Red River

The group in the bog, led by Sam, sits in shock as more eyewitnesses arrive and tell stories about the battle. As witnesses arrive, they tabulate the names of the men who are known to be dead, which includes most of the McCullens. Israel is said to be alive but a prisoner. Sam is restless, knowing that McCully saved him by sending him away and that his closest friend, Israel, has an uncertain fate. Safe, “he revels in the fact that he is still alive, so steeped in his relief that it feeds his guilt” (185).

Eventually, Levi Allen appears with 11 other surviving men. He had not left the fight but guarded the entrance to the woods so that “no white man pursued any colored man managing to cross over into the wooded area” (186). After nightfall, Sam leads Levi to the river, where he can sneak out of the parish. Back at the camp in Boggy Bayou, Sam takes his sons, Green and Jackson, to go hunting. He also invites Noby when he sees him sitting alone. They catch two possums, which the women cook. Sam announces that he is going to Colfax. Polly protests and asks Sam if they should “think about moving on from Colfax” (188). Sam tells Polly that “no place else gonna be different till we make it different” (188). He goes to find out what has happened in Colfax.

Most of the white group leaves after supper, but Baby-face Jim and a dozen others stay, retelling the events of the day and congratulating each other on their victory. They tap a keg and start drinking and playing cards. Eventually, Luke Hadnot appears with a few men from Montgomery. He addresses October White and explains that his brother, Smokin’ Jimmy Hadnot, was among the white men who were killed in the confrontation. October protests that he wasn’t at the courthouse, except when the white men sent him to deliver a message to Levi Allen. Luke hits October, but Sheriff Nash says he knows that October “wasn’t one of them” (192). Again, the sheriff says that he will wait until morning to decide what to do with the prisoners. Luke tells the sheriff to go home, and “I take charge of the prisoners” (193). He promises “no funny business,” and Sheriff Nash leaves (193).

Once alone, Luke Hadnot and the others march the prisoners to the river, near the Pecan Tree. Luke Hadnot tells the white men to take two prisoners and “take their shirts off and put ’em back to back” (193). Two brothers are taken out of line and places back to back. Luke Hadnot tells them that they killed his brother. One of the prisoners says he saw what happened: “your brother got caught cross-ways from the side by a bullet, back from where the shooting was” when the black men tried to surrender (194). Furious, Luke shoots him in the head while the other prisoner of the pair tries to run with his feet tied together. Luke shoots him in the back and laments: “they made me use two bullets” (194).

From the middle of the line, Israel sees Luke “perfecting the game he has invented to kill two men with a single bullet” (193). More pairs of men are killed as Luke “practices trick shots, shooting from under his arm, but his balance is shaky, and he settles into calling his target beforehand to keep himself amused” (194). The men are “mean-drunk” and “the dead pile up, and two white men are assigned to take them down to the riverbank by their hands and feet and throw them into the water” (195). Israel’s turn comes, and he is paired with Eli McCullen. Luke shoots Eli in the chest, and Eli falls backward, onto Israel. Israel doesn’t move, playing dead to stay alive. The white men drag them away and dump them with the other bodies. Israel listens to more men die, including October White, who again protests his innocence. As the white men come to deposit more bodies, Israel cannot stop himself from gasping. One of the men notices and calls: “this one’s alive” (196). 

Found out, Israel resigns himself to death. When he is rolled over, a white man takes aim and fires. However, the man is drunk and hits Israel in the right eye, “and his vision becomes nothing more than the concept of red” (197). When Israel rolls over in pain, the white man shoots him in the back. Israel loses sensation in his body but does not die. The white men decide to hang the last three men from the Pecan Tree. Israel tries to force himself to lose consciousness but cannot. He hears the white men throw ropes over the tree branch. He hears Luke Hadnot, in a final twisted act, castrate the last three prisoners before hanging them.

The hangings excite the white men for a moment, but “after the three colored men sway suspended in the darkness with their necks broken and faces swelling,” the white men quiet down (199). 

Sam takes a pistol with him and heads toward Colfax, leaving the Enfield rifle with his son. Sam passes many groups of black people hiding in the woods, and he proceeds with caution that slows his progress significantly. Finally, he reaches the sugarhouse. The area is quiet, and Sam sees a small group of white men in a drunken sleep. He is confused by the absence of prisoners. He turns to follow the river toward the courthouse, ready to bolt if he sees any white men. Moving closer, he sees the Pecan Tree and approaches it despite the eerie quiet.

Sam inches forward until he stumbles and “looks down, forced to register what he should have seen all along” (203). He is surrounded by the bodies of dead black men. Horrified, he “lifts his eyes heavenward for an answer. Hanging from the lower branches of the town’s Pecan Tree, three limp forms are outlined by the moon, as if their heads are lowered in prayer” (203). Sam lifts the bodies down from the tree and lays them on the ground. He then walks among the bodies to identify the dead men for their families.

The sound of a choking gurgle scares him, and he starts to run before realizing that someone is alive. He returns and finds Israel. Israel can barely speak due to a bullet wound in his throat. He asks about his family, and Sam assures him that they are all safe. For a moment, Sam wonders if Israel has been castrated, too, and, if so, whether he should put him out of his misery, but he is “shamed by his squeamishness, his selfishness” (205).

They decide to try to get Israel to Mirabeau Woods, to McCully’s family. Sam doesn’t tell Israel what he knows because “first priority for the survivors is to live to fight another day” (206).

They make slow progress due to Israel’s wounds but eventually reach Jessie McCullen’s cabin. His widow tends to Israel while Sam returns to Boggy Bayou to deliver news to the waiting families. Along the way, he meets black families carrying their dead away from the courthouse field; the white men are “letting the families claim their men” (207). In daylight, the field looks different, and Sam hears two white men “remark loudly about the shame of the Colfax Riot, how the colored men who took over the courthouse were radicals and got what they deserved” (208).

Back in Boggy Bayou at last, Polly runs to hug Sam. Sam then tells Lucy that he found Israel alive but seriously hurt. He will take her and the boys to see him. He tells Polly what he overheard: “Colfax Riot, my foot. Words matter in how people see, how they gonna remember. Easter Sunday 1873 be the Colfax Massacre, not the Colfax Riot” (209). Again, Polly suggests they leave Colfax. Sam refuses, saying, “McCully and the rest can’t be for nothing. We got to make stepping stones out of stumbling blocks” (209).

Sam has much to do, including speaking to the families of the dead men and taking Lucy to Israel, but first he “will have his sons shout out their name, Tademy, right here in the godforsaken swamp, for everyone to hear. They daren’t forget” (210).

Part 1 ends with several real news clippings about the events of the “Colfax Riot.”