An Editorial by W.O. Saunders
The City Manager and Board of Aldermen of Elizabeth City have so far declined to take any action in the case of Policeman George Twiddy for the brutal, unwarranted and murderous shooting of the negro youth Davis Overton Jr. on the morning of Sunday, April 2.
The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth about this outrageous case was given to the public thru the columns of this newspaper last week. Any member of the Board of Aldermen could verify the facts published in this newspaper.
But this man-killer Twiddy continues to wear his policeman’s badge and walk the streets of Elizabeth City clothes with authority to carry a gun. Maybe if Twiddy continues is man-killing career he will eventually kill one man some politicians in this town want killed. Is that the reason Twiddy is retained on the police force in face of the charges against him?
This newspaper has asked Mayor Goodwin what he purposed to do in the Twiddy case. Mayor Goodwin says he was not consulted in the matter of police appointments; that he had nothing to do with putting Twiddy on the police force and he does not consider it his duty to take the initiative in removing him.
Chief of Police Holmes, to whom Twiddy is directly responsible in the performance of his duties says he knows nothing about the shooting of the negro youth, and he doesn’t appear to want to know.
Needless to ask the City Manager, J.B. Ferebee, who has no more authority under his masters, the Board of Aldermen, than a blind mule in the city stables.
One by one the Aldermen pass the buck. Alderman W.H. Jennette says he had nothing to do with putting Twiddy on the police force and he doesn’t purpose to have anything to do with his removal.
It seems that five members of the Board of Aldermen are responsible for Twiddy’s appointment. They are P.H. Williams, W.H. Weatherly, C.H. Twiddy, P.C. Cahoon and L.W. Anderson. Williams says the Aldermen will take no action in Twiddy’s case until the Courts have acted. Mr. Williams says there are several sides to the case.
Several sides to the case! There is only one side in which the Board of Aldermen should be interested. The incontrovertible facts are that George Twiddy gathered up a party of men, three of whom were nonresidents of this county and went out of his jurisdiction, four miles out of town, between daybreak and sunrise on the morning of Sunday, April 2, to hunt a negro boy wanted by the county authorities for vagrancy. The sheriff of Pasquotank county says Twiddy had no warrant for the negro. But whether he had a warrant or not, this posse, organized and headed by Twiddy, fired a volley of shots after that frightened negro boy. One of these bullets entered the boy’s back, penetrated his liver and right lung and lodged behind a front rib. The boy was left in the woods in that condition. Twiddy came back to town and made no report of the incident. Five days later the boy was found more dead that alive in a ditch near the point where he was shot.
The facts set forth here are facts which this newspaper is prepared to establish. They are facts upon which Twiddy could bring a suit for criminal libel if they could not be proved.
The people of Elizabeth City are incensed over the outrage; the eyes of all law-abiding, Christian-minded people of Eastern North Carolina are upon Elizabeth City. And it looks as if Twiddy is to be whitewashed by the Board of Aldermen of Elizabeth City and encouraged to pursue his murderous career.
The fact that the boy is lying at the point of death in the Elizabeth City Hospital, as a result of Twiddy’s murderous excursion in the county, is a negro makes the lassitude and indifference of the Aldermen all the more deplorable. A white boy shot down like a dog would be avenged. Do the Aldermen intend to say to the negroes of this city and county that a negro’s life is inconsequential and not to be held sacred? If that is the spirit of the Aldermen of Elizabeth City, then I tremble for the safety of this town and county. This town and this county have been fortunate in the amicable relationship of the two races living side by side. Is the confidence of the negro in a white man’s justice to be utterly destroyed and the heart of the negro steeled against his white neighbors? It must no be. Where are the ministers, the spokesmen of the merciful Christ and all the professing Christians in this town that they do not prevail upon their Aldermen to go to the very bottom of this damnable piece of business? In meantime Twiddy should be suspended without another hour’s delay; his continuance on the police force of the town is a disgrace to the community and a crime against humanity.
From the front page of The Independent, Elizabeth City, N.C., April 21, 1922
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