Autauga County Civil Rights History

At some point in the 1950s or 60s, there were Blacks organizing in Autauga County, Alabama, participating in the Civil Rights movement. The sheriff of the county at that time and local klansmen plotted to hide up in some trees one night and when the (men I am presuming)came from their meeting, they would descend on them from the trees and attack them. A black woman who was working as a maid in the home of one of these men(I believe it was the sheriff), heard what was being planned and ran back to tell the black community what was going to occur. The Black organizers prepared themselves. The night of the planned incident, they carried guns and held them pointed straight up at the trees. When they reached the place where the men were hidden in the trees, they fired their guns into the air. The sheriff was shot in the behind and from what I am told that later developed into cancer, from which he died. Interesting bit of history.