Lynching of five Sicilian shopkeepers in Tallulah, Louisiana

Background. Tallulah had historically been a center of agriculture since the antebellum years, producing cotton and pecans, and the town and its parish have long had majority-African American populations. By 1899, five Sicilians were doing business in Tallulah, with four small stores devoted to fruit, vegetables and poultry. As general context, anti-Italian sentiment arose among some Americans as an effect of large-scale Italian immigration to the United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries; no supplied passage ties this general sentiment to the Tallulah lynching as a documented cause.

The Lynching. On July 20, 1899, a mob of white residents of Tallulah lynched the five Sicilians from Cefalù. The victims were still citizens (nationals) of Italy, and their government protested strongly to the United States government about each lynching murder. A conflicting secondary account of anti-Italian sentiment describes three Italian-American shopkeepers lynched in Tallulah in 1899 because they had treated Black customers the same as whites; it differs from the Tallulah account in victim count and stated motive and cannot be merged with it as a settled cause.

Legal and Diplomatic Aftermath. None of the white lynch mob was prosecuted, which the source describes as typical in a period of frequent lynchings of Black US citizens. The Italian government protested strongly to the United States government about each lynching murder. A July 1899 Harper's Magazine item titled "Tallulah's Shame" appears in the source's references; its content is not described in the supplied passages.