Covington, Ga., April 7—Evidence in the trial of John S. Williams, charged with murder of one of 11 negroes who met deth after Federal investigation into allege peonage conditions started on his farm, was concluded today.
The only witness for the defense was Williams himself, who told the jury, “I am as innocent as a man can be.”
The last two state’s witnesses who testified today corroborated statements of Clyde Manning, negro farm boss. Manning told the jury yesterday Williams directed the killing of the men, three of whom were drowned in Newton County.
The state announced it expected to use three hours and the defense approximately five.
The order of arguments was announced as follows:
C.C. King, Covington, for defense; Graham Wright, assistant state attorney general, prosecution; W.H. Key, Monticello, Ga., defense; Solicitor General A.M. Brand, prosecution; W.M. Howard, Augusta, Ga., prosecution; Green F. Johnson, Monticello, defense.
Mr. King started speaking soon after the afternoon session began, arguing on the law regarding omission of corroboration or the testimony of an accomplice.
He regarded the defense expected to rely also on the “alibi” which he said Williams had established ‘as far as possible’ by describing how he was home the night the crimes are charged against him.
King sought to show the jury that Manning “probably had sufficient motive in his own mind to make way with these negroes.”
Manning, he said, knew nothing about the penalty for peonage and, when Federal agents told him he was “just as guilty as Williams was” and had “lied and ought to be hanged,” the negro “no doubt thought he had committed a hanging crime and proceeded to get these negroes out of the way.”
There really had been no peonage on the farm and Williams knew this and had no possible motive for the killngs.
“If you were to take Clyde Manning’s testimony out, that’s practically all you would have,” he said.
In conclusion, he made charges that state’s witnesses had been “coached” and reminded the jury that Williams was on trial for the alleged murder of Peterson alone.
Williams told the jury he had told Federal agents he might be technically guilty of peonage if their statements to the Federal laws were correct and said Clyde Manning, negro farm boss, had told him the agents said Manning “was as guilty as Williams was.”
Williams confined his remarks to the cases of Lindsey Peterson, Harry Price and Willie Preston, three negroes drowned in Newton County. He is specifically on trial for the death of Peterson.
Court recessed for luncheon when Williams left the stand and the arguments were assigned to start at the afternoon session, each side to have three speakers.
Having introduced no testimony, merely letting Williams tell his story to the jury without being sworn, the defense won the privilege of opening and closing the arguments. The fact that Williams was not sworn prevented his being cross examined.
Rena Manning, wife of Clyde Manning, testifed in corroboration of her husband’s statement that, on the night Peterson, Willie Preston and Harry Price were last seen alive, Williams carried them and Manning and Charlie Chisholm off in his car.
Sheriff B.L. Johnson of Newton County testified that Manning identified the bodies of Peterson, Preston and Price, found in Newton County rivers and told where the other bodies could be found.
Williams took the stand as the first witness to make a statement in his own behalf.
“I have never had any kind of criminal charge against me or my boys before this,” were among the first words of Williams to the jury.
Williams said his four grown sons were among the first in the county to answer the country’s call to war.
“Like most farmers, I have bonded out negroes and worked them,” he continued.
Williams said he paid these men wages. He then told of he Federal investigation that started last February. He asked the Department of Justice agents to tell him exactly what peonage was and said, on being told that working bonded negroes was, that he told the Federal agents he might have been technically guilty and that “most Georgia farmers were, if their definition was correct.”
“You lying scoundrel, you ought to have your neck broken,” Williams said one of the agents said to Manning after comparing the version Williams had given about the recapture of Gus Chapman, a negro who had run off and that Manning had captured. Chapman had been brought back after attacking Manning’s wife, the defense had explained. Williams said Manning denied to the agents that he knew of the capture of Chapman.
“The surroundings are much better than we expected,” agents told him, he said, and added, “you may be technically guilty of peonage.
The agents commented that the farm hands were “well fed and well dressed,” Williams said.
“Mr. Johnny you ain’t treated me right. You made me out a liar right before those agents,” Wiliams said Manning told him afterwards.
“They told me I was just as guilty of peonage as you were,” he also quoted the negro as saying.
The last night Preston, Price and Peterson were seen, he said, they came to him and said they wanted to visit their homes but would return. They asked for and got five dollars each, he added, and he offered to take them to the train. Charlie Chisholm and Clyde Manning got 50 cents apiece form him, Williams declared, and went off.
“That was the last I ever saw of these boys,” he said, referring to Peterson, Price and Preston.
Williams said he asked Manning next day and the latter replied: “They went off last night.”
Williams was talking in a calm, clear voice and occasionally made a slow gesture as he addressed the jury.
He told of hearing later that the negroes’ bodies had been found and of his later arrest.
“Whoever put the bodies in the river did it for a purpose,” he said. “If I had done this crime, gentlemen, I would have had plenty of time to get where they could not put their hands on me,” he asserted.
Williams asserted that he was “falsely accused,” and added “what they done to him (Manning) to make him accuse me, I don’t know.
“I did not know what he was going to say until we heard him on the stand,” he said.
Williams then went into details of Manning’s long employment on the farm.
Williams said Clyde Manning’s mother asked him to take Clyde Manning and others of her children, take care of them, as he said the mother could not control them. He told of paying doctor bills and of trying “to make them do right.”
“As far as this case is concerned, I am absolutely innocent,” continued Williams.
“That’s about all I can say,” he concluded and left the stand.
Williams, in his statement, had confined himself solely to the deaths of the three negroes found drowned in Newton County.
The defense rested.
Rena Manning, wife of Clyde Manning, the first witness today, testified briefly in support of her husband’s statement that when the negroes Lindsey Peterson, Willie Preston and Harry Price were last seen alive, Williams was taking them off in a car. Manning and Charlie Chisholm, another negro, went with them, she added.
“Who told you to tell this?” Green F. Johnson, counsel for Williams, asked repeatedly as he went over the woman’s statement on cross-examination.
Sheriff B.L. Johnson of Newton County testified next, telling of the recovery of the bodies of Peterson, Preston and Price from Newton County rivers.
Sheriff Johnson also told of Manning’s identifying bodies already fond and of telling where the remainder were. The sheriff denied any threats or promises induced Manning’s statement. Frequent arguments of technicalities necessitating retirement of the jury prolonged the sheriff’s stay on the witness stand.
From the front page of The Charlotte News, Thursday, April 7, 1921
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