Pioneer Black Lawyers Season 4 Episode 10

By W. F. Twyman, Jr.

Good morning from San Diego! We know San Diego is sunny but they never tell you about the chill. And man, oh man, it is chilly this morning. I have a warm Bishop’s School blanket on my lap, a Willamette University DAD mug to my left, and Freedom’s Lawmakers by Eric Foner to my right. To complete the mood, I am listening to Alone Again Naturally by Gilbert O’Sullivan.

Since 2021 and the moral panic of George Floyd which was much ado about nothing, I have thrown myself into the world of pioneer black lawyers every Black History Month. I do so because I know people are individuals. People are not avatars for a group. The ways in which babies come of age into adulthood, middle age and pass away intrigues me as a curious person. Lawyers are intelligent by and large. Pioneers are courageous types who live beyond group think. And Blackness is supposed to be Oppression. Nothing else matters.

What would I find as I peered into the evil past? Would I find humanity, human dignity? Would I relish a buffet of personalities and contradictions, corruptions and nobilities in the extreme? Yes, yes, yes, and yes. I can think of no better and apt introduction for today’s pioneer black lawyer than the gift of non-conformity in dangerous times of race. I present today an enigma, a pioneer lawyer whom I cannot figure out, who repels the very notion of a racial box. Read not about a caricature. Inhale no more stereotypes. Relax and consider the life of one John D. Webster (1841 - 1887).

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How do I begin this story of a life? Well, let’s start from the beginning.

Born in Virginia like me, John D. Webster came into the world not in 1961 but 1841. And that is a world of difference for those who see no difference between the world of today and the world of American slavery. Between 1841 and the Civil War, the record is silent on Webster.

The 1860s

The transforming event of a generation was the American Civil War (1861 - 1865). There was an America before the War. There was a different America after the War. Query how the current decade, the 2020s, will be viewed by our grandchildren and our grandchildren’s grandchildren in the year 2100. Will they perceive an America before the 2020s and an America after the 2020s? Time will tell.

Webster rose to the cause of his time. He served in the 54th Massachusetts Regiment and mustered out as a quarter-master sergeant.

In 1869, Webster came to Mississippi in search of opportunity. All pioneer black lawyers were ambitious in this way. Webster came to Greenville “as a jailor for Sheriff Webber…but served only a short while…”

The 1870s

More important than oppression is the tenor of one’s age, the destiny of one’s time. Generations are always shaped by unique circumstances. I am a unique creation of the 1970s, life on the ascent in a southern small-town suburb. Urban life as a transformative imprint is alien to me. Same goes for my uncles, aunts, cousins, neighbors and friends who called Chesterfield County, Virginia home in the 1970s.

Similarly, living in Washington County, Mississippi in the 1870s altered and shaped Webster’s world of the possible. How could it be otherwise?

So, I invite you to leave the diversity training at the doorstep this morning. Answer my prayer. Accept John D. Webster on his own terms as a man.

A literate man who earned a living as a building contractor, Webster came to the attention of leading citizens in Washington County. In 1871, he was appointed Clerk of the Circuit Court in the county. Webster excelled in this position. Indeed, it was said Webster was “one of the best clerks in Mississippi.” Webster was just revving up his reputation. A year later, Webster represented Mississippi at the 1872 Colored Convention.

In 1872 to 1873, Webster served in the Mississippi State House of Representatives. Observers knew an up and comer when they saw one. And John D. Webster was that guy. A commentator at the time wrote of Webster:

His great ambition is to be a leader in the House…a good mind, analyzes a subject carefully, and detects a flaw very quickly. When he speaks he is very nervous, and his forefinger — which is always outstretched, while the others are doubled up — trembles like a limb of a tree before an angry wind. His lips also quiver, and a person can readily discover that his feelings are worked up to a high pitch. He is rather tall in stature, brown complexion, has a butting head, and a pleasant countenance.

Befitting a man of ambition, Webster studied law and was admitted to the Mississippi Bar of Washington County as of March 27, 1873. Webster was destined for great things in Washington County, if not the state of Mississippi.

Then defeat entered Webster’s life for the first time on the public stage.

In 1873, Thomas W. Cardozo defeated Webster in a race for the Republican nomination for State Superintendent of Education. Webster switched gears. He ran for the post on a ticket headed by James L. Alcorn and supported by modern Republicans and Democrats. Cardozo sailed to victory in the general election and served as Superintendent of Education from 1874 to 1876.

At this point, Webster becomes unpredictable in my eyes.

On or about August 17, 1875, picture this scene in the sleepy town of Greenville. Black Brigadier General and State Senator William H. Gray has been talking smack about white people. From his several Baptist pulpits, Pastor Gray has spoken his mind — Gov. Ames would send him (Gray) two thousand stand of arms, and that under his (Gray’s) orders his soldiers could murder every white man, woman and child in the county. This is not some deranged post on Tik Tok in 2024. These are dangerous racial times in 1875 in Washington County, Mississippi.

On the following Tuesday, this same Brigadier General and man of the cloth stepped into a store owned by the Brill Brothers. The Brills were white. They knew Gray. Gray and a Brill got into an argument. Brill refused to sell Gray a suit of clothes on credit. Things were heating up in the store. None other than Webster accompanied Gray into the Brill store. It was clearly a set up of some type. Sensing the tension in the store, Gray sent an order for his pal, Ross, playing cards at a local saloon, to come hurry to the Brill store. The white people “were imposing on (Gray).”

Shots were fired!

Ross shot at Brill and missed. Brill shot Ross in the nose and blinded Ross. Ross shot wildly at the ceiling, here, there and everywhere. Someone shot Ross in the neck. Ross was shot again in the shoulder. Gray and Ross ran for their lives out of the store! It is said no bullet could have caught Gray on the run. Ross ran to his home and to his bed.

And what about our pioneer black lawyer?

Webster was arrested and tried for assault with intent to kill Brill. Webster beat the rap, although the evidence clearly showed he (1) aided and abetted Gray’s attack on Brill, and (2) urged Gray to resist arrest.

The newspapers duly noted racial tensions in town — “the citizens are armed, organized and resolved.”

Now here is the thing — the previous Saturday, the Republicans of Washington County assembled at the courthouse in a mass convention. And Webster addressed the group and the following resolution was reached:

Resolved, That we, the Republicans of Washington County, are opposed to anything that looks like drawing the Color Line in politics: that we regard it as destructive to the interest and prosperity of both races, and also of the State.”

Two years later, Webster switched parties. In 1877, he ran as a candidate for the Democratic nomination for Mississippi Secretary of State. He received the second highest number of votes but lost nonetheless.

On August 2, 1877, Webster attended the Democratic Convention where he declared for the record “He was also satisfied that the white people of the South are the true friends of the Negro, and will stand to him.” Not sure that sentiment aged well.

Webster continued his work as a building contractor. The following is an ad he placed for work in the Weekly Democrat-Times: BRICK WORK done on short notice, and upon most reasonable terms. Cisterns built and warranted for one year. Orders left at the office of N.B. Johnson & Co., will receive prompt attention. JOHN D. WEBSTER, Sept. 8, 1877

The 1880s

By 1880, Webster was living in Greenville with his wife, Addie, and their two daughters, Blanchie and Bessie.

Where was Webster’s mind when it came to race in the 1880s? You tell me.

On August 19, 1884, Webster represented a black young man charged with the assault and battery of Rachel (over 50 years old). I do not know the facts of the case. Nor do I have mastery of the context. I will share with you what Webster said in his argument to the jury:

I tell you, would to God we had a thousand young men like this boy. He ought to have armed himself with a Winchester rifle and gone and cowhided this woman. For oppression to the innocent, God has already caused a portion of this town to cave in the river; and if you gentlemen of the jury, would find this boy guilty, the people, as I believe they will, ought to sweep the rest of it from the face of the earth, like God did Sodom and Gomorrah.

On October 22, 1884, Webster pulled no punches in condemning the incompetence of a black congressional candidate. It would be nice to have a black man in Congress but competence mattered more — “Pearce is profoundly ignorant, imprudent and vain glorious, and is without a single qualification as the Representative of the District in Congress.”

On October 31, 1884, the newspapers listed John D. Webster as a “colored Republican.”

On March 7, 1885, the newspaper referred to Webster as “a prominent colored attorney from the Greenville bar.”

I think Webster was getting up in years as the 1880s drew to a close. He had seen it all and had no time for non-sense. Life was short, so say it like it is.

On December 27, 1887 and during Christmas time, John D. Webster left this world. Life wrote Webster’s obituary —

He was prominent in all the societies, and his body was followed to the grave by a very large procession of fraternities and of citizens. He came here as a jailor for Sheriff Webber, in 1869, but served only a short while, and began to practice law, which he followed to the time of his death.”

Conclusion: No unifying theory can explain all of John D. Webster. At best, we are left with the essence of a man. He came to Greenville as a jailor, knew the feeling of being arrested and tried, and defended criminal defendants. It was not his destiny to hold statewide office in Mississippi.

It was his fate to live life, to know victory and defeat, and to pass away remembered by those whom he touched in life.

City Clerk’s Office, Greenville, Mississippi