The Summers Clan (or is it Klan?)

Common Sense is not so Common
                                            Voltaire

The Cairo Bulletin, Cairo, Illinois, Wed 1 Sep 1875

Following the battle of Maddox Lane, John Duckworth, shot from his horse, was the first member of the KKK group to be arrested. Then Green Cantrell was captured because his horse with its saddled filled with buckshot was found and recognized. Next was George Proctor, who was captured after his dead horse was identified. Eventually, forty-eight Franklin Co men, involved in the Maddox Lane incident or suspected of being KKK members, were arrested. The list is most interesting.

Thirteen of those arrested had the Summers surname and were descendants of Joseph Summers, born in Kent Co Delaware! And many others who were issued writs had Summers connections. John Duckworth was a son of Cassander Summers. George Proctor would later have a child with Elisha Summers’s daughter, Sarah E., though they were apparently never married. William Plasters Jr. was married to Sarah Collins, a daughter of Martha Summers. Williamson Briley was a son of Rebecca Summers, daughter of Joseph. John Launius, son of the preacher at Mt. Etna Methodist Church, was married to Rebecca Summers, daughter of Alexander, and James Launius was their son. Aiken Plasters Sr. was the husband of Eliza Summers. At least twenty of those arrested were members or in-laws of the Franklin Co Summers family.

And what happened to the captives? An attempt to try them in a Mt. Vernon, Illinois, Federal Commissioners court on charges of conspiracy to prevent citizens from exercising their constitutional rights failed. Even Aaron Neal, the “Grand Master” of the Franklin Co Klan, who was found guilty of the minor charge of disturbing the peace in a Benton, Illinois, trial, was never punished. But, though the conspirators went free, the power of the KKK in Franklin Co was broken, at least until the 1920s when it reemerged throughout Southern and Central Illinois. But that’s another story, and we hope one that doesn’t involve Summerses.

On 10 Oct 1875, John Duckworth, who nearly lost his life at Maddox Lane, married his second cousin, Elizabeth Ann Summers, and then immediately left Illinois. A St. Louis newspaper story of the 15 Jan 1876 Benton, Illinois, trial of Aaron Neal, the “reputed captain of the Ku-klux klan,” for his role in the Maddox Lane incident stated

"A much stronger case could have been made for the people but for the absence of Jacobs and Duckworth, the chief prosecuting witnesses. The whereabouts of the last named gentlemen is not exactly known, but it is thought they are traveling for their health.”

John and Elizabeth Duckworth in Kentucky, c1935.

Like John Duckworth, William Washington Jacobs, a participant in the Maddox Lane incident, had been an informant, claiming that he had joined the Klan only to expose its activities. Jacobs and Duckworth were certainly “traveling for their health.” They had made enemies not only due to their KKK connection, but also because they had squealed. They had antagonized both sides.

John and Elizabeth first fled to Posey Co, Indiana, where the Duckworths had lived before moving to Franklin Co. But then traveled on to Union Co, Kentucky. John Duckworth died in Henderson Co, Kentucky, 10 Oct 1938. Jacobs and his wife headed to Perry Co, Illinois, where he died 3 May 1921.

And that’s our final blog about the KKK of Franklin Co. It is planned and hoped that future tales of the Delaware Summers will be much more favorable.