Son seeks closure in father’s 1964 Mississippi slaying

Jerry Mitchell

LIBERTY, Miss. — Henry Allen has been waiting for justice since he found his father’s cold body beneath a logging truck one winter night in 1964.
He’s still waiting.

Standing on the same ground where his father took his last breath, the 62-year-old son of Louis Allen pointed to the concrete culvert where he believes the assassin crouched.

“A cowardly bastard laid out in the bushes and stole his life like a rabbit,” he said.

He believes that killer is still walking the streets of this community.

“Why is it that God let that no-good bastard live to see his grandchildren?” he asked. “My daddy ain’t bothered nobody, went to the Army, fought in World War II and come home and died right here at his house, all because nobody could run over him.”

Louis Allen was a marksman in the war and helped haul ammunition to the front lines of battles that took place on New Guinea and other Pacific islands.

When the Army drafted him, he and his wife, Elizabeth, already had a son — the first of four children.

“My mama told me that was the first time she ever seen him cry because he didn’t want to leave his family,” the younger Allen said.

Louis Allen survived the war, only to face his own battles when he returned to Mississippi.

On Sept. 25, 1961, he witnessed the killing of fellow African American Herbert Lee, who was involved in the civil rights movement. Then-state Rep. E.H. Hurst insisted he shot Lee in self-defense.

Henry Allen said his father related how, after Hurst shot Lee, Hurst threw a tire tool on the ground and remarked, “Didn’t y’all see that n----- try to hit me? You seen him, didn’t you, coming at me with a tire tool?”

Louis Allen told the FBI that he had seen Hurst kill Lee in cold blood. Hurst since has died.

Word spread about his cooperation with the FBI. Businesses stopped buying his logs and selling him gas.

On June 30, 1962, deputy Daniel Jones handcuffed him. “All my daddy asked was, ‘Can I have my hat?’ He said, ‘No, you cannot have the hat.’ Then daddy said, ‘Well, can my son bring me my hat?’”

Henry Allen said Jones remarked, “Hell, no, get in the damn car.”

He said Jones struck his father with a flashlight, breaking his left jawbone. Louis Allen later sued Jones, alleging he had been assaulted, but the lawsuit eventually was dismissed.

When reached for comment, Jones would not talk about the matter or the case.

“Just take your information and write your story,” he said. “I’m not going to discuss it with you.”

Despite his broken jaw, Louis Allen went with others to the Amite County Courthouse a month later to register to vote. A shot was fired, and they were turned away.

FBI documents call Jones a “suspected Klan member” — an accusation Jones didn’t deny when the FBI interviewed him recently.

In November 1963, Jones arrested Louis Allen again, this time on charges of writing a bad check and carrying a concealed weapon.

About this time, Henry Allen said, a friendly white businessman visited and told his father, “Louis, the best thing you can do is leave. Your little family, they’re innocent people, and your house could get burned down. All of you could get killed.”

Convinced it was no longer safe for him and his family to stay, Louis Allen made plans for the family to move to Milwaukee, where his brother already lived.

On Jan. 31, 1964 — what he had planned to be his last night in Mississippi — Louis Allen was returning home in his logging truck about 8:30 p.m.

He got out of his truck to unhook the gate when gunfire rang out.

“The shots came from there,” Henry Allen said, pointing. “Two of his fingers got shot off.”

His father then tried to hide from his assassin under his log truck, Henry Allen said.

He doesn’t know if there were one or two killers that night, but whoever was responsible walked up and fired two final blasts.

About 11 p.m., Henry Allen arrived at home in his ’54 DeSoto with his cousin, John Horton.

He knew something was wrong. His father’s truck was blocking the drive, and the headlights were half dim.

He called out first for his father and then searched around the truck before stepping on his father’s hand. A flashlight confirmed the grisly discovery — a hand hiding the damage done by a fatal shotgun blast to the head.

When he started to move his father to take him to the hospital, his cousin told him to get the law first. They drove to the nearest law they knew — Jones, who was now sheriff.

Henry Allen sped to Jones’ house and told him, “Daddy looks like he’s shot, and I want to get him to the hospital.”

“You think he’s dead?” he said the sheriff replied.
“I hope not,” he said he responded.

He said he heard Jones pumping his shotgun before following them to the scene of the crime.

On the way back, Henry Allen floored his DeSoto, hitting 85 mph.

His cousin warned him not to go so fast because they’d get a ticket. “The hell with that,” he said. “I’m not stopping until I get to Daddy.”

After the sheriff arrived, Henry Allen held the flashlight so he could study the crime scene.

“He took everything out of the wallet,” he said. “When he got to the NAACP card, he looked at me and then looked back down. He said, ‘Let me see if I can find something that caused the problem.’”

The sheriff kept the wallet and later returned it with all the money, he said. “The NAACP card — he kept that.”

He said the sheriff told him at the scene: “Whatever you tell the FBI, you make sure you tell me first. You see, I’m the one investigating this case. There’s nothing the FBI can do unless you tell me first.”

Henry Allen said he thought at the time: “I might be young, but I’m not that big of a fool.”

The same day he buried his father, he said his mother made him leave Mississippi because of threats. The family sold their eight-acre tract on Huckleberry Hill.

Since that day, Henry Allen, who now lives in Louisiana near Baton Rouge, has yearned for justice.

“My mother never got over it, and I’m still hurt,” he said. “It ripped my whole family apart.”

He’s been told to leave his father’s case alone, that it’s been too long.

“It’s been too long, all right,” he said. “It’s been 43 years too long.”

(The Clarion-Ledger of Jackson, Miss.)