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District Attorney's Closed Case Files, 204116 (1935) (New York City Municipal Archives).
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2021-12-09T01:50:40+00:00
William Ford arrested
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2023-08-26T22:43:24+00:00
At 10:40 PM, Patrolman Walter MacKenzie told the Harlem Magistrates Court, he saw William Ford, a seventeen-year-old Black laborer throw a brick through a large display window in Kress' 5, 10 & 25c store at 256 West 125th Street. Ford then allegedly shouted, "in a loud tone of voice "Shed white blood, kill the cops, there has been enough black blood shed now." A "very large and threatening crowd" gathered in response to Ford's shouts, according to MacKenzie. By that time the large crowds that had been focused on 125th Street had broken into smaller groups, many of which scattered north and south up the avenues, but some groups remained. Ten minutes before windows were broken in Kress' store, Claude Jones allegedly threw a rock that broke a window at Blumstein's department store several buildings to to the east, and then called on the people on the street to attack police, drawing a large crowd. Around the same time, a white man named Thomas Wijstem was hit by a rock in front of the W. T. Grant store immediately east of Blumsteins, allegedly while being attacked by a group of Black men. Douglas Cornelius was arrested for allegedly throwing the rock.
Patrolman MacKenzie appeared in the Harlem Magistrates Court as the arresting officer of not just Ford but also the two other men arrested nearby around the same time, Claude Jones and Douglas Cornelius. It is not clear he actually made the arrests. In court MacKenzie stated that he had witnessed Ford and Jones breaking windows and inciting the crowd, but made no mention of arresting them (there are no details of the circumstances of the arrest of Cornelius). Police had established a headquarters in front of Kress' store, and officers from throughout the city had begun arriving there before 10.30 PM, so there were likely other officers in the area who could have made the arrests.
William Ford gave his address as 263 West 130th Street in his examination in the Harlem Magistrates Court, saying he had lived there for about four years. That address was five blocks directly north of Kress' store, just east of the intersection with 8th Avenue, so Ford could have been among those drawn to 125th Street by the noise and rumors circulating after the store closed. He was one of only four individuals under the age of eighteen years arrested during the disorder. Ford appeared in lists of those arrested in the disorder, but the charge made against him is different in each list: in the list published in the Atlanta World, Afro-American and Norfolk Journal and Guide he appeared among those charged with inciting a riot; in the list published in the New York Evening Journal the charge is disorderly conduct; and in a list published in the New York Daily News, Ford is charged with assault. On March 20, when he appeared in the Harlem Magistrates Court, the docket book records the charge as inciting a riot, although the arresting officer's affidavit describes Ford breaking a window and calling on the crowd to attack police. Magistrate Renaud remanded him in custody.
Ford was returned to the Harlem Magistrates Court a week later and held on bail of $1000. He was one of only eighteen of those arrested in the disorder to have a lawyer representing him listed in the court docket book, in his case West-Indian born Hutson Lovell, prominent in the Phi Beta Sigma fraternity and the Elks Lodge, with an office at 240 Broadway (both the other men arrested at same time, Claude Jones and Douglas Cornelius, also had Black lawyers representing them). Two days later Ford appeared again, when Magistrate Ford sent him to the grand jury. After MacKenzie was not present for Ford's first schedule appearance on April 8, it would be two weeks before his case was presented to the grand jury. On April 12 the grand jury transferred Ford to the Court of Special Sessions, with a note on the Magistrates Court affidavit recording both the misdemeanor forms of inciting a riot, and malicious mischief, an offense involving damage to property used in the prosecution of those who allegedly broke windows during the disorder (as the malicious mischief charge was not recorded in the docket book Ford is not categorized as being charged with that offense). There was no information on the outcome of that trial. Ford did not appear in the transcript of the 28th Police Precinct blotter that provides outcomes for most of those prosecuted in the Harlem Magistrates Court. No newspapers reported his appearances in court.
The day after Ford appeared in the grand jury, his mother, Nora Ford, went to the MCCH to make a complaint about the police department in regards to his arrest. No details of her complaint appeared in the record of her visit, but the subcommittee on crime had begun to hear testimony in its public hearings about what it termed police brutality. Patrolman Mackenzie appeared on a list of police witnesses in the records of the chairman of that subcommittee, Arthur Garfield Hays, indicating that they had asked to have him testify in a public hearing. That did not happen. With a large number of cases reported to it, rather than holding hearings about them all, the MCCH asked Black lawyers from the Harlem Lawyers Association to investigate some cases, one of which may have been Ford's complaint. There is no evidence of the outcome of the complaint. -
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2021-12-08T22:06:03+00:00
Kress 5, 10 & 25c store front windows broken (10:40 PM)
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2023-07-31T19:03:55+00:00
At 10:40 PM, a large display window in Kress' store at 256 West 125th Street broke after being hit by a brick. Patrolman Walter MacKenzie told the Harlem Magistrates Court that he saw William Ford, a seventeen-year-old Black laborer throw the brick, and them allegedly shout, "in a loud tone of voice "Shed white blood, kill the cops, there has been enough black blood shed now." A "very large and threatening crowd" gathered in response to Ford's shouts. By that time the large crowds on 125th Street had been cleared from the street and had broken into smaller groups, many of which scattered north and south up the avenues, but some groups remained. Ten minutes before windows were broken in Kress' store, Claude Jones allegedly threw a rock that broke a window at Blumstein's department store several buildings to to the east, and then called on the people on the street to attack police, drawing a large crowd. Around the same time, a white man named Thomas Wijstem was hit by a rock in front of the W. T. Grant store immediately east of Blumsteins, allegedly while being attacked by a group of Black men.
One or two display windows at the front of Kress' store had been broken earlier, at the beginning of the disorder, as well as more windows at the rear of the store not long after. However, a reporter for the Afro-American wrote that the store "suffered very little loss on the front." Repairs to the front of the store next day appear to have focused on only two sections of the store window, on the right side of the left entrance, in a photograph published in the New York American, and on the left side of the right entrance, where a ladder can be seen in Universal newsreel footage. Those repairs cannot have taken long. A photograph of Kress' store published in the Daily News on March 21 showed intact store windows, guarded by two police officers. A sustained police presence during the disorder appears to have protected the front of the store. Police established a cordon in front of Kress' store from the time it closed; officers were still there around 10 PM, when Detective Henry Roge was hit by a rock while standing in front of the store, and after the windows was broken at 10:40 PM, there were officers able to arrest William Ford. Later in the evening the police cordon extended to cover 125th Street from 8th Avenue to Lenox Avenue, with Kress' store remaining at its center, and as the base for police responding to the disorder. It was also the case that Ford was not alleged to have been trying to incite others to break more windows, as most of the other men arrested for inciting crowds allegedly did, but to attack police.
There is no mention of this specific incident in any newspapers reporting on the disorder. William Ford did appear in the Harlem Magistrates Court, on March 20, but his case was not among those about which the Home News reported details. Eventually sent to the grand jury, Ford was transferred to the Court of Special Sessions to be tried for both the misdemeanor forms of inciting a riot, and malicious mischief, an offense involving damage to property used in the prosecution of those who allegedly broke windows during the disorder. There ws no information on the outcome of that trial; Ford does not appear in the transcript of the 28th Police Precinct blotter that provides outcomes for most of those prosecuted in the Harlem Magistrates Court.
The Kress 5, 10 & 25c store appears in the MCCH business survey taken in the second half of 1935 and was still visible in the Tax Department photograph from 1939-1941.