Frank Morris was 51 years old when Klansmen torched his shoe shop in Ferriday, LA, on December 10, 1964. He had been sleeping in a back room when he was awakened after midnight by the sound of breaking glass. Outside the front of the shop, he observed two men. One held a shotgun, the other an empty gas can.
Suddenly, one of the men ignited the gasoline that had been poured inside the shop. Morris attempted to escape the flames through the front door but the man with the shotgun pointed the barrel at Morris’ head and told him to remain inside. Making his way through the inferno and out a back door, he was picked by two Ferriday police officers passing by in their patrol car and rushed to the Concordia Parish hospital. Morris was naked. The fire had burned the clothing off his body.
An FBI agent arrived at the hospital hours later and took several statements from Morris, who was heavily sedated and often incoherent. He said he did not recognize the men who attacked him. Four days after the fire, Morris died.
The FBI investigated the case during the 1960s and again beginning in 2007. Several suspects were identified during the 1960s and in 2011, as a result of reporting by the Concordia Sentinel, a new suspect was named. A month after the article was published a grand jury was called, but took no action. No one was ever arrested for the murder.
Morris was popular in both the black and white communities in Ferriday, a poor town where many families depended on him to keep their shoes in good repair. Klan and police-inspired rumors circulated about Morris, including that he was allowing white women and black men to have sexual liaisons in the back of his shop. But that allegation was untrue.
The true motive appears to be a simple one. Morris had argued with Frank DeLaughter, a Concordia Parish sheriff’s deputy and Klansmen, a short time before the arson. Statements given by two men in the 1960s indicated that Morris had refused to provide DeLaughter any more credit for shoe repair or for the purchase of shoes because the deputy refused to pay his bills. Furious, DeLaughter would tell Coonie Poissot, one of the suspects revealed by the Concordia Sentinel, that DeLaughter had told Poissot that Morris had acted “uppity” and that he (DeLaughter) was going to teach Morris a lesson.
In 2011, the Concordia Sentinel reported that family members of Arthur Leonard Spencer of Rayville, LA, alleged that Spencer and Poissot were the arsonists. The family members said both had confessed years earlier in separate conversation. Poissot was dead by 2011, but Spencer, who is also now dead, denied the allegations that he was involved in the arson.
Coonie Poissot, pictured here two years prior to the 1964 Frank Morris arson, told FBI agents in 1967 that Deputy Frank DeLaughter planned to teach Morris a lesson, due to an argument between Morris and DeLaughter over a DeLaughter’s habit of not paying his shoe repair bills. Poissot was later implicated in the arson by family members of Leonard Spencer, who they also implicated in the attack. (FBI file photo)Tommy Lee Jones of Natchez took part in several Klan wrecking crew projects and was a suspect in the Frank Morris murder. He was shot in the face by James White in Concordia Parish when Jones and other Klansmen attempted to kidnap White following unfounded rumors that White was a Black Muslim.This 1950s photo shows William Garnett posing for a photo in front of Frank Morris’ shoe shop in Ferriday. (Photo courtesy Concordia Sentinel)The ruins of Frank Morris’ shoe shop. (Photo courtesy Concordia Sentinel/August Thompson)Even though Ferriday Klan leader E. D. Morace was a suspect in the Frank Morris arson murder, he would become a reliable FBI informant. Morace told the FBI, while working as an informant, that Morris had argued with Deputy Frank DeLaughter over a pair of cowboys boots and because of DeLaughter’s failure to pay Morris past due bills. A witness who owned the Ferriday radio station told the FBI the same thing – specifying that the argument was over a child’s pair of cowboy boots.The foundation of Frank Morris’ shoe shop in Ferriday remains almost six decades after the 1964 arson that took his life. The site is now visited by people from through the world. Here, a film crew from Czechoslovakia interviews Stanley Nelson, then the editor of the Concordia Sentinel, who is standing on the foundation of the shop. (Photo courtesy Concordia Sentinel)Leonard Spencer (left), whose family members said he confessed to involvement in the Frank Morris arson, is interviewed by Concordia Sentinel editor Stanley Nelson in 2010. Spencer denied the allegations. Nelson is associate director of the LSU Cold Case Project. (Photo courtesy David Paperny)James White was one of Frank Morris’ best friends. He visited Morris in the hospital in Ferriday after Morris was fatally wounded during the arson of his shop. White also worked out of Morris’ shop at times selling custom-fitting men’s suits. A few months before the Morris arson, White was attacked at home by Klansmen who attempted to kidnap him. He shot one of the Klansmen in the face with a shotgun. The injured Klansmen was treated by a Mississippi doctor during the dead of night. (Photo courtesy Concordia Sentinel)James L. Scarborough, a Ferriday Klansman who was preparing for a race war during the 1960s, was a suspect in the arson of Morris’ shop. (FBI file photo)In Ferriday 1962, the Sevier High band led the homecoming parade. The building shown at far left was Frank Morris’ shoe shop.Frank Morris (center, wearing visor and apron) is shown with his employees and friends in front of his shoe shop in the early 1950s. On December 10, 1964, he was murdered by Klansmen who set Morris’ shop on fire while he was still in the building. (Photo courtesy Concordia Sentinel/William Brown)Frank Morris (learning against door) watches the Sevier High homecoming parade in November 1964, one month before his murder. Standing beside him was one of his best friends – James White. (Photo from Ferriday Pictorial History Facebook site)For two decades up until his murder in 1964, Frank Morris was a regular advertiser in the Concordia Sentinel in Ferriday.FBI agent Paul Lancaster, pictured here in 2009, received a call during the early morning hours of December 10, 1964, that a Black businessman in Ferriday had been severely wounded in the arson of his shoe shop. Lancaster raced from Alexandria, LA, to the hospital in Ferriday where he interviewed Frank Morris, who was heavily sedated and dying from burns suffered during the arson. Morris told Lancaster that he could not identify the two men who torch the building. (Photo courtesy Concordia Sentinel)Father August Thompson visited Frank Morris twice in the Concordia Parish Hospital before Morris died as a result of severe burns suffered from the arson of his shoe shop in Ferriday, LA, in 1964. On one visit, Thompson and a white priest asked Morris who had attacked him, but Morris did not answer. Thompson also took a photo of Morris during his final hours to preserve an image of the brutal and senseless attack by Klansmen. (Photo courtesy Concordia Sentinel)Even though Ferriday Klan leader E. D. Morace was a suspect in the Frank Morris arson murder, he would become a reliable FBI informant. Morace told the FBI, while working as an informant, that Morris had argued with Deputy Frank DeLaughter over a pair of cowboy boots and because of DeLaughter’s failure to pay Morris past due bills. A witness who owned the Ferriday radio station told the FBI the same thing – specifying that the argument was over a child’s pair of cowboy boots.Dr. Charles Colvin is shown at work at the Concordia Parish Hospital in Ferriday where in 1964 he treated the fatally wounded Frank Morris after his shoe shop was torched by Klansmen. Colvin arrived at the emergency room on the night of the arson and quickly observed bloody footprints leading into the emergency room where he found Frank Morris being treated by a nurse. The image of the bloody footprints haunted Colvin. (Photo courtesy Colvin family)Deputy Frank DeLaughter (left) is shown with Sheriff Noah Cross in the mid-1970s after both had been released from federal prison. Cross was convicted in connection with a mob-operated house of prostitution and gambling den known as the Morville Lounge. He was paid kickbacks to protect the mob operation. DeLaughter was also convicted in the racketeering case and for police brutality. He was also believed the mastermind of the Frank Morris arson and was the only person to express intention to harm Morris after the deputy argued with the shoe shop owner over past due bills DeLaughter owed Morris. DeLaughter confided to Coonie Poissot that he was going to teach Morris a lesson for acting “uppity.” (Photo courtesy the Concordia Sentinel)
Frank Morris hosted a gospel music program on Sundays on radio station KFNV in Ferriday. He took requests, including those from mothers who prayed for protection for their Black sons wherever they might be. One particular fear was that they were in the hands of racist cops. The song, by The Consolers, is entitled, “Waiting for My Child to Come Home.”
Leonard Spencer being interviewed by Stanley Nelson in Morris deathFBI photo taken while tailing Silver Dollar Group leader Red GloverJames Ford Seale at 2008 conviction in the deaths of Henry Dee and Charles James Ford Seale 1964 arrest shot
