Smith County Jail, Tyler, TX, Built In 1881
1890 - WE REMEMBER JOHN AMBROSE
On Thursday, March 13, 1890, the Brenham Weekly Banner reported the lynching of a Black man in Tyler, Texas.
The article read, “John Ambrose, colored, was being carried from the jail to the new courthouse at Tyler to be tried on a charge of attempted outrageous assault on a young lady, Frank Perry, the young lady's brother, and J. J. Hamilton, her cousin, intercepted the officer and killed the negro.”
Further research led to an account in the Texas Christian Advocate reading, “While the Sheriff was taking John Ambrose, a negro charged with assault upon a young lady, into court, at Tyler, the lady's brother, Frank Perry, shot the negro five times, killing him.”
Perry acted as judge, jury, and executioner of Ambrose.
“Southern lynching took on an even more racialized character after the Civil War. The act and threat of lynching became “primarily a technique of enforcing racial exploitation—economic, political, and cultural.”
Source:
Brenham Weekly Banner, March 13, 1890
Texas Christian Advocate, March 13, 1890
