Biography
Taft Holmes was a Black sharecropper and member of the Share Croppers’ Union near Camp Hill, Alabama. He joined the union after reading its literature and took part in the meetings that preceded the July 1931 confrontation with the sheriff. After union member Ralph Gray was shot and killed, authorities arrested sharecroppers across the area. Holmes was put in jail on Friday evening, July 17. The International Labor Defense campaigned for the arrested workers, and Holmes was later released.
First-person Dadeville jail account and confirmed freedom by August1931
The August 29, 1931 Southern Worker individually identifies Taft Holmes as one of the Camp Hill sharecroppers already released from Dadeville jail following International Labor Defense efforts. Its first-person account describes his arrest in a country store, crowded confinement on a bare cement floor, and inadequate food. The paper reports that he personally spoke at the August 22 demonstration in Chattanooga. That establishes that he was free by that appearance, not that August 22 was the day he left jail.
This is an attributed account of conditions and the place of detention within the existing July 1931 case, not a second incarceration. No exact exit day or completed duration is supplied, and the existing July 17 admission and all numerical custody fields are unchanged. The article separately names Jasper Kennedy as still held; it does not establish that Kennedy is the current record named Jasper Canada.
Source: Southern Worker, volume 2 number 2, August 29, 1931, original pages 1, 2. Contemporary political allegations are attributed to the newspaper.
