DIED TODAY: Leo Frank, factory superintendant convicted in 1913 of the murder of an employee, Mary Phagan, aged 13. Sentenced to death by hanging in 1913, later commuted to life imprisonment. Abducted from prison on 16th August 1915, and lynched today, by the “Knights of Mary Phagan”, a vigilante group specifically formed for the abduction and lynching. A superior court judge is photographed among the spectators.
“Leo Frank was posthumously pardoned in 1986 by the Georgia State Board of Pardons and Paroles , which said that it was done without attempting to address the question of guilt or innocence. The consensus of researchers on the subject is that Frank was wrongly convicted”. [Wikipedia].
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leo_Frank
Extreme Weather: Galveston, Texas is rocked by a category 4 hurricane, with winds of 135mph. Port Arthur is flooded.
http://antonk.com/august-in-history/august-17-on-this-day-in-history-2/
http://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth221876/
War!
War at Sea: The German submarine U-38 sinks 10 vessels, 9 British and 1 Spanish, in a single day, on its voyage to become the third most successful U-boat of the first world war.
https://www.google.co.uk/?gws_rd=ssl#q=17th+august+1915&start=10
onehundredyearsagotoday 