 That same night, Republican County Solicitor, Alexander Boyd, a white native of South Carolina and Alabama resident, was murdered by the Ku Klux Klan in his hotel in Eutaw.The prevailing theory by historians for the burning of the courthouse is that the records of some 1,800 suits by freedmen against planters were about to be prosecuted; the fire destroyed the documents.The deaths of Martin and Boyd were typical of the KKK, who attacked Republican officeholders and freedmen sympathizers, in addition to freedmen, especially politicians.