The Danville Massacre, also known as the Danville Riot, was a deadly assault on

African Americans African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...

at a

Danville, Virginia Danville is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States, located in the Southside Virginia region and on the fall line of the Dan River. It was a center of tobacco production and was an area of Confederate activity ...

market November 3, 1883 and continued for several days after with violent attacks continuing until after the election. The shooting took place during tensions between

white supremacists White supremacy or white supremacism is the belief that white people are superior to those of other races and thus should dominate them. The belief favors the maintenance and defense of any power and privilege held by white people. White su ...

and members of the

Readjuster Party The Readjuster Party was a bi-racial state-level political party formed in Virginia across party lines in the late 1870s during the turbulent period following the Reconstruction era that sought to reduce outstanding debt owed by the state. Readj ...

. Four African Americans and one white man were killed. A local investigation faulted the African Americans and a U.S. Senate investigation faulted the white supremacists. In the aftermath of the event, as many blacks were leaving Danville, the Democratic Party regained control at the state and local level, pushing out the biracial Readjuster Party. Democrats forced African Americans out of office and suppressed their voting rights.

Background

The industrial town of

grew rapidly in the late 19th century, attracting many single workers, and associated gambling, drinking, and prostitution establishments. In 1882 the biracial

had gained control of the city council, causing resentment and even alarm among some white residents; even though the council was still dominated by white members; the city had a majority African-American population. The Readjuster Party had been in power at the state level since 1879.

Shooting

The attack occurred on November 3, 1883, during a market day when African Americans, many tobacco factory workers, bought groceries. As the large crowd gathered, a racially-motivated street fight broke out and turned into a shooting, resulting in five men being killed, four of them black. The violence continued in the days following the shooting and African Americans were attacked, beaten, killed, and kept from voting in the election. The ''

Richmond Dispatch The ''Richmond Times-Dispatch'' (''RTD'' or ''TD'' for short) is the primary daily newspaper in Richmond, the capital of Virginia, and the primary newspaper of record for the state of Virginia. Circulation The ''Times-Dispatch'' has the second-h ...

'' ran a statement the day after the shootings that "These negroes had evidently come to regard themselves as in some sort the rightful rulers of the town. They have been taught a lesson — a dear lesson, it is true ... but nevertheless a lesson which will not be lost upon them, nor upon their race elsewhere in Virginia."

Aftermath

A local commission found African Americans at fault for the violence on November 3, but a US Senate investigation decided that white residents were to blame. No prosecution resulted from either inquiry. Businesses owned by African Americans closed, many moved outside of town, and Democrats retook control of local and state politics after the November 1883 elections (held three days after the event). White Democratic legislators interpreted the Danville events as more reason to push blacks out of politics. In 1902 the state legislature passed a new constitution that raised barriers to voter registration, effectively disenfranchising most blacks and many poor whites, who had been part of the Readjuster Party. They excluded them from the political system, causing them to be underrepresented and their segregated facilities to be underfinanced.Brent Tarter, "Post-Reconstruction Suffrage and following sections"
''Disfranchisement'', Encyclopedia of Virginia, 19 July 2016; accessed 17 March 2018 The

Equal Justice Initiative The Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) is a non-profit organization, based in Montgomery, Alabama, that provides legal representation to prisoners who may have been wrongly convicted of crimes, poor prisoners without effective representation, and othe ...

included the deaths in the Danville Riot in its 2015 report of lynchings in the South from 1877 to 1950. There were five lynchings in Danville, the second highest total of any independent city or county in the state, led only by Tazewell with 10.''Lynching in America'', 2nd edition
, Supplement by County, p. 7

References

{{coord missing, Virginia Danville, Virginia 1883 in Virginia November 1883 events Massacres in the United States Massacres in 1883

Background

Shooting

Aftermath

See also

References