The Hillsborough Recorder

THE NEGRO RIOTS IN MEMPHIS.

The Memphis Avalanche of May 2d, gives a detailed account of the commencement of the riots in that city. It says:

The terrible state of affairs between the white and black races, which the teachings of the radical extremists to the negro have caused the fear of, almost since the cessation of hostilities, commenced in our city about 6 o'clock yesterday, in a serious and fatal earnest. "The war began on South street, in the extreme southern portion of the corporation. It originated from a difficulty between a white and negro boy, near the bridge over the bayou, on the street already mentioned. These juveniles had come to blows, and officers O'Neil and Stephens, of the police, on discovering it, started for the bridge to separate the parties, when a crowd of fifteen or twenty grown up negroes, armed with pistols, simultaneously started for the same point. Two other policemen, whose names we could not learn, from an adjoining beat, also having seen the bridge affair, came up about the time that O'Neil and Stephens reached the place.

The negroes immediately surrounded the police and commenced an unprovoked assault upon them with pistol shots. Officer Stephens was here wounded severely in the thigh, felling him to the ground. O'Neil and the other policemen then commenced defending themselves, and promptly returned the shots of the negroes who had encircled them, and succeeded in driving the entire party some distance back.

In a few moments the black crowd became augmented considerably, and recommenced their devil's work by firing at every white person they could see, whether policeman or not. Mr. James Finn, a harmless citizen, who happened to be in sight at this time, was shot by them, the ball taking effect in the small of his back, and inflicting a most painful if not dangerous injury. The negroes then renewed the attack upon officer O'Neil and party, overwhelming and driving them back.

Information was dispatched to the station house immediately of the condition of affairs in South Memphis, and a force of fifty policemen was sent without delay. Before they arrived, however, the life of Mr. Henry Dunn, engineer of steam fire engine No 2, was most fiendishly taken by the infuriated demons. He was shot through the head, the ball passing from the base of the brain through the forehead.

When the fifty policemen, who had been dispatched to assist in putting down the rioters, reached Elliott street, a negro man started out from some nook, or hiding place, and set off at a run. Some one cried to them that "there goes the negro who shot Stephens," and they gave pursuit, but made no attempt to shoot him. During the race he carried a Colt's navy in his hand. As he reached South street the officer shouted to him to halt and surrender; finding that he took no heed, they fired on him, bringing him down with two balls, from the injuries of which he lived but a short time. The negroes, by this, had again summoned themselves for the rencounter, and were firing on the police, from different places, at a fearfully lively rate.

A negro was shot on Avery street, and two were severely wounded from among those in the cabins. At this time, when the bloodshed and riot was at its height, a detachment of regular troops was sent down to the riotous district, to aid in suppressing the disturbance, which they did, to some considerable extent, though they used no light persuasion in the matter, as the battered up condition of many of the negroes afterwards sent to the station house exhibited.

At midnight the riot had been suppressed for the day, and all became quiet." Ten negroes had been killed and about as many wounded.