A frontier justice that left me with a lifetime of guilt

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This story is told from the vantage point of a 12 year old Johnny Marsh, looking back at age 74, and include graphic depicts of 

What happened on June 5, 1889, at Third and Fillmore streets, just off the square in Topeka, Kansas, has haunted me my entire life.

My name is Johnny Marsh, in '89, I was 12 years old.

Alphonso Rodgers was the nicest, most generous grocer in town, everyone loved him. He was my neighbor too.

Butch, our half Collie-German Shepherd, was kind of a scraggly looking dog that growled a lot. We would go down to Rodgers Grocery almost everyday to get some lemonade or a candy.

Mrs. Rodgers hated Butch, “Get that mangy thing out of here, he scares off customers.”

Butch liked Mr. Rodgers though, he would give him a bone once in a while that he would gnaw-on across the street.

Mr. Wilson and some other old fellows were usually in back, playing Dominos or Euchre. Wilson was mostly pleasant, but called me 'boy' all the time. The others ignored me.

On June 4, school was out. It was a normal summer day of being a boy. My dad, like most in Topeka, worked for the railroad, always out of town, while mom stayed home. She had supper ready at the usual time, then I went out and played with my buddies 'til it got dark.

That night, there was a ruckus down the street. People were yelling and horses whinny'ing. I put on my pants, scrambled outside and followed the noise. The panic was coming from the Rodger’s home, people were frantic, a few crying. 

Turns out, someone broke into their house and tried to rob them! It was 3 a.m., Mr. Rodgers had been tending to his daughter Rebecca, who was battling whooping cough, when he heard something and ran smack into the burglar in the hall.

They fought, the man had a pistol that quickly went off, hitting Rodgers in the stomach. Both men were wrestling when Mrs. Rodgers joined the fray, grabbing the gun and biting the intruder's hand. The gun went off again with the bullet striking her arm.

Their maid then joined the fracus, and managed to get the gun away from the shooter. The burglar gives up, makes his escape, stealing nothing and shooting two.

Alphonso Rodgers was hurt, bad. A doctor lived across the street, heard the shots and was now leaning over the grocer, shaking his head. My good friend died right there in his hallway as the sheriff galloped up.

The officer, for some reason, thought he knew who the attacker was. It didn't take long to find Nat Oliphant walking the streets sobbing. I know Nat, he wasn’t right.

Nat’s dad worked for the railroad, his mother died of the croup last year. One day his father went to work and just never came back.

The sheriff took Nat to jail where I guess he kept yelling, “I didn’t mean to do it!” The next morning the town was incensed!

Slowly, throughout the day, people kept gathering in front of the jail, some carrying shovels, pick axes and crowbars. Running down in the afternoon, there were so many people I couldn't see anything so I climbed one of the new electricity poles, now eyeing everything.

Mr. Wilson and his friends were front and center, yelling, then forcing their way into the jail. The sheriff and deputies didn’t stand a chance.

Minutes later, 50 men drug Nat out of that jail to the cheers of the crowd. There were now hundreds of people in the town square, men, women and children demanding swift justice.

Roughly, they led poor Nat down the front stairs, Mr. Wilson had a rope. He saw me, walked over to the pole and yelled “here boy!” He flung the rope up and told me to wrap it around the post I was on, make a loop, drop the noose through it and lower it back to him. His orders were exact, almost like he’d done this before.

Years later in touching that rope, I realized it made me into an accomplice.

Before I knew it, they had put the noose around Nat’s neck. Nat looked up at me with a gaze I’ve never seen before or want to see again. He kept on yelling. “but I didn’t mean to do it!”

Nat’s expression was a combination of “mad as hell” and “scared to death.” His last glare at me was mean, he gritted his teeth and growled just as three men hoisted him into the air.

My best friend Luke has an uncle that works at the State penitentiary. When they execute a prisoner they use a trap door that usually breaks their neck. 

Not in Nat's case, he was being strangled to death.

Looking down at the gawking faces staring at Nat, most had their mouths open. Mothers covered their children’s eyes … but they were there.

The pole started to sway and I climbed down, looking at Nat still struggling, his hands were tied behind him and feet shackled.

It affected me in another way, I started crying, bolting through the crowd I ran all the way home.

Once back it hit me, why were all those people there to see that? I really liked Mr. Rodgers too, but was it vengeance, justice or sick entertainment? Whatever it was, it was sickening.

Mark Twain watched a lynching once and was appalled by the onlookers, writing an article about the dehumanizing of society celebrating the event, criticizing his country by calling it the United States of Lyncherdon.

Later in life, I questioned how people could detach themselves from others' pain or trauma. This isn’t new, in the 18th century there would be announcements of guillotine executions in France attracting thousands of chanting and cheering fans. Fans of what, watching others suffer?

You would think this story was about over but you’d be wrong, tune in next week, it takes another bizarre turn, in this case of true frontier justice being stranger than fiction.

As I look back, I’m now 74 years old and full of “the cancer.” Nat Oliphant's lynching has tormented me almost day of my life. One question that leaves me empty, that I can never answer, is on June 5, 1889, where was God?