

Although I'm not guilty of the crime that I'm accused of, but mother, it is God's will

that I go now and in this way and mother, I'm going to look for you in the family.

If possible, I will meet you by the river, unquote, that's fucking sad as shit.

This is a bummer ass story, Jamie.

You're welcome.

Yeah.

I got bummed out and I decided to share it with you and you, whoever you are listening.

Yeah.

This is by far like the saddest story we've ever covered.

Yeah.

Thank you.

It's like, yeah, it's, it's rough going through it even again.

So if you are still with us and haven't rage quit our podcast, thank you for sticking with

us and hearing this awful story.

This is one of those things again, that when I learned about this from this little news

clip, it took me down this rabbit hole where I felt really upset and I wanted to make everyone

else just as upset because you can't fix shit until you know what actually happened.

So, also thanks to our friend Kevin and Raven sound studios for hosting us and making us

sound better than we do on our home USB mics.

Thanks Kevin.

I'm sorry for we bummed you out.

Super bummed, super pissed, super kind of like where do you even go from here, but whatever.

And if you actually want us to make more stuff like this or hear Bambi's more cheerful episodes,

you can help us out by subscribing on your favorite podcast app, rate us on Apple podcasts,

write a review.

All that stuff really helps us, helps us capture a new audience, share episodes or clips on

social media.

You can also go to chainsawhistory.com where you can actually find the full back catalog,

read the extensive show notes, find all the research links that we do.

And if you want to actually help us pay the bills for hosting and for all the books and

rentals that I had to do in order to do all this research, then you can subscribe via

substack on chainsawhistory.com.

That's also where you can find the bonus content where you can hear the value of series or

Bambi reads me children's books from the eighties.

She has also now begun her own episodes where she picks her own topics and comes at me just

the way I do.

Yeah, but you only get it for like holidays and stuff because my hands all fucked.

And also no time for Dr. Love where I get to indulge my Indiana Jones obsession through

history.

That is you keep saying no time for love or no time, Dr. Love.

And it's like, no time for love, Dr. Jones.

Yeah, there you go.

Wow.

Why am I going for that?

I don't know.

You really want the porn.

No, I don't.

I need my Indiana Jones porn list, please.

So all of that nowadays, old indie.

So after getting really upset, it's good to remember the NAACP worked with these families

for over 100 years to get the result we finally got, which, you know, still suck.

Those men didn't get to live to benefit from that, but at least their families got some

peace and their names and honor got to be restored.

So I recommend for our listeners to donate to the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational

Fund.

They work for racial justice through litigation, advocacy, and public education.

You can learn more and support them at www.naacpldf.org Yeah.

And mine is still stopcopcity.org where Atlanta is trying to bulldoze a forest to build a

police training facility for urban warfare and fuck a bunch of that shit.

And not just for our cops, but for cops all over the country and even urban warfare training

for say, you know, military forces and other countries that yeah, it's all fucking bad

might have relate to some serious foreign conflicts happening right now.

They also like want to build another studio there and it's like leave our fucking forest

alone you you dicks.

So green space is important.

So look up defend the Atlanta forest stopcopcity.org.

You can also look up the Atlanta solidarity network if you want to contribute to the bail

funds of people who've gotten arrested just for protesting this bullshit.

Yep.

Some of them are in there on RICO charges.

It's bullshit.

And if yeah, if there's ever a story that we've told that, you know, really emphasizes

why we have this particular movement and why we've been supporting it for so long.

This is one.

Yeah, well, fucking Fulton County has three, three RICO cases right now.

And that's Donald Trump, young thug, and forest defenders.

It's complete fucking nonsense on top of the terrorist charges, which is also nonsense.

I mean, so yep.

So if you want to learn more, go to stopcopcity.org.

And now we're going to cheer ourselves up and try to shake off this bummer of a story.

Yeah, for real.

Listen to some Bob Marley and smoke some more weed.

Yeah.

All right.

Thank you.

Bye.