Reasons for Hall's testimony against the Wilmington Ten
One of the key witnesses in the case of the Wilmington Ten who later recanted his testimony was Allen Hall, a teenager who exchanged his testimony for a reduced sentence. Nantambu explains how Hall had been involved in the 1971 uprising and how he remembers Golden Frinks playing various factions of both the white and black communities off each other. Nantambu later describes how Hall identified the Ten.
Citing this Excerpt
Oral History Interview with Kojo Nantambu, May 15, 1978. Interview B-0059. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007) in the Southern Oral History Program Collection, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Full Text of the Excerpt
So at the same time, just before school closed, let me tell
you what happened. This dummy, Allen Hall, went out to the school
house--see, I didn't know him then. I might have
met him by that time ...
- LARRY THOMAS:
-
He wasn't at the church with y'all?
- KOJO NANTAMBU:
-
He says he was, but--see, I didn't know him then. I
didn't meet Allen until afterwards. We went to Raleigh one
Saturday to the Justice Department, the Federal Building. The Department
of Civil Rights had a hearing on all the activities going on in North
Carolina. It was like a public tribunal with people participating and
testifying to the conditions in the schools. That's the first
time I saw Allen Hall to know him because he went with us. After that,
Allen went out to Hanover one day--he had no damned business
out there--and got in a fight with a white teacher, hit the
teacher in the head with a bottle. So he took off to D. C. His brother
named Tom--he's the one I told you about moved to
D. C. and took Allen with him. Allen was up there, had a job. Golden was
going to get on national television--you know how he did with
Joanne Little--got on television down here and
. "I told that lady,
'Don't let your son run. Tell him to come on
back.' I'll go and get him." And went up
there and told him to serve his time.
- LARRY THOMAS:
-
He went and got Allen Hall?
- KOJO NANTAMBU:
-
He went and got Allen Hall and told him to come back. So when they
arrested Allen, they put him in jail and they were
going to give Allen something like twelve years. He was going to tell
the brother to come back, the brother went to jail, then he was going to
tell the brother's mother "You ought to make Ben
Chavis get him out. He's going around getting everybody else
out of jail, you ought to make him get him out." His mamma came
to us, man, and said, "I want to know what y'all are
going to do about Allen." We say we ain't going to
do nothing about Allen because we don't know nothing about
Allen. Because, really and truly, Ben wasn't there. Ben
didn't come back for a long time after that because the BYBBC
was taking care of business then. She came around there to us, and I
said, "I'm sorry. Allen went on his on. Allen did
what he did. Nobody tell him to do what he did. We didn't
tell him. We can't get no law for ourselves; we
can't get no law for Allen Hall." So Golden put this
shit in Allen's head. Golden started telling Allen stuff
like, "Well, I wouldn't take that mess. You ought to
make them get you out. You got in this trouble--they getting
everybody else out of jail, you ought to make them get you out.
He's abandoned you. See what they did to you."
- LARRY THOMAS:
-
He was in jail for what?
- KOJO NANTAMBU:
-
. There wasn't nobody there but him. He
was over there trespassing. We didn't send nobody to no
schools to do nothing. He was just over there trespassing. He kept
"Ben and them don't care
nothing about you." But he wasn't working with us.
He hadn't never set foot in the
BYBBC, our headquarters in there. After things happened, Ben started
working directly with us because we were the only vanguard organization
in the community. So that's how that got started. Allen tried
to hang himself, started sending messages saying, "Tell Ben you
got to get me out of here." We told him, "Hey,
brother, we didn't put you in there." Golden even
had some of our people arrested for something they didn't do,
and wouldn't testify to get them out of jail. They took a
truckload of children to the South Center and they went through the
shopping center turning over racks of clothes, overturning
shit--you know, vandalism. SCFC. I said Golden,
didn't I?
- LARRY THOMAS:
-
For what?
- KOJO NANTAMBU:
-
Just protesting.
[OTHER VOICES INDISTINGUISHABLE IN BACKGROUND GIVING DETAILS]
. They went through grocery stores filling up food in baskets and
leaving the baskets, or turning them over. This is why we know that
Golden was working with the city. They had a conspiracy to do away with
the BYBBC.
- LARRY THOMAS:
-
He had to be working with somebody, man. FBI ...
- KOJO NANTAMBU:
-
Of all that happened, the only people that was arrested was two people in
our organization who weren't no where around. Because we were
getting ready to have--I don't know whether it was
a conference or a church meeting or what--but we were in our
office all that day scrubbing and waxing. Hell, the next night,
grandmamma came up to us and came up to us, and
arrested us, and said, "What?"
Arrested them. They said they were at the shopping center with
Golden and those people. And them people
positively identified them, man. And the sister was pregnant. Put on a
thousand dollar bond. Just two people, now. The two people arrested
wasn't even there and didn't even have nothing to
do with it--was in our organization so they could put that in
the paper. The thousand dollar bond we had to pay to get them out. We
told Golden, "Look, man, y'all going to testify.
Tell them people that they weren't down there." The
sister they arrested was pregnant, man. And Golden stood right there
--I started to beat him in the courtroom, see--this
was when me and him split up, not split up, but this was when I just
considered him a common revolutionary nigger that needed to be off.
Right then what he did--the judge told the girl,
"Well, I can see that you get an abortion."
two years in prison. I said, "You
ain't going to see that she gets nothing." I said,
"You ain't going to jail. Come on here,
girl."
- LARRY THOMAS:
-
Who said this, man?
- KOJO NANTAMBU:
-
Judge Burnett. I told you he's a racist dog, man. So the
brother, he was one of my best organizers. They told him he'd
have to leave town. They fixed it up to send him out of town to school
...
- LARRY THOMAS:
-
A restraining action?
- KOJO NANTAMBU:
-
Golden wouldn't testify. I grabbed and knocked his ass on one
of them tables in the courtroom and they didn't even say
nothing, because you know the judge wanted to see us fight anyhow. But I
told him, "Man, I ought to kill you." My cousin was
right along with him. George Kirby was the one
driving the truck and he knows that they weren't on that
truck, and he could have testified to who was there. Even if they
couldn't have testified personally, they could have testified
that they wasn't there.
- LARRY THOMAS:
-
You're opening my head, brother.
- KOJO NANTAMBU:
-
That was one of the main things that made us realize that there was a
conspiracy. Then the federal court took out an injunction against us and
said that nobody--just Algernon Butler issued the
injunction--nowhere in New Hanover County could go anywhere
near the schools during school hours or commit a statement concerning
the schools.
[Laughter].
Do you dig that--could make a statement concerning the
school situation. Anybody known or unknown--that's
how the injunction read--will be arrested in violation of this
injunction and so forth. We found out the day we were in court that
Golden had been threatening the crackers about letting loose some
chickens at the Festival
. The day we were in court one of our spies found out that Golden
received ten or thirty thousand dollars from some white folks, not to
let loose the chickens--which he wasn't going to do
nohow. We found out that the man was on the take and stuff like that.
All that injunction did--and that's why he did all
that--was to handcuff us from doing stuff.
- LARRY THOMAS:
-
Was he jealous of y'all basically, do you think?
- KOJO NANTAMBU:
-
He was sent here to create that dissension and diversion. The first week
of school the ROWP was on the elementary school
campus frightening young brothers and sisters, telling them,
"Don't come back to school Monday." And do
you know did they get arrested? They showed pictures of police right
there watching them. They didn't arrest no damn body. But yet
they were telling us if you go near the schools, they're
going to arrest us. But anyway Golden was responsible for getting Ben
and them arrested. And then Allen being so stupid, man, he's
going to go ahead on and let them people blow his brains out. He let
Golden brainwash him first, making him feel that Ben was responsible
...
- LARRY THOMAS:
-
How pick specifically those Ten?
- KOJO NANTAMBU:
-
They showed their pictures. It was sixteen. That brother that was in
here, he was one of them. They charged him and Ben with conspiracy to
commit murder and murder of Harvey Cumber. Tom Atwood--we call
him now. They dropped the charges on him. All
they wanted was Ben. After they got the Ten, they just dropped the
charges ...
- LARRY THOMAS:
-
Why do you think they wanted Ben so bad?
- KOJO NANTAMBU:
-
To cease his activities in North Carolina and around the country. You
know how that is--shut up all the activists and the militants
and put them in jail and that'll discourage all the other
people from getting involved. And it has in Wilmington. Ain't
nobody want to do nothing--they're scared of going
to jail. But I don't give a damn. After Golden and them did
that, he put all that stuff in Allen's head. It made Allen
hate Ben, and Ben hadn't done nothing
to Allen Hall.