More than 87 years after a lynching on the Stewart Bridge stoked fury on both sides of the city’s racial divide, local leaders want to give the lynching victim a proper headstone.
On April 20, 1923, James T. Scott, a janitor and World War I veteran, was accused of raping a 14-year-old girl in a wooded area near the bridge. Scott was black, and the rape victim, Regina Almstedt, was white.
Scott insisted he was cleaning up in the University of Missouri Medical Building at the time the rape occurred. No evidence tied him to the crime, other than Almstedt’s identification of him while sitting at a distance on her porch and selection of his voice out of a lineup. But Scott was taken into custody in the county jail and charged with the crime.
About 11 p.m. that night, a mob of nearly 500 men broke into Scott’s cell and dragged him through the streets to the bridge. He was hanged by a rope and, although the prosecuting attorney later filed charges against leaders of the mob, no one was ever convicted of the lynching.
Scott’s trial had been set for less than one month later.
The Rev. Clyde Ruffin, the pastor at Second Baptist Church where Scott was a member, now plans to raise money for a monument at Scott’s burial site. Scott is buried in Columbia Cemetery, in a portion of the cemetery previously reserved for blacks, and the grave is marked only with a small plaque.
“This project will not only serve to bring dignity to the circumstances of his death,” said Ruffin in a written statement, “but also provide an opportunity for the citizens of Columbia to renew their commitment to reconciliation, justice and peace.”
The monument could include genealogical information and details about Scott and the lynching. An inaugural event in support of the project is scheduled for 6 p.m. Nov. 7 at Second Baptist Church, 407 E. Broadway. The event will raise money for the headstone and include performances by the Lincoln University choir and string ensemble and a speech by Patrick Huber, author of “The Lynching of James T. Scott: The Underside of a College Town.”
Doug Hunt, a professor emeritus at MU who has extensively researched the lynching and published an account of it in the Missouri Review, “A Course in Applied Lynching,” hopes the building of the monument will offer a chance for healing.
“When you short-circuit the course of justice, different narratives get continued from that point forward,” Hunt said. “Because there was no closure on this, it has caused discomfort in the community for generations.”
Hunt noted that one of the 18 groups that have agreed to formally endorse the project is the family of Regina Almstedt. Almstedt has two sons who live in St. Louis in addition to other relatives.
On the night of the lynching, Almstedt’s father, Hermann, pleaded with the mob to relent and give Scott a fair trial. Those pleas were ignored. “He always felt that justice should have taken its course,” Hunt said.
Dedication of the monument is planned for April, the month of Scott’s death.