September 28, 1868 - The Opelousas, Louisiana massacre started when three local White men beat-up a young White abolitionist named Emerson Bentley who was registering Black men to vote. When local Black men came to his... rescue, 12 of them were arrested by the sheriff, taken to jail, and hung that night. In the next few days, bands of armed Whites scoured the countryside killing Blacks in what was described as a “Negro hunt”. It is estimated that 200 Blacks were killed in the fields and swamps surrounding Opelousas.