Pickens County Courthouse (Alabama)
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Pickens County Courthouse
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| Location | Carrollton, Alabama |
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| Coordinates | 33°15′42.37″N 88°5′42.31″W / 33.2617694°N 88.0950861°WCoordinates: 33°15′42.37″N 88°5′42.31″W / 33.2617694°N 88.0950861°W |
| Built | 1877 |
| Architectural style | Italianate |
| NRHP Reference # | 94000441 |
| Significant dates | |
| Added to NRHP | May 19, 1994 |
| Designated ARLH | July 23, 1976 |
The Pickens County Courthouse in the county seat of Carrollton, Alabama is the courthouse for Pickens County, Alabama. It is famous for a ghostly image that can be seen in one of its garrett windows, claimed to be that of freedman Henry Wells.
According to a common version of myth, Wells was arrested for burglary and arson, and lynched by a mob after his arrest. He was alleged to have burned down the second courthouse in 1876 (built to replace one destroyed by Union forces during the Civil War). By 1878 this third courthouse was completed, although the windows were not installed until February through March. The courthouse was rebuilt.
This time period was one of volatile social tensions. In 1877, the federal government ended Reconstruction and withdrew its troops from the South. White Democrats had regained control of state legislatures and passed measures to impose white supremacy. Wells was arrested in January 1878 and charged with the courthouse burning two years before. He was held in the new courthouse garret. He was taken out and lynched by a white mob before receiving any trial.
Historic sources say that Wells died of wounds after being shot while fleeing arrest in January 1878. But other freedmen were lynched at or near the courthouse, including four black men and a woman shot and killed in their cells in September 1893.
The story of the appearance of the face in the courthouse window seems to have been a conflation through myth of two historic events, that of the lynching of Nathaniel Pierce, and that of the arrest and shooting of Henry Wells, who later confessed to burning down the courthouse,, likely under coercion, and died of his wounds. White guilt over the lynching may have contributed to the account of Wells cursing the town and threatening they would be haunted by him.
This period was one of turmoil, as the federal government was withdrawing the last of its troops from the south, formally ending Reconstruction. White Democrats had already regained control of the state legislature and on the local level, white minorities used racial violence to impose and maintain white supremacy. As the 19th century progressed, the rate of lynchings rose, mostly directed at black men.
According to the West Alabamian, which was Carrollton's only newspaper at the time of the events, Nathaniel Pierce was being held on charges of murder when, on September 26, 1877, an armed mob forced their way into the jail where he was being held, took him outside the city, and lynched him. There was no indication that Pierce’s lynching had anything to do with the burning of the courthouse.
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