Biography
Olen Montgomery was one of the nine Black teenagers prosecuted in the Scottsboro case. On March 25, 1931 nine Black teenagers (ages 12 to 19) were pulled off a Southern Railway freight train at Paint Rock, Alabama and accused of raping two white women, Victoria Price and Ruby Bates, who had been riding in the same boxcar. Jailed at Scottsboro and Gadsden, AL, then transferred to Kilby Prison in Montgomery, the nine were tried in groups in Scottsboro, AL beginning April 6, 1931. Eight were convicted and sentenced to death; the case of 12-year-old Roy Wright ended in a hung jury. The Communist Party's International Labor Defense and (later) the NAACP took up their defense. The U.S. Supreme Court intervened twice — first in Powell v. Alabama (1932), holding that the right to counsel applies to capital defendants in state court, and again in Norris v. Alabama (1935), reversing the convictions on grounds of systematic exclusion of African Americans from Alabama jury rolls. Five (Charlie Weems, Clarence Norris, Andy Wright, Haywood Patterson, Ozie Powell) were re-convicted in further trials; four (Olen Montgomery, Willie Roberson, Eugene Williams, Roy Wright) had charges dropped on July 24, 1937. The case remains the defining African-American legal cause célèbre of the 1930s. In 2013 Alabama posthumously pardoned the three (Weems, A. Wright, Patterson) who had not previously been pardoned or had charges dropped.
Daily Worker, October 25, 1934, page 6: The editorial directs supporters’ correspondence to him at Jefferson County Jail in Birmingham, alongside the other defendants held there. Its collective allegations about coercion remain the newspaper’s claims; the location report supplies no new admission, transfer or release day.
The March 25, 1932 issue reports Alabama’s Supreme Court affirming the death judgments of seven Scottsboro defendants on March 24, while reversing Eugene Williams’s judgment on juvenile-jurisdiction grounds and leaving Roy Wright’s mistrial situation separate. The reported execution schedules were prospective and do not establish any execution or physical custody endpoint. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1932/v09-n072-NY-mar-25-1932-DW-LOC.pdf#page=1
Daily Worker, May 24, 1935: Page 3 reports the National Scottsboro Defense Committee’s release of letters by 105 prominent supporters urging Alabama Governor Bibb Graves to release the nine Scottsboro defendants and protesting plans to reindict them after the jury-exclusion ruling. This documents collective defense activity concerning the established nine defendants; a proposed reindictment is not a new completed prosecution, conviction or release. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1935/v12-n124-NAT-may-24-1935-DW-Q.pdf
Frances Levkoff’s jail-visit account in the July 7, 1936 Daily Worker describes Powell still ill, with an impaired arm and difficulty walking; Norris sharing a cell with a mentally ill prisoner; Eugene Williams undernourished; Roy and Andy Wright asking that greetings reach their mother Ada; and Montgomery requesting drawing materials. It dates Powell’s shooting to January 24, distinct from the January 25 operation reported earlier. The visit supplies no new individual custody endpoints. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1936/v13-n162-NY-jul-07-1936-DW-Q.pdf#page=3
The December 21, 1935 Daily Worker describes his poor eyesight, his mother and sister Mary Alice in Monroe, Georgia, and his effort to obtain treatment in Memphis when arrested at Paint Rock in March 1931. One eye was blind and the other worsening, preventing his former illustrated letters. Its nearly five years describes ongoing approximate imprisonment, not a completed five-year term. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1935/v12-n307-NY-dec-21-DW-Q.pdf#page=6
In Allen’s first-person account of the 1933 Decatur proceedings, he and artist Jacob Burck visited the Scottsboro prisoners in a filthy, insect-infested cell block with an old gallows in direct view. The youths described beatings during earlier confinement and transfers, while defense efforts had secured exercise, mail and family visits. Roy Wright and Eugene Williams were practicing reading and writing, and the prisoners sang together. This eyewitness account adds prison conditions without inventing new custody episodes or counting ongoing imprisonment as completed service. Source: https://www.marxists.org/archive/allen/organizing-south.pdf#page=114
The February 13, 1933 Daily Worker distinguishes Roy Wright’s confinement in Birmingham County jail from the other eight Scottsboro defendants’ confinement in Kilby death cells despite the new-trial ruling. It reports defense use of Ruby Bates’s January 5, 1932 letter to Earl Streetman recanting her accusation and alleging police threats of jail. Judge J. P. McCoy impounded the letter January 23, 1933 and ordered a photostat January 31 during Roy’s unsuccessful bail proceedings. These are attributed defense evidence and reported jail locations; no release is inferred. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1933/v010-n037-X-feb-13-1933-DW-LOC.pdf#page=1
The May 7, 1931 Daily Worker reports defense new-trial motions and family organizing in the Scottsboro case. It describes Janie Patterson disputing a purported letter from Haywood and Ada Wright preparing a New York visit. The source uses Robertson, Ollie Montgomery and Charley Weems as period variants and reports ages that are not substituted for verified birth data. Eight death sentences and proposed July 10 executions are distinguished from actual deaths; no new physical custody endpoint is inferred. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1931/v08-n110-NY-may-07-1931-DW-LOC.pdf#page=1
The April 19, 1932 Montgomery report published April 20 says the Alabama Supreme Court granted a stay the preceding day for seven defendants, postponing execution until June 24 pending a U.S. Supreme Court appeal. It distinguishes Eugene Williams’s new trial and Roy Wright’s continued jail after a mistrial. The older page-four statement incorrectly groups nine under a May13execution forecast; the specific updated report governs this note. The stay and future execution dates are not release or death events. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1932/v09-n094-NY-apr-20-1932-DW-LOC.pdf#page=1
The November 9, 1932 Daily Worker reports the U.S. Supreme Court reversal of the seven Alabama death judgments and the continued confinement of the Scottsboro defendants. It describes the failure to allow adequate consultation and preparation with counsel, and Judge Hawkins’s proposal for a March retrial while resisting a venue change. Reversal is not physical freedom, and the proposed retrial is not a completed later outcome. These seven reviewed death judgments are distinguished from the separate procedural situations of Eugene Williams and Roy Wright. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1932/v09-n268-NY-nov-09-1932-DW-LOC.pdf#page=1
The April 9 report identifies a letter from Montgomery to defense attorney Joseph Brodsky alleging starvation and torture. Benjamin J. Davis Jr. reported that six Scottsboro defendants remained in solitary confinement at Jefferson County jail and were being threatened to change counsel. The source prints Olin Montgomery; it does not individually identify all six or establish a new custody episode. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1934/v11-n085-apr-09-1934-DW-LOC.pdf#page=1
The Powell v. Alabama transcript, Part 2, printed pages 109-137 and 145-146, records the five-defendant trial verdict on April 8, 1931, formal death sentences on April 9, and denial of the amended new-trial motion on June 22. The defense alleged inadequate preparation, racial exclusion from juries and coercive public pressure; the Alabama majority rejected those arguments, while Chief Justice Anderson dissented. His dissent (pages 171-174) traces military-escorted removal to Gadsden, return to Scottsboro for arraignment, removal to Gadsden while awaiting trial, return for trial, and removal after sentence; it does not provide exact transfer days. The Alabama Supreme Court affirmed his judgment March 24, 1932 and ordered delivery to Kilby Prison for a scheduled May 13 execution (pages 144 and 171). Rehearing was refused April 9; its April 19 order postponed execution to June 24 (pages 180 and 184-185). The final printed order, filed May 31, 1932 (page 187), grants United States Supreme Court certiorari and advances argument to October 10. These scheduled executions were not completed deaths or physical release dates. Source: https://briefs1.lonedissent.org/1932/powell-v-alabama/Transcript%20of%20Record,%20Part%202.pdf
Labor Defender, May 1934: The article reports Montgomery placed in solitary confinement at Jefferson County Jail after protesting the small portion of food on his plate. It attributes the punishment to Warden Dan Rogers and describes censorship of defense literature. No exact disciplinary admission, release or duration is supplied. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/labordefender/1934/v10n05-may-1934-orig-LD.pdf#page=7
Labor Defender, June 1934: The report of the Scottsboro mothers’ White House delegation quotes his mother Viola saying Olen had been losing his sight and left home to seek eye treatment at a Memphis hospital before his arrest. This is her attributed explanation for his journey, not a new detention or a medical diagnosis inferred by the editor. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/labordefender/1934/v10n06-jun-1934-orig-LD.pdf#page=14
Labor Defender, August 1932, printed page 144 (PDF page 5): A signed letter by Viola Montgomery identifies Olen as her third child and describes him and the other eight Scottsboro defendants as confined at Kilby Prison in Montgomery for over a year. She discusses family poverty, domestic and farm work, loss of an older daughter and support for the ILD. Her statement that her husband was weak and blind in one eye describes Olen's father, not a new diagnosis for Olen. The letter is first-person family advocacy and an approximate continuing-custody report, not a complete service total or exact endpoint. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/labordefender/1932/v08n08-aug-1932-LD.pdf
Page 1's April 16 Birmingham report describes seven Scottsboro defendants confined on the top floor of Jefferson County Jail and subjected for several weeks to solitary confinement and alleged abuse. A planned May Day rally would demand improved treatment and freedom. The item supplies collective context for the Birmingham group, without individually listing its seven members, establishing separate beatings for each, or giving a new individual admission or discharge date. The forthcoming rally is prospective. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1934/v11-n092-apr-17-1934-DW-LOC.pdf
Daily Worker, May 24, 1935; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
His mother Viola describes his childhood and employment at a boarding house for three dollars a week, his departure to seek better-paid work in Chattanooga, and next seeing him in Kilby prison. Her own husband’s chain-gang term is a separate unnamed-person report and is not assigned to Olin. This interview adds family testimony without changing his case dates.
Labor Defender, August 1932; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
Daily Worker, April 17, 1934; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
Page 5 individually identifies him in the nine-defendant Scottsboro photograph and explicitly distinguishes Roy Wright from the eight sentenced to death; July 10 was a prospective execution date. George Chamlee’s statement and the page 6 LSNR appeal allege Stephen Roddy failed to investigate, seek delay and effectively cross-examine, and describe conflict over representation by ILD and NAACP. These partisan criticisms are attributed; they do not establish a completed execution, later retrial result or new custody interval. Existing identified portrait retained.
The Scottsboro article individually discusses Olen through his mother Viola Montgomery’s letters about family poverty and organizing for the defendants. It reports that the boys remained in death cells after SupremeCourt relief and awaited retrial. The article’s collective sentencing language and November6,1932 court-date statement are not used to assign identical individual outcomes or replace independently established court dates.
