Our records show the following number of cases of lynchings of Negroes in which the victim was taken from officers or jails: Alabama 2 Georgia 4 Louisana 2 Mississippi 1 North Carolina 1 Oklahoma 1 South Carolina 1 Tennessee 1 --- 13 INNOCENCE ADMITTED PUBLICLY In three cases of which we have record the press has spoken of the innocence of victims; one of these involved three persons, another the ten victims of Brooks and Lowndes Counties mobs (aside from the one person who shot the white farmer which was the incentive to the lynchings). In another case it is the common belief in the community in which a Negro was lynched for "killing a white woman" that the husband of the woman was himself the murderer. No charge has been brought against him, however, by the authorities. In such cases, Negroes are usually too fearful of danger and too hopeless of anything being done, to initiate legal action. In an additional case a bank cashier declared in an interview in an Alabama paper, that a certain lynching victim had committed no offense, that there had been a mistake made in the man the mob was after. LEGAL ACTION TAKEN BY PUBLIC OFFICIALS Governor Thomas W. Bickett of North Carolina ordered the sheriff to investigate one case, but the sheriff reported that the "guilty parties could not be ascertained." The Governor in another case personally appealed to a mob at midnight and prevented the lynching of a man who was later hanged. The same Governor in November appealed to the Federal authorities and secured the support of a tank corps of 250 Federal army men to assist the authorities of Winston-Salem, North Carolina, in holding the local jail against a mob which was attempting to get a Negro prisoner to lynch him. The Mayor and "Home Guards" of Winston-Salem, aided by the Federal soldiers alluded to, protected the aforementioned prisoner at the cost of the lives of some of the "Home Guards," for which public service, so unusual where Negro-hunting mobs are concerned, they should receive the tributes of all good citizens. (The Association's appreciation was made known to all concerned by a public commendation).[9] Governor Richard I. Manning of South Carolina ordered a sheriff to arrest 17 prominent farmers who had participated in a lynching. Bail was fixed at a total of $97,500, in February. From the Judge who placed the men under bail we learn that no indictments were found by the grand jury. "Lack of evidence," is given as the reason.