The story of Wells' face in the courthouse window seems to have been a conflation through the myth of two historic events, that of the lynching of a white man named Nathaniel Pierce, and that of the arrest and shooting of an African American man named Henry Wells. He later confessed to burning down the courthouse, likely under coercion, and died of his wounds. White guilt may have contributed to the account of Wells cursing the town and threatening they would be haunted by him.