On February 6th 1863, William Faulkner was arrested for the molestation of white nine-year old girl by the name of Mary Brown. According to Mary and Ellen Hoover, a friend of the young girl who was also the same age, they were walking to Michigan Avenue to mail a letter. En route, the two passed Faulkner’s bar and were coerced into coming inside, where Mary was allegedly assaulted. A crime of this nature already arises an outraged and disgusted response. However, the response was made worse by innacuries published in the Detroit Free Press. For example, the Free Press in addition to charging Faulkner as a rapist also charged him with the crime of being black. Although, Faulkner claims that he was of the Mestizo race, meaning he was of both Spanish and Indian blood.
It is worth noting that Faulkner denied all allegations and claimed that the charges brought upon him
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The trial ended rather quickly after jurors found Faulkner guilty within ten minutes of deliberating. Seeing as how, at this time Detroit had no actual police force, people feared that an attempt to lynch Faulkner would be made. Thus, it was the role of the court to safely escort him to the county jail. As the men attempted to walk towards the jail, Faulkner and his (detail/escorts) were attacked with rocks and variety of heavy objects. The attack was so violent that Lieutenant Van Stan ordered his man to halt and to shoot blanks into the crowds. The violence continued thus live ammunition was shot into the crowd. Resuntantly, a white bystander was shot and killed. From his death erupted, what the Free Press would later regard as the “bloodiest day that ever dawned upon Detroit” where a mob of white men took to burning down entire black neighborhoods, leaving a multitude of black civilians homeless. Throughout the three days of the riot, no attempt was made to stop the