Texas newspaper editor accuses abolitionists of planning to launch a slave revolt in the state

On July 8, 1860, fires sparked by a heat wave had caused heavy damage in towns in Denton County, Texas and elsewhere.  The editor of the Dallas Herald, Charles Pryor, had been completely burned out and on this day had published in several North Texas newspapers a lengthly accusation, with evidence, that the fires were the result of an abolitionist plot to instigate a slave insurrection.  This marked the beginning of a panic among whites in Texas that cost the lives of scores African Americans in the coming weeks.  (By John Osborne)