A Forgotten Early Account of the Great Hanging at Gainesville, Texas: P’s Letter to the Houston Tri-Weekly Telegraph, August 1863

A stylized depiction of the 1862 Great Hanging at Gainesville that appeared in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, Feb. 20, 1864.

We are accustomed to taking account of two histories of the 1862 hangings at Gainesville, Texas, William Barrett’s The Great Hanging (1885), a pamphlet privately printed in Gainesville, and George Washington Diamond’s Account of the Great Hanging at Gainesville, 1862, which was completed in 1876 and first published by the Texas State Historical Association in 1963.¹ Both accounts are now available in The Great Hanging at Gainesville, 1862, with an introduction by Richard B. McCaslin and an afterword by L. D. Clark. In the editor’s note to this convenient book, Ryan R. Schumacher describes these as “the only known narratives written by individuals personally connected to the Great Hanging.”² But now, a third account can be added.

The present author has found a contemporary history of the great hangings by an eyewitness if not a participant, a letter in the Houston Tri-Weekly Telegraph for August 31, 1863, by a writer from Gainesville who signs himself merely as “P.” The letter anticipates sections in Barrett and especially Diamond. Most interestingly, it reveals that the leaders of the men who carried out the hangings were already constructing justifications for the actions not even a year later. P. makes it seem that such a project might have already been in the works by the time of the Telegraph article: “a full history of the ‘Cook expedition’³ will be published when facilities for publication will justify.” (P assumed, probably correctly, that the Telegraph would not have space for such a “connected history.”)

Texas historians will want to scrutinize this 1863 letter, perhaps starting with identifying P. They will, of course, weigh what he says against Barrett and Diamond. Descendants of the men involved in the hangings will find P’s letter fascinating, if horrifying. All readers will see that the language and the tone of the letter reveal that the men involved in the hangings recognized the extremity of their behavior and how determined they were to control the telling of the history of their bloody deeds.

Houston Tri-weekly Telegraph, August 31, 1863
GAINESVILLE, August 11, 1863

Editor Telegraph.—Having ascertained that exceedingly erroneous opinions prevail in various portions of the State in regard to the execution, last autumn, of a number of disaffected men in Cook county, who had attached themselves to a secret organization, having for its object the overthrow of the Confederate States and the destruction of innocent men, women and children, I would ask the privilege of giving to the public a few facts respecting that sad affair, through the medium of your paper. As a full history of the “Cook expedition” will be published when facilities for publication will justify, and as a connected history of it would necessarily encroach on your columns, I can only give a few desultory facts. After some of our most prudent, patriotic and active citizens had, through skillfully devised plans and unceasing vigilance, fully satisfied themselves of the existence of an unlawful and most unholy secret organization in our midst, they on the eve of making arrests, notified a number of our most reliable citizens in different portions of the country. Immediately after the ringleaders of said fraternity had been arrested, the loyal people of Cook met almost en masse at Gainesville, appointed five men to select a jury of twelve men, approved the selection, and by a unanimous vote consented to abide the decisions of that jury, which I may venture the assertion, in point of moral integrity, intelligence, discretion and humanity, would compare favorably with any jury that has ever been summoned to sit in any court in the State. I heard some of the criminals say that they were perfectly satisfied to commit themselves into their hands. The jury were sworn. The witnesses were examined separately and after examination...