Charles Hamilton Houston and the Crawford Case
The Loudoun County Courthouse Is Center Stage
By Mitch Diamond
In 1932 , Loudoun County was a sleepy rural place . There were small upscale equestrian communities around Middleburg , Upperville , and Leesburg , but for the most part , Loudoun was sparsely populated by farmers and small tradespeople and its economy based on agriculture – mostly dairy and beef cattle plus wheat , corn and hay . The railroad still ran from Washington out to Leesburg and Purcellville and back every day carrying a few passengers and fresh milk for the processing plants in Washington . Most of the roads were dirt , except for some paved roads in the towns and improved two lane paved roads .
The population of 19,800 in 1932 was actually lower than it had been a hundred years earlier , and the African American share of that population had shrunk from nearly 25 percent to less than 10 percent , in part due to the growing mechanization of agriculture and out-migration of small farmers and their families .
The community was strictly segregated despite earlier efforts by black mutual aid societies to challenge discriminatory practices in Loudoun . African Americans did not attend school with whites , serve on juries , or eat or live in the same places . When African American people took the train , they
had to wait in a separate room , use separate restrooms , and sit in separate sections of the small train . Restrictions on voting meant there were very few African American voters in the County . The very first secondary school for African Americans in Loudoun County had been set up in Leesburg in 1930 , but the first accredited high school for African Americans was more than a decade away . The first modern-day African American physician in Loudoun established his practice in Leesburg in 1933 . Yet no African American attorney had ever practiced in the Loudoun County Court , and there is no record of any African American sitting as a juror . But as Loudoun
Charles Hamilton Houston
Photo : CourtesyScurlock Studio Records , Archives Center , National Museum of American History , Smithsonian Institution suffered through the Depression years , things began to change .
In 1933 , Loudoun County and its Courthouse became the center of the newly emerging struggle for equal justice and civil rights in the United States . The foremost African American attorney in the nation , Charles Hamilton Houston , led the first all-black legal team in a major case in a southern courthouse , challenging the segregated process for jury selection while cross examining prominent white officials . In this first ever major case conducted by African American attorneys in the South , the defendant was saved from almost certain death , the biased jury selection process was clearly exposed , laying the groundwork for a major U . S . Supreme Court case a few years later , and an entire generation of civil rights attorneys , including Howard University Law School ’ s two leading students , Thurgood Marshall and Oliver Hill , were inspired to pursue their illustrious careers .
The Situation
In January 1932 , a black man , George Crawford , was accused of murdering a Middleburg socialite , Agnes Ilsley , and her maid Mina Buckner , both white – and things began to change . The case resounded throughout the nation , was widely reported in the news of the day , involved the Federal Courts in Boston and the U . S . Supreme Court , led to calls for the impeachment of a Federal judge , and was a critical early opening to the modern era of civil rights jurisprudence .
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14 wander I spring • summer 2023