There had been unrest for years in western Louisiana and eastern Texas as workers tried to organize to gain better conditions in the industry.
At Grabow the main factions involved were the Galloway Lumber Company and a party of striking unionized mill workers and their supporters.
The companies had organized to cooperate in setting conditions such as wages, and most employed private police or militias to suppress union activities and labor unrest.
Given the state of arms and control, violent confrontations were frequent over labor issues in Beauregard Parish during this period.
On July 7, 1912, the union workers held a series of rallies at several different company towns including Bon Ami and Carson, Louisiana.
The group, with twelve wagons, marched the six miles to Carson for more speeches and to attempt to sway the non-union workers to join the BTW.
Grabow had a number of non-union workers and it was quickly decided to hold a rally with speeches.
While there were some unorganized single shots, the first organized firing came from the mill office, where four men, including the owner John Galloway, had been waiting for the march.
[3]: 101–102, 122–124 The Louisiana National Guard was called out and arrived the next day but there were no further acts of violence and they withdrew shortly after.
[4]: 50 Subsequently, 65 of the timber workers' group were brought up on charges ranging from inciting a riot to murder.
Bill Haywood, one of the founders of the IWW used his considerable might at these rallies and it became the cause célèbre of the union world.
Arrests continued, with the small local jail of holding fifty-five men by the end of July, leading to the Louisiana State Board of Health ordering the prisoners moved to the basement of the courthouse.
Below is an excerpt from the newspaper article "A Year of Death", which appeared in the Beaumont Sunday Enterprise-Journal, Section C, September 15, 1974.
Rogers picks up the story as an eyewitness: "We had been to Merryville, Singer, Newlin and Carson and were headed for Bon Ami.
"Charles Smith, nicknamed "Leather Britches", wore a pistol on each hip and carried a rifle everywhere he went.
Rill (Loftin) Grantham stated that Leather Britches saved her future husband from hanging shortly after the Grabow riot.
Evidence was also provided that Myatt had shot and killed a neighbor named John Cook and left him lying in a field.
[6] All that remains of Graybow are some bricks, a well, a mill pond, and a historical marker put there in 2003 by the descendants of the Galloway family and the Brotherhood of Timber Workers.
[10] The area known to local people and reflected on maps, situated in Vernon Parish, no longer exists.
Once a thriving lumber town, the only known remnants are a mill pond about 3.5 miles north of Rosepine, Louisiana, on the east side of highway 171, and two abandoned grave sites, one surrounded by trees near the old Neame mill pond and the other on the west side of highway 171 in the middle of a field.