Dr.
Kerr's Holyroodhouse-type
sanctuary for the Greenwood Blacks at Tulsa's First Presbyterian
Church:
Immediately
upon learning of the Citys invasion and devastation of
Greenwood, Dr. Charles W. Kerr rang his Sexton and told him to
open the First Presbyterian Church in downtown Tulsa as a
sanctuary for all refugee Blacks
-- on the
model of the old Holyroodhouse Sanctuary in Edinburgh.
Dr.
Kerr's Holyroodhouse
sanctuary for
oppressed Greenwood
Blacks
domed
First Presbyterian
Church built in
1911
Seventh
& Boston
on site
of present Kerr
Building
Dr.
Kerr also authorised church funds to be used to feed, cloth, and
care for these Black refugees.
Then, Dr. Kerr rang various Greenwood Pastors and Black
leaders telling them
to spread the word in Greenwood that his church was
a sanctuary which would welcome all who need refuge from
official racial oppression by Tulsa's City Government.
Early
the next morning of Wednesday, 1st June 1921,
still clad in his trademark Prince Albert frock coat,
Dr. Charles W. Kerr went to his First Presbyterian
Church at Seventh and Boston to minister to the many
Greenwood refugees seeking sanctuary from racial persecution by
the City of Tulsa.
These
Black refuges told Dr. Kerr about deliberate atrocities
inflicted upon them by the armed forces of the City of Tulsa
suppressing as city policy a fictional
'Negro Insurrection' in
Greenwood:
Deliberate murder of a pregnant Black wife and mother by Tulsans
'just for meanness' -- 'Magic Empire' Tulsans blew her head off
with a shotgun.
Deliberate murder by Tulsans of
Black parents of small children.
Deliberate arson of Black churches with Black refugees inside by 'specially
commissioned' Tulsa 'Emergency Police Deputies' who shot Black
refugees attempting to leave the burning churches.
Over 15 ,000
Tulsans attack
Greenwood as
City Posse
to
execute city policy
of suppressing non-existent
'Negro Insurrection'
contrived by
City Government
as an
official
lie to clear out
Greenwood for
Tulsa civic
leadership's long-proposed
rail switchyard,
industrial and
warehouse district
Systematic
burning of
Black homes block by block by Tulsa's armed forces 'specially
commissioned' as a City Posse under state law with petrol supplied by the
City Government. See
21 O.S.
§1401.
Tulsa Police 'deputies' preventing firemen from extinguishing
fires in Black-owned property
to insure that such burnt to the ground.
Malicious looting of Black homes by socially prominent Tulsans:
Tulsa social-page 'society women' accompanying their
oilman husbands stole Black people's possessions, clothing, and even underwear before their husbands arsoned these Black homes: What
does this 'say' about Tulsa's oil-wealthy ,
elite, socially-prominent
'high society" ?
part-
2
