Illinois: Nigger, Go Home

The dingy Douglas Hotel in the slums of Chicago’s South Side was home to the no Negro men, women and children who rented its rooms and apartments for $7.50 a week and up. In one of those apartments late one afternoon last week a fire broke out and swiftly spread. The Douglas tenants scrambled down rickety fire escapes, stood outside dazed and weeping—and counting themselves lucky to be alive. But their troubles had only begun.

Checking a list of available shelters, Red Cross officials decided on the Holy Cross Lutheran Church, two miles away from the fire scene in an allwhite, lower-middle-income neighborhood that has long feared and fought encroachment by Chicago’s growing Negro population. As the first busload of Negroes arrived outside the church, a handful of white teen-agers began to chant: “Nigger, nigger, nigger—go back to your neighborhood.”

More Negroes arrived, and the crowd of whites began to grow until it surrounded the church. Inside, Mrs. Albert H. Constien, wife of the pastor, answered the phone and heard an anonymous voice say: “If you don’t get those niggers out of that church, we’ll blow it up.” The mob swelled to 350. Down in the basement, the Negroes could hear every bitter shout: “Nigger, nigger, go home,” and “Nigger lovers never go to heaven,” and “We’ll rock you out,” and “Get the niggers out of there.”

A score of Chicago cops stood placidly by, making no effort to break up the threatening mob. As the crowd grew angrier, Pastor Constien and his wife had mixed thoughts. Said she afterwards: “We were asked to help those people. That’s why the Lord put us here.” But Constien feared for the safety of his church, which had recently been redecorated to celebrate its 75th anniversary. He asked the Red Cross to evacuate the Negroes “because of the property involved.” The Negroes walked to Red Cross station wagons through volleys of oranges, apples and eggs, and were taken to Negro churches several miles away.