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The Wilmington insurrection of 1898, also known as the Wilmington massacre of 1898 or the Wilmington coup of 1898, was a coup d'état and
massacre A massacre is the killing of a large number of people or animals, especially those who are not involved in any fighting or have no way of defending themselves. A massacre is generally considered to be morally unacceptable, especially when per ...
carried out by
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 ...
in
Wilmington, North Carolina Wilmington is a port city in and the county seat of New Hanover County in coastal southeastern North Carolina, United States. With a population of 115,451 at the 2020 census, it is the eighth most populous city in the state. Wilmington is th ...
, United States, on Thursday, November 10, 1898. The white press in Wilmington originally described the event as a
race riot This is a list of ethnic riots by country, and includes riots based on ethnic, sectarian, xenophobic, and racial conflict. Some of these riots can also be classified as pogroms. Africa Americas United States Nativist period: 1700s� ...
caused by
black people Black is a racialized classification of people, usually a political and skin color-based category for specific populations with a mid to dark brown complexion. Not all people considered "black" have dark skin; in certain countries, often in ...
. Since the late 20th century and further study, the event has been characterized as a violent overthrow of a duly elected government by a group of white supremacists. It is the only such incident in the history of the United States. Multiple causes brought it about. The coup was the result of a group of the state's white
Southern Democrats Southern Democrats, historically sometimes known colloquially as Dixiecrats, are members of the U.S. Democratic Party who reside in the Southern United States. Southern Democrats were generally much more conservative than Northern Democrats wit ...
conspiring and leading a mob of 2,000 white men to overthrow the legitimately elected local Fusionist biracial government in Wilmington. They expelled opposition black and white political leaders from the city, destroyed the property and businesses of black citizens built up since the American Civil War, including the only black newspaper in the city, and killed an estimated 60 to more than 300 people. The Wilmington coup is considered a turning point in post-
Reconstruction Reconstruction may refer to: Politics, history, and sociology *Reconstruction (law), the transfer of a company's (or several companies') business to a new company *''Perestroika'' (Russian for "reconstruction"), a late 20th century Soviet Union ...
North Carolina North Carolina () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the 28th largest and 9th-most populous of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Georgia and S ...
politics. It was part of an era of more severe
racial segregation Racial segregation is the systematic separation of people into racial or other ethnic groups in daily life. Racial segregation can amount to the international crime of apartheid and a crime against humanity under the Statute of the Internat ...
and effective
disenfranchisement Disfranchisement, also called disenfranchisement, or voter disqualification is the restriction of suffrage (the right to vote) of a person or group of people, or a practice that has the effect of preventing a person exercising the right to vote. D ...
of
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 enslav ...
throughout the
South South is one of the cardinal directions or compass points. The direction is the opposite of north and is perpendicular to both east and west. Etymology The word ''south'' comes from Old English ''sūþ'', from earlier Proto-Germanic ''*sunþa ...
, which had been underway since the passage of a new constitution in
Mississippi Mississippi () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States, bordered to the north by Tennessee; to the east by Alabama; to the south by the Gulf of Mexico; to the southwest by Louisiana; and to the northwest by Arkansas. Missis ...
in 1890 which raised barriers to the registration of black voters. Other states soon passed similar laws. Historian Laura Edwards writes, "What happened in Wilmington became an affirmation of white supremacy not just in that one city, but in the South and in the nation as a whole", as it affirmed that invoking "whiteness" eclipsed the legal citizenship, individual rights, and equal protection under the law that black Americans were guaranteed under the Fourteenth Amendment.


Background

In 1860, just prior to the outbreak of the American Civil War, the majority of Wilmington's population was black, and it was also the largest city in the state of North Carolina, with a population of nearly 10,000.''North Carolina and the Civil War''
North Carolina Museum of History
Numerous enslaved laborers and
free people of color In the context of the history of slavery in the Americas, free people of color (French: ''gens de couleur libres''; Spanish: ''gente de color libre'') were primarily people of mixed African, European, and Native American descent who were not ...
worked at the city's port, in households as domestic servants, and in a variety of jobs as artisans and skilled workers. With the end of the war,
freedmen A freedman or freedwoman is a formerly enslaved person who has been released from slavery, usually by legal means. Historically, enslaved people were freed by manumission (granted freedom by their captor-owners), emancipation (granted freedom a ...
who lived in many states left plantations and rural areas and moved to towns and cities, not only to seek work, but also to gain safety by creating black communities without white supervision. Tensions grew in Wilmington and other areas because of a shortage of supplies Confederate currency suddenly had no value and the South was impoverished following the end of the long war. In 1868, North Carolina ratified the
Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution The Fourteenth Amendment (Amendment XIV) to the United States Constitution was adopted on July 9, 1868, as one of the Reconstruction Amendments. Often considered as one of the most consequential amendments, it addresses citizenship rights and e ...
, resulting in the recognition of
Reconstruction Reconstruction may refer to: Politics, history, and sociology *Reconstruction (law), the transfer of a company's (or several companies') business to a new company *''Perestroika'' (Russian for "reconstruction"), a late 20th century Soviet Union ...
policies. The state legislature and governorship were dominated by Republican officials, with the governor a white man and the legislature made up of both white and black people.
Freedmen A freedman or freedwoman is a formerly enslaved person who has been released from slavery, usually by legal means. Historically, enslaved people were freed by manumission (granted freedom by their captor-owners), emancipation (granted freedom a ...
were eager to vote and overwhelmingly supported the Republican Party that had emancipated them and given them citizenship and suffrage. However, conservative white Democrats, who had previously dominated politics in the state, greatly resented this "radical" change, which they deemed as being brought about by black residents, Unionist "
carpetbagger In the history of the United States, carpetbagger is a largely historical term used by Southerners to describe opportunistic Northerners who came to the Southern states after the American Civil War, who were perceived to be exploiting the lo ...
s", and
race traitor Race traitor is a pejorative reference to a person who is perceived as supporting attitudes or positions thought to be against the supposed interests or well-being of that person's own race. The term is the source of the name of a quarterly magaz ...
s referred to as "
scalawags In United States history, the term scalawag (sometimes spelled scallawag or scallywag) referred to white Southerners who supported Reconstruction policies and efforts after the conclusion of the American Civil War. As with the term ''carpetba ...
". Resentment also developed over Confederate veterans being barred from voting and holding public office in the state for a period after the war. Many white Democrats were already embittered by the Confederacy's defeat. Insurgent veterans joined the Ku Klux Klan (KKK), which orchestrated violence and intimidation to deter blacks from organizing and voting. Democrats regained control of the state legislature in 1870. After the KKK was suppressed by the federal government through the Force Act of 1870, new
paramilitary A paramilitary is an organization whose structure, tactics, training, subculture, and (often) function are similar to those of a professional military, but is not part of a country's official or legitimate armed forces. Paramilitary units carr ...
groups arose in the South. By 1874, chapters of Red Shirts, a
paramilitary A paramilitary is an organization whose structure, tactics, training, subculture, and (often) function are similar to those of a professional military, but is not part of a country's official or legitimate armed forces. Paramilitary units carr ...
arm of the Democratic Party, had formed in North Carolina. Democrats developed a plan to subvert
home rule Home rule is government of a colony, dependent country, or region by its own citizens. It is thus the power of a part (administrative division) of a state or an external dependent country to exercise such of the state's powers of governance wit ...
, seeking to have local officials appointed by the state rather than elected by the people. They began circumventing legislation by taking over the state's judiciary and adopting 30 amendments to the state constitution, which effected widespread policy changes, including lowering the number of judges on the
North Carolina Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the State of North Carolina is the state of North Carolina's highest appellate court. Until the creation of the North Carolina Court of Appeals in the 1960s, it was the state's only appellate court. The Supreme Court consist ...
, putting the lower courts and local governments under the control of the state legislature, rescinding the votes of certain types of criminals, mandating segregated public schools, outlawing interracial relationships, and granting the
General Assembly A general assembly or general meeting is a meeting of all the members of an organization or shareholders of a company. Specific examples of general assembly include: Churches * General Assembly (presbyterian church), the highest court of presby ...
the power to modify or nullify any local government. By adopting these elements, the Democrats became identified as would-be bastions for white Americans. However, their control was largely limited to the western part of the state, within counties where, demographically, there were relatively few black Americans. As the Democrats chipped away at Republican rule, things came to a head with the 1876 gubernatorial campaign of Zebulon B. Vance, a former Confederate soldier and governor. Vance called the Republican Party "begotten by a
scalawag In United States history, the term scalawag (sometimes spelled scallawag or scallywag) referred to white Southerners who supported Reconstruction policies and efforts after the conclusion of the American Civil War. As with the term ''carpetb ...
out of a
mulatto (, ) is a racial classification to refer to people of mixed African and European ancestry. Its use is considered outdated and offensive in several languages, including English and Dutch, whereas in languages such as Spanish and Portuguese is ...
and born in an outhouse." Through Vance, the Democrats saw their biggest opening to begin implementing their agenda in the eastern part of the state. However, in that region, poor white cotton farmers were often more fed up with the capitalism of big banks and railroad companies, who charged high freight rates and used
laissez-faire economics ''Laissez-faire'' ( ; from french: laissez faire , ) is an economic system in which transactions between private groups of people are free from any form of economic interventionism (such as subsidies) deriving from special interest groups. A ...
that worked against the already impoverished South. These farmers aligned with the labor movement, with many joining the People's Party (also known as the Populists). In 1892, as the U.S. plunged into an economic depression, the Populists banded with black Republicans who shared their hardships, forming an interracial coalition with a platform of self-governance, free public education, and equal voting rights for black men, called the Fusion coalition. Republicans and Populists agreed jointly to support municipal candidates.


Wilmington

In the last decade of the 19th century, Wilmington, still the largest city in the state, continued to have a majority-black population, with black people accounting for about 55 percent of its roughly 25,000 people. There were numerous black professionals and businessmen among them, and a rising middle class. The Republican Party was biracial in membership. Unlike in many other jurisdictions, black people in Wilmington were elected to local office, and also gained prominent positions in the community. For example, three of the city's
aldermen An alderman is a member of a municipal assembly or council in many jurisdictions founded upon English law. The term may be titular, denoting a high-ranking member of a borough or county council, a council member chosen by the elected members the ...
were black. Of the five members on the constituent board of audit and finance, one was black. Black people also served in the civic positions of justice of the peace, deputy clerk of court, and street superintendent, and as coroners, policemen, mail clerks, and mail carriers. African Americans also held significant economic power in the city. Many former slaves had skills which they were able to use in the marketplace. For example, several became bakers, grocers, dyers, etc., making up nearly 35 percent of Wilmington's service positions. By 1889, many black people had moved into other areas of the economy as well. They began moving out of service jobs and into other types of employment, where there was a higher demand for their work, along with higher pay. At the time, black people accounted for over 30 percent of Wilmington's skilled craftsmen, such as mechanics, carpenters, jewelers, watchmakers, painters, plasterers, plumbers, stevedores,
blacksmiths A blacksmith is a metalsmith who creates objects primarily from wrought iron or steel, but sometimes from other metals, by forging the metal, using tools to hammer, bend, and cut (cf. tinsmith). Blacksmiths produce objects such as gates, gril ...
, masons, and
wheelwrights A wheelwright is a craftsman who builds or repairs wooden wheels. The word is the combination of "wheel" and the word " wright", (which comes from the Old English word "''wryhta''", meaning a worker or shaper of wood) as in shipwright and ark ...
. In addition, they owned ten of the city's 11 restaurants, 90 percent of the city's 22 barbers, and one of the city's four fish and oyster dealerships. There were also more black bootmakers and shoemakers than white ones, one-third of the city's butchers were black, and half of the city's tailors were black. Lastly, two brothers,
Alexander Alexander is a male given name. The most prominent bearer of the name is Alexander the Great, the king of the Ancient Greek kingdom of Macedonia who created one of the largest empires in ancient history. Variants listed here are Aleksandar, Al ...
and Frank Manly, owned the '' Wilmington Daily Record'', one of the few black newspapers in the state and reportedly the only black daily newspaper in the country. With the help of patronage and equitable hiring practices, a few black people also held some of the most prominent business and leadership roles in the city, such as architect and financier Frederick C. Sadgwar. Thomas C. Miller was one of the city's three real estate agents and auctioneers, and was also the only pawnbroker in the city, with many whites known to be indebted to him. In 1897, following the election of Republican President
William McKinley William McKinley (January 29, 1843September 14, 1901) was the 25th president of the United States, serving from 1897 until his assassination in 1901. As a politician he led a realignment that made his Republican Party largely dominant in ...
, John C. Dancy was appointed to replace a prominent white Democrat as the U.S. collector of customs at the Port of Wilmington, at a salary of nearly . The editor of the '' Wilmington Messenger'' often disparaged him by referring to Dancy as "
Sambo , aka = Sombo (in English-speaking countries) , focus = Hybrid , country = Soviet Union , pioneers = Viktor Spiridonov, Vasili Oshchepkov, Anatoly Kharlampiev , famous_pract = List of Practitioners , olym ...
of the Customs House". Black professionals increasingly supported each other. For example, of the more than 2,000 black professionals in Wilmington at the time, more than 95 percent were clergy or teachers, professions where they were not shut out from competing, unlike doctors and lawyers.


White resentment

With black people in the area rapidly emerging into this newfound social status, racial tensions grew as they progressed economically, socially, and politically. Former slaves and their children had no inherited wealth. With the collapse of the Freedman's Bank in 1874 (of the 37 branches, one was in Wilmington), some black residents from Wilmington lost much of their savings and, after the experience, most distrusted banks. Freedmen were also leery of debt, as the debt-slave metaphor stuck within the community. In addition, credit or loans available to them were marked up in price. See in particula
Chapter 5: November 10: "Hell Jolted Loose"
/ref> The annual interest rate of credit charged to black people was nearly 15 percent, compared to under 7.5 percent for poor whites, and lenders refused to let African-Americans pay off their mortgages in installments. This practice, known as "principal or nothing", positioned lenders to take over black property and businesses through forced sales. The lack of inherited wealth, limitations of access to credit, and loss of savings through federal mismanagement and fraud, created a combined effect in which black people "could not save anything", or otherwise acquire the means to own taxable property. Though they made up nearly 60 percent of the county's population, property ownership among black residents in Wilmington was rare, at just eight percent. Of nearly $6 million in real and personal property taxes, they paid less than $400,000 of this amount. And while the per capita wealth for whites in the county was around , it was less than for black people. Despite this, affluent whites believed that they were paying taxes in a disproportionate amount given the amount of property they owned, relative to the city's black residents, who now held the political power to prevent affluent whites from changing this ratio. Additionally, there was tension with poor, unskilled whites, who competed with African-Americans in the job market and found their services in less demand than skilled black labor. Black people were caught between not meeting the expectations of affluent whites and exceeding the expectations of poor whites, paradoxically progressing too fast and too slow at the same time in the eyes of white residents. An example of the view that blacks were "moving too slow" can be found in the following excerpt from an 1898 magazine article: This sentiment was echoed even among whites who aligned politically with African-Americans, such as Republican governor Daniel L. Russell: The homes and businesses of successful African-Americans were sometimes torched by whites at night. But because black residents had enough economic and political power to defend their interests, socially, things were relatively peaceful.


Fusionist dominance

These dynamics continued with the elections of 1894 and 1896, in which the Republican-Populist
Fusion Fusion, or synthesis, is the process of combining two or more distinct entities into a new whole. Fusion may also refer to: Science and technology Physics *Nuclear fusion, multiple atomic nuclei combining to form one or more different atomic nucl ...
ticket won every statewide office, including the governorship in the latter election, won by Daniel L. Russell. The Fusionists began dismantling the Democrats' political infrastructure, namely by reverting their appointed positions in local offices back to offices subject to popular elections. They also began trying to dismantle the Democratic stronghold in the less-populated western part of the state, which allowed the Democrats more political power through
gerrymandering In representative democracies, gerrymandering (, originally ) is the political manipulation of electoral district boundaries with the intent to create undue advantage for a party, group, or socioeconomic class within the constituency. The m ...
. The Fusionists also encouraged black citizens to vote, who constituted an estimated 120,000 Republican sympathizers. By 1898, Wilmington's key political power was in the hands of "The Big Four", who were representative of the Fusion ticket: the mayor Dr. Silas P. Wright; the acting sheriff of
New Hanover County New Hanover County is one of 100 counties located in the U.S. state of North Carolina. As of the 2020 census, the population was 225,702. Though the second-smallest NC county in land area, it is one of the most populous, as its county seat, Wilm ...
, George Zadoc French; the postmaster, W. H. Chadbourn; and businessman Flaviel W. Fosters, who wielded substantial support and influence with black voters. The "Big Four" worked in concert with a circle of patronsmade up of about 2,000 black voters and about 150 whitesknown as "the Ring". The Ring included about 20 prominent businessmen, about six first- and second-generation New Englanders from families that had settled in the
Cape Fear region Cape Fear is a coastal plain and Tidewater region of North Carolina centered about the city of Wilmington. The region takes its name from the adjacent Cape Fear headland, as does the Cape Fear River which flows through the region and empties ...
before the War, and influential black families such as the Sampsons and the Howes. The Ring wielded political power using
patronage Patronage is the support, encouragement, privilege, or financial aid that an organization or individual bestows on another. In the history of art, arts patronage refers to the support that kings, popes, and the wealthy have provided to artists su ...
, monetary support, and an effective press through the ''Wilmington Post'' and ''The Daily Record''. This shift and consolidation of power horrified white Democrats, who contested the new laws, taking their grievances to the
state Supreme Court In the United States, a state supreme court (known by other names in some states) is the highest court in the state judiciary of a U.S. state. On matters of state law, the judgment of a state supreme court is considered final and binding in ...
, which did not rule in their favor. Defeated at the polls and in the courtroom, the Democrats, desperate to avoid another loss, became aware of discord between the Fusion alliance of black Republicans and white Populists, although it appeared that the Fusionists would sweep the upcoming elections of 1898, if voters voted on the following issues.


Issues

The economic issues, on which the Fusion coalition built its alliance, included: #
Free coinage Free silver was a major economic policy issue in the United States in the late 19th-century. Its advocates were in favor of an expansionary monetary policy featuring the unlimited coinage of silver into money on-demand, as opposed to strict adhe ...
: Currency reform was an emotional issue, and the Fusionists built a pragmatic political coalition around it. The U.S. Coinage Act of 1834 had increased the silver-to-gold weight ratio from its 1792 level of 15:1 to 16:1, which brought the minting price for silver below its international market price, a move favorable to holders of silver
bullion Bullion is non-ferrous metal that has been refined to a high standard of elemental purity. The term is ordinarily applied to bulk metal used in the production of coins and especially to precious metals such as gold and silver. It comes from the ...
. In 1873, due to a change in market dynamics and currency circulation, the
Treasury A treasury is either *A government department related to finance and taxation, a finance ministry. *A place or location where treasure, such as currency or precious items are kept. These can be state or royal property, church treasure or ...
revised the law, abolishing the right of holders of silver bullion to have their metal struck into fully legal tender dollar coins, ending
bimetallism Bimetallism, also known as the bimetallic standard, is a monetary standard in which the value of the monetary unit is defined as equivalent to certain quantities of two metals, typically gold and silver, creating a fixed rate of exchange betwe ...
in the United States and placing the nation firmly on the
gold standard A gold standard is a monetary system in which the standard economic unit of account is based on a fixed quantity of gold. The gold standard was the basis for the international monetary system from the 1870s to the early 1920s, and from the la ...
. Because of this, the act became contentious in later years, and it was denounced by people who wanted inflation as the " Crime of '73". The appearance of the revision was that it hurt poor people, as silver was known as "the poor man's money" given its use and circulation among the poor. While state Populist leadership believed its party was more ideologically aligned with the Democrats, some Populists refused to align with a party that did not support increased coinage of silver. # 1868 North Carolina railroad bonds scandal: Since before the American Civil War, the state had been trying to expand the
Western North Carolina Railroad Western North-Carolina Railroad Company was incorporated under act of North Carolina on February 15, 1855.Interstate Commerce Commission. ''Southern Ry. Co.'', Volume 37, Interstate Commerce Commission Valuation Reports, November 6, 1931, p. 215 ...
, which was incorporated in 1855. The railroad, which was supposed to link
Asheville Asheville ( ) is a city in, and the county seat of, Buncombe County, North Carolina. Located at the confluence of the French Broad and Swannanoa rivers, it is the largest city in Western North Carolina, and the state's 11th-most populous cit ...
to both
Paint Rock, Alabama Paint Rock is a town in Jackson County, Alabama, United States, along the Paint Rock River, and is included in the Huntsville-Decatur Combined Statistical Area. It was incorporated in July 1894.Ducktown, Tennessee, saw its construction stalled at Henry Station, a few miles from Old Fort, around 1872, plagued with construction problems in the
Blue Ridge Mountains The Blue Ridge Mountains are a physiographic province of the larger Appalachian Mountains range. The mountain range is located in the Eastern United States, and extends 550 miles southwest from southern Pennsylvania through Maryland, West Virgin ...
. The railroad became
insolvent In accounting, insolvency is the state of being unable to pay the debts, by a person or company (debtor), at maturity; those in a state of insolvency are said to be ''insolvent''. There are two forms: cash-flow insolvency and balance-sheet ins ...
due to underfunding, misappropriation of bonds, and poor management. The state purchased the railroad in June 1875 for $825,000. However, the purchase also made the state liable for the railroad's nearly $45 million in debtsa substantial amount of that due to fraud because, in 1868, two men had defrauded the state legislature into issuing bonds for the railroad's western expansion. Controversy mounted when
Zebulon Vance Zebulon Baird Vance (May 13, 1830 – April 14, 1894) was the 37th and 43rd governor of North Carolina, a U.S. Senator from North Carolina, and a Confederate officer during the American Civil War. A prolific writer and noted public speak ...
was re-elected as Governor in 1877 and made the railroad's completion a personal crusade. Vance had an inherent conflict of interest in supporting the railroad, as his family were major landholders in the area around Asheville, where the railroad would pass through. Additionally, although Vance publicly decried that the original bondholders were still owed money by the state, paying them would further cost the financially-strapped state, which would only further delay the construction of the railroad. Possibly because of this, Vance never took any action to resolve the crisis during the rest of his governorship, leaving many bondholders straddled with the debt of the state. Vance later left office to become a U.S. Senator, and after the railroad was completed using leased convict labor, he negotiated a sale of the railroad to a private company. After Vance left, the state issued a complete settlement of less than 15 percent of the roughly $45 million in bonds, leaving bondholders upset. Democrats blamed Republicans for the mishap, as they held legislative power when it happened. However, Fusionists associated railroads with the capitalist greed of Democrats. In addition, many of the Democrats blaming Republicans had voted to authorize the bonds, notably Tom Jarvis. #Debt relief: Whites and blacks had differing experiences with debt after the American Civil War. For whites, before the war, being in debt invoked undertones of personal moral failings. However, after the war, the fact that most Southern whites were in debt created a sense of community. That community banded together to push for political and economic reforms and negotiate favorable interest rates. Conversely, black people deemed debt another form of slavery, one that was immoral, and sought to avoid it. They were often subject to high, non-negotiable interest rates. Recognizing that poor whiteswho advocated doing away with credit systems altogether, in favor of a "pure-cash" systemhad an incentive to keep debt low, and that poor black people were less well off than poor whites, Fusionists sought a platform to align their interests. By 1892, poor whites were incensed at Zebulon Vance and the Democrats, who had pledged to stand with the
Farmers' Alliance The Farmers' Alliance was an organized agrarian economic movement among American farmers that developed and flourished ca. 1875. The movement included several parallel but independent political organizations — the National Farmers' Alliance and ...
(a precursor to the Populist party) on the issue of debt but had failed to do anything about the issue. In July 1890, Eugene Beddingfield, an influential member of the North Carolina State Farmers' Alliance, warned Vance about the extent of their anger, saying: : ::With 90 percent of North Carolinians in debt, the Fusionist platform restricted interest rates to 6 percent. In 1895, once in office, the Fusionists successfully passed the measure with about 95 percent of black Republicans and white Populists supporting it; however, 86 percent of Democrats, who accounted for most of the lending class, opposed it.


1898 White Supremacy campaign

In late 1897, nine prominent Wilmington men were unhappy with what they called "Negro Rule". They were particularly aggrieved about Fusion government reforms that affected their ability to manage and "game" (i.e., fix to their advantage) the city's affairs. Interest rates were lowered, which decreased banking revenue. Tax laws were adjusted, directly affecting stockholders and property owners who now had to pay a "like proportion" of taxes on the property they owned. Railroad regulations were tightened, making it more difficult for those who had railroad holdings to capitalize on them. Many Wilmington Democrats thought these reforms were directed at them, the city's economic leaders. The nine men (a.k.a. "the Secret Nine") Hugh MacRae, J. Allan Taylor, Hardy L. Fennell, W. A. Johnson, L. B. Sasser, William Gilchrist, P. B. Manning, E. S. Lathrop, and Walter L. Parsleybanded together and began conspiring to re-take control of the government. Around the same time, the newly elected Democratic State Party Chairman, Furnifold Simmons, was tasked with developing a strategy for the Democrats' 1898 campaign. Simmons knew that in order to win, he needed an issue that would cut across party lines. A student of Southern political history, he knew that racial resentment was easy to inflame. He would later admit he had taken notice when, in the previous year, Populist Senator Marion Butler wrote in his newspaper, ''The Caucasian'': So Simmons decided to build a campaign around the issue of
white supremacy 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 ...
, knowing that the question would overwhelm all other issues. He began working with the Secret Nine, who volunteered to use their connections and funds to advance his efforts. He developed a strategy to recruit men who could "Write, Speak, and Ride." "Writers" were those who could create propaganda in the media; "speakers" were those who would be powerful orators; and "riders" were those who could ride a horse and be intimidating. He also had Tom Jarvis relay a promise to "the large corporations": if the Democrats won, the party would not raise their taxes. In March 1898, after realizing that the
Raleigh Raleigh (; ) is the capital city of the state of North Carolina and the seat of Wake County in the United States. It is the second-most populous city in North Carolina, after Charlotte. Raleigh is the tenth-most populous city in the Southe ...
-based ''News & Observer'' and ''
The Charlotte Observer ''The Charlotte Observer'' is an American English-language newspaper serving Charlotte, North Carolina, and its metro area. The Observer was founded in 1886. As of 2020, it has the second-largest circulation of any newspaper in the Carolinas. I ...
'', which represented both the liberal and conservative wings in the Democratic party, were "together in the same bed shouting 'nigger'", Simmons met with Josephus "Jody" Daniels, the editor of the ''News & Observer'', who also had the 21-year-old cartoonist Norman Jennett (nicknamed "Sampson Huckleberry") on staff, and with Charles Aycock. The men met at the Chatawka Hotel in
New Bern New Bern, formerly called Newbern, is a city in Craven County, North Carolina, United States. As of the 2010 census it had a population of 29,524, which had risen to an estimated 29,994 as of 2019. It is the county seat of Craven County and t ...
and began planning how to execute the Democratic campaign strategy. Simmons began by recruiting media outlets sympathetic to white supremacy, such as ''The Caucasian'' and '' The Progressive Farmer'', which cynically called the Populists the "white man's party", while touting the party's alliance with black people. He also recruited aggressive, dynamic, and militant young white supremacists to help his effort. These publications presented black people as being "insolent", accused them of exhibiting ill-will and disrespect for whites in public, labeled them as corrupt and unjust, constantly laid claims about black men's alleged interest in white women, and accused white Fusionists allied with them of supporting "negro domination". Simmons summarized the party's platform when he stated: Party leader Daniel Schenck added: On November 20, 1897, following a Democratic Executive Committee meeting in Raleigh, the first statewide call for white unity was issued. Written by Francis D. Winston, it called on whites to unite and "re-establish
Anglo-Saxon The Anglo-Saxons were a cultural group who inhabited England in the Early Middle Ages. They traced their origins to settlers who came to Britain from mainland Europe in the 5th century. However, the ethnogenesis of the Anglo-Saxons happened wit ...
rule and honest government in North Carolina". He called Republican and Populist rule anarchy, evil, and apocalyptic, setting a vision for the Democrats to be the saviorsthe
redeemers The Redeemers were a political coalition in the Southern United States during the Reconstruction Era that followed the Civil War. Redeemers were the Southern wing of the Democratic Party. They sought to regain their political power and enforce w ...
that would rescue the state from "tyranny".


Alfred M. Waddell

Simmons created a speakers bureau, stacking it with talented orators whom he could deploy to deliver the message across the state. One of those orators was Alfred Moore Waddell, an aging member of Wilmington's upper class who was a skilled speaker and four-time former Congressman, losing his seat to Daniel L. Russell in 1878. Waddell remained active after his defeat, becoming a highly sought-after political speaker and campaigner. He positioned himself as a representative of oppressed whites and a symbol of redemption for inflamed white voters. He had developed a reputation as "the silver tongued orator of the east" and as an "American
Robespierre Maximilien François Marie Isidore de Robespierre (; 6 May 1758 – 28 July 1794) was a French lawyer and statesman who became one of the best-known, influential and controversial figures of the French Revolution. As a member of the Esta ...
". In 1898, Waddell, who was unemployed at the time, was also dealing with financial difficulty. His law practice was struggling, and his third wife, Gabrielle, largely supported him through her music teaching. The Chief of Police, John Melton, later testified that Waddell was seeking an opportunity to return to prominence as a politician, in order to "lighten the burden of his wife". Waddell aligned with the Democrats and their campaign to "redeem North Carolina from Negro domination". Melton stated that Waddell, who had been out of public life for while, saw the
White Supremacy 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 ...
Campaign as "his opportunity to put himself before the people and pose as a patriot, thereby getting to the feed trough". Waddell was "hired to attend elections and see that men voted correctly". With the aid of Daniels, who would distribute racist propaganda that he later acknowledged helped fuel a "reign of terror" (i.e., disparaging cartoons of blacks) before speeches, Waddell, and the other orators, began appealing to white men to join their cause.


White Supremacy Clubs

As the fall of 1898 approached, prominent Democrats such as George Rountree, Francis Winston, and attorneys William B. McCoy, Iredell Meares, and John D. Bellamy, began organizing white supremacy clubs, known as the White Government Union. The clubs demanded that every white man in Wilmington join. Membership in the clubs began spreading throughout the state. The clubs were complemented by the development of a white labor movement created to oppose blacks competing with whites for jobs. The "White Laborer's Union" got the backing of the Wilmington Chamber of Commerce and the Merchant's Association and vowed to create a "permanent labor bureau for the purpose of procuring white labor for employers". The efforts of the white supremacists finally consolidated in August 1898, when Alexander Manly, owner of Wilmington's only black newspaper, '' The Daily Record'', wrote an editorial responding to a speech supporting lynchings by printing that many white women were not raped by black men, but willingly slept with them. Manly was the acknowledged grandson of Governor Charles Manly and his slave, Corinne. Whites were outraged at Manly's piece. This provided an opening for Democrats, now calling themselves "The White Man's Party", as "evidence" supporting their claims of predatory and emboldened blacks.


Commentaries

For some time, Josephus Daniels had used Wilmington as a symbol of "Negro domination" because its government was biracial, ignoring the fact that it was dominated by a two-thirds white majority. Many newspapers published pictures and stories implying that African-American men were sexually attacking white women in the city. This belief was championed throughout the country following a speech by
Rebecca Latimer Felton Rebecca Ann Felton (née Latimer; June 10, 1835 – January 24, 1930) was an American writer, lecturer, feminist, suffragist, reformer, slave owner, and politician who was the first woman to serve in the United States Senate, although she serve ...
, a prominent women's suffragist, and wife of Georgia populist William H. Felton, at the Georgia Agricultural Society, about the problems farm wives faced. She stressed that, of all the threats farm wives face, there was none greater than "the black rapist", due to the failure of white men to protect them. She advocated that white men should resort to vigilante justice as a way for them to restore that protection:
In response to Felton's speech and the danger it imposed upon black men, 32-year-old Alexander Manly wrote an editorial, refuting it and asserting that white women have consensual sex with black men. Fearing the backlash of the piece, five prominent black Wilmington RepublicansW. E. Henderson (lawyer), Charles Norwood (Register of Deeds), Elijah Green (Alderman), John E. Taylor (Deputy Collector of Customs) and John C. Dancy (Collector of Customs)urged Manly to suspend the paper. However, many whites were appalled at the suggestion of consensual sex between black men and white women. Within 48 hours, white supremacists, aided by newspapers across the South, used Manly's wordsthough reprinting incendiary distortions of themas a championing catalyst for their cause.Melton A. McLaurin, "Commemorating Wilmington's Racial Violence of 1898: From Individual to Collective Memory", ''Southern Cultures'', 6.4 (2000), pp. 35–57

accessed March 13, 2011
Waddell, and other orators, began inciting white citizens with sexualized images of black men, insinuating black men's uncontrollable lust for white women, running newspaper stories and delivering speeches of " Black Buck, black beasts" who threatened to deflower white women. Following the coup, Felton would later say of Manly: Prior to this editorial, ''The Daily Record'' had been considered "a very creditable colored paper" throughout the state, that had attracted subscriptions and advertising from blacks and whites alike. However, after the editorial, white advertisers withdrew their support from the paper, crippling its income. Manly's landlord, M. J. Heyer, then evicted him. For his own safety, Manly was forced to relocate his press in the middle of the night. He and supporters moved his entire press from the corner of Water Street and Princess Street to a frame building on Seventh Street between Ann and Nun. He had planned to move to Love and Charity Hall (aka Ruth Hall), on South Seventh Street, but it declined to take him as a tenant because his presence would have greatly increased the building's insurance rate. Black pastors asked their congregations to step in and purchase subscriptions to help keep Manly's newspaper solvent, which many black women agreed to do, as they deemed Manly's paper to be the "one medium that has stood up for our rights when others have forsaken us." John C. Dancy would later call Manly's editorial "the determining factor" of the riot, while ''
Star-News ''Star-News'' is an American, English language daily newspaper for Wilmington, North Carolina, and its surrounding area (known as the Lower Cape Fear). It is North Carolina's oldest newspaper in continuous publication. It was owned by Halifax Me ...
'' reporter, Harry Hayden, referred to it as "the straw that broke Mister Nigger's political back."


Rallying the base

On October 20, 1898, in Fayetteville, the Democrats staged their largest political rally. The Red Shirts made their North Carolina debut, with 300 of them accompanying 22 "virtuous" young white ladies in a parade where cannons were fired and a brass band played. A guest of honor was South Carolina senator, Ben Tillman, who chastised the white men of North Carolina for not yet "killing that damn nigger editor anly, bragging that Manly would be dead if his editorial had been published in South Carolina, and when it came to blacks, advocating a "shotgun policy." Four days later, 50 of the city's most prominent white men, such as Robert Glenn, Thomas Jarvis, Cameron Morrison and Charles Aycock, who was now the pre-eminent orator of the campaign, packed the Thalian Hall opera house. Alfred Waddell delivered a speech, declaring that white supremacy was the only issue of importance for white men. He deemed blacks to be "ignorant" and railed that "the greatest crime that has ever been perpetrated against modern civilization was the investment of the negro with the right of suffrage", and he advocated punishment for race-traitors for enabling it, cementing his call with a blistering closing: Waddell's closing became a rallying cry, for white men and women alike: Portions of Waddell's speech were printed, sent around the state, and "quoted by speakers on every stump."


"White Supremacy Convention"

After the Thalian Hall speech, on October 28, "special trains from Wilmington" provided discounted train tickets to Waddell, and other white men, to travel across the state to Goldsboro for a "White Supremacy Convention". A crowd of 8,000 showed up to hear Waddell share the stage with Simmons, Charles Aycock, Thomas Jarvis, and Major William A. Guthrie and the mayor of Durham. Preceding Waddell on the stage, Guthrie declared: Waddell followed by accusing blacks of "insolence", "arrogance", which he claimed was overshadowed only by their "criminality". He insinuated that black men were disrespectful to white women, and blamed the "evils of negro rule" on the white men who had empowered them by "betraying their race". Once again, he concluded his speech assuring them that white men would banish blacks, and their traitorous white allies, even if they had to fill the Cape Fear River with enough black dead bodies to block its passage to the sea.


Intimidation

Waddell's speech so inspired the crowd that the Red Shirts left the convention and started terrorizing black citizens and their white allies, in the eastern part of the state, right away. They destroyed property, ambushed citizens with weapon fire, and kidnapped people from their homes and whipped them at night, with the goal of terrorizing them to the point where Republican sympathizers would be too afraid to vote, or even register to do so. The Populists accused the Democrats of crying "nigger" to distract from the issues, and of attacking the character of good men in order to get elected to office. Several Populists began trying to fight back in the court of public opinion, like Oliver Dockery, who was attacked by John Bellamy at the white supremacy convention: However, the Democrats continued to put more pressure on Republican and Populist, leading to candidates being too afraid to speak in Wilmington. Democrats sought to further capitalize on this fear by making efforts to suppress the Republican ticket in New Hanover County, arguing that a win by any political party opposing the Democrats would guarantee a race riot. They convinced the business community of this outcome: The Red Shirts, known to be "hot-headed," were looked down upon by the Wilmington white elite as "ruffians" and "low class". However, they deployed the Red Shirts around the city, who began holding a series of marches and rallies, organized by an unemployed sympathizer, Mike Dowling, an Irishman who, despite being the elected chair of the White Laborer's Union, had recently been fired as the foreman of Fire Engine Company Number 2 for "incompetency, drunkenness, and continued insubordination." On November 1, 1898, Dowling led a parade of 1,000 men, mounted on horses, for ten miles, through the black neighborhoods i.e. Brooklyn, of Wilmington. Joining his Red Shirts were the New Hanover County Horsemen and former members of the disbanded
Rough Riders The Rough Riders was a nickname given to the 1st United States Volunteer Cavalry, one of three such regiments raised in 1898 for the Spanish–American War and the only one to see combat. The United States Army was small, understaffed, and diso ...
, led by Theodore Swann. White women waved flags and handkerchiefs as they passed. The procession ended at the First National Bank Building, which served as the Democratic Party headquarters, where they were encouraged by Democratic politicians in front of big crowds. The next day, Dowling led a "White Man's Rally". Every "able-bodied" white man was armed. Escorted by Chief Marshal Roger Moore, a parade of men began downtown, again marched through black neighborhoods – firing into black homes and a black school on Campbell Square – and ended at Hilton Park where a 1,000 people greeted them with a picnic and free barbecue. A number of defiant speakers followed. For example, future U.S. Representative Claude Kitchin said: "All the soldiers in the United States will not keep white people from enjoying their rights", and "if a negro constable comes to a white man with a warrant in his hand, he should leave with a bullet in his brain". Leading up to the election, these gatherings became daily occurrences; the white newspapers announced the time and place of meetings. Free food and liquor were provided for the vigilantes in order to "fire them up, and make them fiercer and more terrorizing in their conduct". At night, the rallies took on a carnival-like atmosphere. However, away from the streets, the groups began disrupting black churches, and patrolling the streets as "White Citizens Patrols," wearing white handkerchiefs tied around their left arms, intimidating and attacking black citizens. The patrons of the white supremacy campaign also supplied them with a new
Gatling gun The Gatling gun is a rapid-firing multiple-barrel firearm invented in 1861 by Richard Jordan Gatling. It is an early machine gun and a forerunner of the modern electric motor-driven rotary cannon. The Gatling gun's operation centered on a ...
.


Atmosphere and suppression of black defense

The atmosphere in the city made blacks anxious and tense. Conversely, it made whites hysterical and paranoid. A number of black men attempted to purchase guns and powder, as was legal, but the gun merchants, who were all white, refused to sell them any. The merchants reported to the clubs on any black person who tried to procure arms. Some blacks tried to circumvent the local merchants by purchasing guns from outside of the state, such as from the
Winchester Repeating Arms Company The Winchester Repeating Arms Company was a prominent American manufacturer of repeating firearms and ammunition. The firm was established in 1866 by Oliver Winchester and was located in New Haven, Connecticut. The firm went into receivership ...
. However, the manufacturer would refer the request back to their North Carolina state branch, which would then call the order in to the local Wilmington branch. Once the state branch learned from the local branch that the purchasers were black, the state branch would refuse to fill the order. Merchants sold no guns to blacks between November 1 and 10, but later testified that they sold over 400 guns to whites over the same period. The only weapons blacks had were a few old army muskets or pistols. Newspapers incited people into believing that confrontation was inevitable. Rumors began to spread that blacks were purchasing guns and ammunition, readying themselves for a confrontation. Whites began to suspect black leaders were conspiring in churches, making revolutionary speeches and pleading with the community to arm themselves with bullets, or to create torches from kerosene and stolen white cotton bales. Alderman Benjamin Keith wrote: The Political Director of ''
The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nat ...
'', Henry L. West, went to Wilmington to cover the White Supremacy Campaign. He wrote: The Democrats hired two detectives to investigate the rumors, including one black detective. However, the detectives concluded that the black residents "were doing practically nothing". George Rountree would later write that two other black detectives claimed that black women agreed to set fire to their employers homes, and that black men threatened to burn Wilmington down if the white supremacists prevailed in the election. To prevent any black conspiring, the Democrats forbade blacks from congregating anywhere. Right before the election, the Red Shirts, supported by the White Government Union, were told that they wanted the Democrats to win the election "at all hazards and by any means necessary ... even if they had to shoot every negro in the city". The Red Shirts had so instituted a level of fear among the city's blacks that, approaching the election, they were "in a state of terror amounting almost to distress". The day before the election, Waddell excited a large crowd at Thalian Hall when he told them:


1898 election

Most blacks and many Republicans did not vote in the November 8 election, hoping to avoid violence, as Red Shirts had blocked every road leading in and out of the city, and drove potential black voters away with gunfire. The Red Shirts were in line with Congressman W. W. Kitchin, who declared, "Before we allow the Negroes to control this state as they do now, we will kill enough of them that there will not be enough left to bury them." Governor Russell, who by this point had withdrawn his name from the ballot in the county, decided to come to Wilmington, as it was his hometown, and he thought he might be able to calm the situation. However, when his train arrived, Red Shirts swarmed his train car and tried to lynch him. When the day was over, Democrats won 6,000 votes, overall, which was sizable given that the Fusion Party won 5,000 votes just two years prior. However, years later, it was determined that the 11,000-vote net increase also strongly suggested a high degree of election fraud. Mike Dowling would support this suggestion when he testified that Democrat party officials worked with the Red Shirts, instructing them where to deposit Republican ballots so they could be replaced by votes for Democrats. The political director of the ''Washington Post'', who was in Wilmington for the election, recounted, "No one for a moment supposes that this was the result of a free and untrammelled ballot; and a Democratic victory here, as in other parts of the State, was largely the result of the suppression of the Negro vote." However, the biracial Fusionist government still remained in power in Wilmington, because the mayor and board of aldermen had not been up for reelection in 1898. The night following the election, Democrats ordered white men to patrol the streets, expecting blacks to retaliate. However, no retaliation occurred:


''The White Declaration of Independence''

The "Secret Nine" had charged Alfred Waddell's "Committee of Twenty-Five" with "directing the execution of the provisions of the resolutions" within a document that they authored, that called for the removal of voting rights for blacks and for the overthrow of the newly elected interracial government. The document was called "The White Declaration of Independence". According to the ''Wilmington Messenger'', the Committee of Twenty-Five included Hugh MacRae, James Ellis, Reverend J.W. Kramer, Frank Maunder, F.P. Skinner, C.L. Spencer, J. Allen Taylor, E.S. Lathrop, F. H. Fechtig, W.H. Northon Sr., A.B. Skelding, F.A. Montgomery, B.F. King, Reverend J.W.S. Harvey, Joseph R. Davis, Dr. W.C. Galloway, Joseph D. Smith, John E. Crow, F.H. Stedman, Gabe Holmes, Junius Davis, Iredell Meares, P.L. Bridgers, W.F. Robertson, and C.W. Worth. On election day, Hugh MacRae (of the Secret Nine) had the ''Wilmington Messenger'' call for a mass meeting. That evening, the paper published "Attention White Men", telling all white men to meet at the courthouse the following morning for "important" business. On the morning of November 9, the courthouse was packed with 600 men of all professions and economic classes. Hugh MacRae sat in front with the former mayor, S.H. Fishblate, and other prominent white Democrats. When Alfred Waddell arrived, MacRae provided him a copy of "The White Declaration of Independence", which Waddell read to the crowd, "asserting the supremacy of the white man". He proclaimed that the
U.S. Constitution The Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the United States of America. It superseded the Articles of Confederation, the nation's first constitution, in 1789. Originally comprising seven articles, it delineates the nationa ...
"did not anticipate the enfranchisement of an ignorant population of African origin", that "never again will white men of
New Hanover County New Hanover County is one of 100 counties located in the U.S. state of North Carolina. As of the 2020 census, the population was 225,702. Though the second-smallest NC county in land area, it is one of the most populous, as its county seat, Wilm ...
permit black political participation", that "the Negro houldstop antagonizing our interests in every way, especially by his ballot", and that the city should "give to white men a large part of the employment heretofore given to Negroes". The full text of the Declaration is as follows: The crowd gave Waddell a standing ovation and 457 signed their names to adopt the proclamation, which would be published in the newspapers, without concealing who they were. The group then decided to give the city's black residents 12 hours to comply with it. Alexander Manly had already shut his press down and left town when he was alerted, by a white friend, that the Red Shirts were going to lynch him that night. Manly's friend gave him $25 and told him a password to bypass white guards on Fulton Bridge, as bands of Red Shirts were patrolling the banks, trains, and steamboats. Once Manly, along with his brother Frank and two other fair-skinned black men, Jim Telfain and Owen Bailey, approached the guards, after escaping through the woods, the guards let them pass. The guards, believing the four men to be white, also invited them to the " necktie party" they were going to that evening for "that scoundrel Manly". The guards even loaded their buggies with Winchester rifles in case they spotted Manly on their way out of the city. Waddell's Committee of Twenty-Five summoned the Committee of Colored Citizens (CCC), a group of 32 prominent black citizens, to the courthouse at 6:00 pm. They told the CCC of their ultimatum, instructing them to direct the rest of the city's black citizens to fall in line. When the black men asked to reason with them and pleaded that they could not control what Manly did, or what any other black person would do, Waddell responded that the "time had passed for words". The black men left the courthouse and went to David Jacob's barbershop on Dock Street, where they wrote a reply to the committee's ultimatum: Lawyer Armond Scott wrote the letter, and was instructed by the committee to personally deliver the response to Waddell's home, at Fifth and Princess Streets, by 7:30 a.m. the next day, November 10. Scott was afraid, and left the response in Waddell's mailbox. Scott later claimed that the letter Waddell had published in newspapers was not the letter he wrote. He said that the letter he authored expressed that Manly had ended publication of ''The Daily Record'' two weeks before the election, thereby eliminating the "alleged basis of conflict between the races".


Massacre and coup d'état

Alfred Waddell and the Committee of Twenty Five purportedly did not receive a response from the Wilmington Committee of Colored Citizens (CCC) by 7:30 a.m. on November 10, though it is unclear when Waddell checked his mailbox. As a result, about 45 minutes later, Waddell gathered about 500 white businessmen and veterans at Wilmington's armory. After heavily arming themselves with rifles and a
Gatling gun The Gatling gun is a rapid-firing multiple-barrel firearm invented in 1861 by Richard Jordan Gatling. It is an early machine gun and a forerunner of the modern electric motor-driven rotary cannon. The Gatling gun's operation centered on a ...
, Waddell then led the group to the two-story publishing office of '' The Daily Record'', the city's black-owned newspaper. They broke into editor Alexander Manly's building, vandalized the premises, doused the wood floors with kerosene, set the building on fire, and gutted the remains. At the same time, black newspapers all over the state were also being destroyed. In addition, blacks, along with white Republicans, were denied entrance to city centers throughout the state. Following the fire, the mob of white vigilantes swelled to about 2,000 men. A rumor circulated that some black people had fired on a small group of white men a mile away from the printing office. White men then went into black Wilmington neighborhoods, destroying black businesses and property and assaulting black inhabitants with a mentality of killing "every damn nigger in sight". As Waddell led a group to disband and drive out the elected government of the city, the white mob rioted. Armed with shotguns, the mob attacked black people throughout Wilmington, but primarily in Brooklyn, the majority-black neighborhood. The small patrols were spread out over the city and continued until nightfall. Walker Taylor was authorized by Governor Russell to command the Wilmington Light Infantry troops, just returned from the
Spanish–American War , partof = the Philippine Revolution, the decolonization of the Americas, and the Cuban War of Independence , image = Collage infobox for Spanish-American War.jpg , image_size = 300px , caption = (cloc ...
, and the federal Naval Reserves, taking them into Brooklyn to quell the "riot". They intimidated both black and white crowds with rapid-fire weapons, shooting and killing several black men. Hundreds of black people fled the town to take shelter in nearby swamps. As the violence spread, Waddell led a group to the Republican mayor, Silas P. Wright. Waddell forced Wright, the board of aldermen, and the police chief to resign at gunpoint. The mob installed a new city council that elected Waddell to take over as mayor by 4p.m. that day. Once he was declared mayor, the "Secret Nine" gave Waddell a list of prominent Republicans who he was to banish from the city. The next morning Waddell, flanked by George L. Morton and the Wilmington Light Infantry, marched six prominent black people on the list out of Wilmington; the other black people on the list had already fled. Waddell put them on a train headed north, in a special car with armed guards who were instructed to take them over the state line. Waddell then gathered the whites on the list and paraded them in front of a large crowd, allowing G.Z. French to be dragged on the ground and nearly lynched from a telephone pole, before he was allowed to board the train and leave the city.


Aftermath


Wilmington

The coup was deemed a success for the business elite, with ''
The Charlotte Observer ''The Charlotte Observer'' is an American English-language newspaper serving Charlotte, North Carolina, and its metro area. The Observer was founded in 1886. As of 2020, it has the second-largest circulation of any newspaper in the Carolinas. I ...
'' quoting a prominent lawyer who said: The number of Black people killed by the mob by the end of the day (November 10) is uncertain. Estimates have included "about 20," "more than twenty," "twenty or more," "somewhere between fourteen and sixty", "as many as 60," "at least sixty", "90,", "more than one hundred", and "exceeded 300.". An additional number, variously estimated between 20 and 50, were banished and ordered to leave town by the mob. The Rev. J. Allen Kirk gave this statement about the experience: While African Americans sought redress for the attacks at the federal level, many also blamed Manly for provoking the attacks by pushing white supremacists too far. John C. Dancy stated in a November 21 ''New York Times'' interview that Manly was responsible for the attacks, and that before his editorials the relations between blacks and whites were "most cordial and amicable ... but the white men of the South will not tolerate any reflection upon their women". Journalist and orator
John Edward Bruce John Edward Bruce, also known as Bruce Grit or J. E. Bruce-Grit (February 22, 1856 – August 7, 1924), was an American journalist, historian, writer, orator, civil rights activist and Pan-African nationalist. He was born a slave in Maryland; ...
agreed, and spoke out against Manly's attempts to "revolutionize the social order". Even the
National Afro-American Council The National Afro-American Council was the first nationwide civil rights organization in the United States, created in 1898 in Rochester, New York. Before its dissolution a decade later, the Council provided both the first national arena for disc ...
called for a day of fasting for African Americans to offer "a hearty confession of our own sins", without condemning the role of white supremacists in the attacks. Along with Alex and Frank G. Manly, brothers who had owned the ''Daily Record,'' more than 2,000 blacks left Wilmington permanently, forced to abandon their businesses and properties. This greatly reduced the city's professional and artisan class, and changed the formerly black-majority city into one with a white majority. While some whites were wounded, no whites were reported killed. City residents' appeals to President
William McKinley William McKinley (January 29, 1843September 14, 1901) was the 25th president of the United States, serving from 1897 until his assassination in 1901. As a politician he led a realignment that made his Republican Party largely dominant in ...
for help to recover from the widespread destruction in Brooklyn received no response; the White House said it could not respond without a request from the governor, and Governor Russell had not requested any help. In the 6th District, Oliver Dockery contested John Bellamy's congressional seat in court. However, he did not prevail. While the loss of blacks and the refusal to hire black workers benefited the white labor movement in terms of job availability, white men were disappointed with the types of jobs that were available, as they were "nigger jobs" that paid "nigger wages". Subsequent to Waddell's usurping power, he and his team were re-elected in March 1899 to city offices. Waddell held the mayorship until 1905. He wrote his memoirs in 1907 and died in 1912.


State politics

Once installed in the state legislature, in 1899, Democrats, who had accounted for nearly 53 percent of the vote, determined there were two things they could do to retain their power: # prevent blacks from voting, and # normalize a racial hierarchy that allowed poor whites to feel empowered over, and antagonistic toward, blacks.


Disenfranchisement

To permanently install "good government by the White Man's Party", the "Secret Nine" installed George Rountree in the state legislature to ensure that blacks were kept from voting, and also to keep white Republicans from aligning, politically, with blacks again. On January 6, 1899, Francis Winston introduced a suffrage bill to keep blacks from voting. Rountree went on to chair a special joint committee overseeing the disenfranchisement amendment, a committee that existed to circumvent the U.S. Constitution which, in fact, granted blacks the right to vote. The legislature passed a law requiring new voters to pay a
poll tax A poll tax, also known as head tax or capitation, is a tax levied as a fixed sum on every liable individual (typically every adult), without reference to income or resources. Head taxes were important sources of revenue for many governments fr ...
, and passed a state constitutional amendment requiring prospective voters to demonstrate, to local elected officials, that they could read and write any section of the Constitution – practices that discriminated against poor whites, and more than 50,000 black men. However, to make sure that as few poor whites as possible would be hurt by the law, and prevented from voting Democrat, Rountree invoked a "
Grandfather clause A grandfather clause, also known as grandfather policy, grandfathering, or grandfathered in, is a provision in which an old rule continues to apply to some existing situations while a new rule will apply to all future cases. Those exempt from t ...
". The clause guaranteed the right to register and vote, bypassing the literacy requirement, if the voter, or a voter's lineal ancestor, was eligible to vote in his state of residence prior to January 1, 1867. This excluded practically any black man from voting. Rountree bragged of his work: The clause remained in effect until 1915, when the Supreme Court ruled it
unconstitutional Constitutionality is said to be the condition of acting in accordance with an applicable constitution; "Webster On Line" the status of a law, a procedure, or an act's accordance with the laws or set forth in the applicable constitution. When l ...
.


Ushering in "Jim Crow"

The Democrats also set about passing its first racial hierarchy laws, prohibiting blacks and whites from sitting together on trains, steamboats, and in courtrooms, and even requiring blacks and whites to use separate Bibles. Nearly every aspect of public life was codified to separate poor whites and blacks. These laws, a direct result of the brief political alliance between blacks and poor whites, not only encouraged whites to see black people as outcasts and pariahs, but also rewarded them for doing so, socially and psychologically. This contributed to voluntary separation, whereas whites and blacks lived close to one another prior to 1898 in Wilmington; however, the following year, physical segregation increased between blacks and whites throughout the state, with home value, social status and quality of life improving for whites, the further they physically lived away from blacks. This essentially lessened political democracy in the area, and enhanced oligarchical rule by the descendants of the former slaveholding class. Through 1908, Democrats in other southern states began following North Carolina's example by suppressing the black vote, through disenfranchisement laws or constitutional amendments, of their own. They also passed laws mandating racial segregation of public facilities, and martial law-like impositions on African Americans. The
US Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...
(at the time) upheld such measures.


Election of 1900

Two years after the coup, the Democrats again ran on "negro domination" with disenfranchisement of blacks on the ballot. Gubernatorial candidate Charles Aycock (one of the campaign's orators) used what happened at Wilmington as a warning to those who dared to challenge the Democrats. He stated that disenfranchisement would keep the peace. When the votes in Wilmington were counted, only twenty-six people voted against black disenfranchisement, demonstrating the political effect of the coup.


Historical recounting


"Race riot"

On November 26, 1898, Collier's Weekly published an article in which Waddell wrote about the government overthrow. The article, "The Story of The Wilmington, North Carolina, Race Riots" included an early use of the term "race riot". Despite vowing to "choke the Cape Fear River with carcasses", and the fact that some members of the white mob posed for a photograph in front of the charred remnants of ''The Daily Record,'' in the article Waddell painted himself as a reluctant, non-violent leader – or accidental hero – "called upon" to lead under "intolerable conditions". He painted the white mob not as murderous lawbreakers, but as peaceful, law-abiding citizens who simply wanted to restore law and order. He also portrayed any violence committed by whites as either being accidental or executed in self-defense, effectively laying blame on both sides: Although individuals of both races pointed to Democrat-backed violence as the driver behind the incident, the national narrative largely cast black men as aggressors, legitimizing the coup as a direct result of black aggression. For example, The Atlanta Constitution, a newspaper in Atlanta, Georgia, justified the violence as a rational defense of white honor, and a necessary response against the "criminal element of the blacks", furthering stereotypes of black violence. The complex reasons for the coup were overlooked in Waddell's account, which disregarded the overthrow as a carefully planned conspiracy, established the historical narrative as the coup being an event that "spontaneously happened", and helped usher in the
Solid South The Solid South or Southern bloc was the electoral voting bloc of the states of the Southern United States for issues that were regarded as particularly important to the interests of Democratic Party (United States), Democrats in those states. T ...
. Complemented by Hugh Ditzler's illustration depicting blacks as gun-welding aggressors, Waddell and Ditzler effectively defined and illustrated the term "race riot", and set the precedent for its application which is still used today. It was referred to that way by the North Carolina Legislature in 2000 when it set up the 1898 Wilmington Race Riot Commission, and is the term used to this day (2018) by the State Archives of North Carolina,
North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources The North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources is a cabinet-level department within the state government of North Carolina dedicated to overseeing projects in the arts, culture, and history within the borders of the state. The cur ...
, and the
State Library of North Carolina The State Library of North Carolina is an institution which serves North Carolina libraries, state government employees, genealogists, and the citizens of North Carolina. The library is the main depository for North Carolina state publications an ...
, in its online '' NCPedia''.


"Massacre" vs. "Insurrection"

Waddell's ''Harper's Weekly'' account framed the violence, and the coup, with a "noble" narrative, comparing the events to the cause of the "Men of the Cape Fear" during the American Revolution. For many whites, the gallant framing remained, as the perpetrators of the coup were deemed to be "revolutionary" heroes who led an "insurrection" against a "riotous" black menace. For example, immediately, following the coup, the coup participants began reshaping the language of the events. For example, William Parsley, a former Confederate Lieutenant-Colonel, wrote of Wilmington's blacks: Supporting that account, Mr. Kramer, a white Wilmington alderman, added: Conversely, the black survivors and community maintained that the event was a "massacre". A survivor of the incident, who fled the city, Rev. Charles S. Morris, told his account of the event before the International Association of Colored Clergymen in January 1899: Revisionists dispute the white supremacist aspect of the event often by 1) denying the culpability of the white actors and 2) framing the cause of the white actors as noble. Arguments that deny culpability, such as equating blame onto blacks, shifts blame away from the white actors and places it onto black residents and their white allies. "Noble" arguments stress that the white actors were not bad people, but honorable souls who were only fighting for "law and order". By not recognizing that the white actors sought "law and order" through criminality and violence, the goodness, valor and values of their ancestors remain affirmed. The branding of the event as a "riot", "insurrection", "rebellion", "revolution", or "conflict", largely remained until the late 20th century due to the accounts of black survivors being minimized, ignored and omitted – as with ''The Daily Record'' destroyed, there were no media outlets to provide recorded accounts of blacks – and due to the South's adoption of Jubal Early's literary and cultural point of view of The Lost Cause, in which violence perpetuated by whites, across American Civil War,
Reconstruction Reconstruction may refer to: Politics, history, and sociology *Reconstruction (law), the transfer of a company's (or several companies') business to a new company *''Perestroika'' (Russian for "reconstruction"), a late 20th century Soviet Union ...
, and the Jim Crow era, evolved into a language of vindication and renewal. The narrative of The Lost Cause allowed the North and the South to emotionally re-unify. It brought sentimentalism, by political argument, and recurrent celebrations, rituals and public monuments that allowed Southern whites to reconcile their regional pride with their Americanness. It also provided conservative traditions and a model of masculine devotion and courage in an age of gender anxieties and ruthless material striving. However, historians have argued that the reunion was of the North and the South was "exclusively a white man's phenomenon and the price of the reunion was the sacrifice of the African Americans". A Gatling gun, and an armed mob, fired upon people prevented from arming themselves. However, the dissonance over the nomenclature of this fact, between blacks and whites, caused controversy about how to address its historical retelling, and also how to deal with the effects of the event's outcome.


1998 Centennial Commission

By the early 1990s, different groups in the city told and understood different histories of the events, sparking interest to discuss and commemorate the coup, following efforts to recognize similar atrocities in which white-led mobs destroyed the black communities, such as in
Rosewood Rosewood refers to any of a number of richly hued timbers, often brownish with darker veining, but found in many different hues. True rosewoods All genuine rosewoods belong to the genus ''Dalbergia''. The pre-eminent rosewood appreciated in ...
and
Tulsa Tulsa () is the second-largest city in the state of Oklahoma and 47th-most populous city in the United States. The population was 413,066 as of the 2020 census. It is the principal municipality of the Tulsa Metropolitan Area, a region with ...
, respectively. In 1995, informal conversations began among the African-American community, UNC-Wilmington's university faculty, and civil rights activists in order to educate residents about what really happened on that day, and to agree on a monument to memorialize the event. On November 10, 1996, the town of Wilmington held a program inviting the community to help make plans for the 1998 Centennial Commemoration. Over 200 people attended, including local state representatives and members of the city council. Some descendants of the white supremacy leaders of 1898 were opposed to any type of commemoration. In early 1998, Wilmington planned a series of "Wilmington in Black and White" lectures, bringing in political leaders, academic specialists and civic rights activists, as well as facilitators such as Common Ground. George Rountree III attended a discussion held at St. Stephen's A.M.E. Church, attracting a large crowd, as his grandfather was one of the leaders of the 1898 violence. Rountree spoke of his personal support for racial equality, of his relationship with his grandfather, and of his refusal to apologize for his grandfather's actions as "the man was the product of his times". Other descendants of the coup's participants also said they owed no apologies, as they had no part in their ancestors' actions. Many listeners argued with Rountree about his position and refusal to apologize. Some said that, "although he bore no responsibility for those events, he personally had benefited from them". Kenneth Davis, an African American, spoke of his own grandfather's achievements during those times, which Rountree's grandfather and others had "snuffed out" by their violence. Davis said that the "past of Wilmington's black community ... was not the past Rountree preferred".


1898 Wilmington Race Riot Commission

In 2000, the state legislature, recognizing that the black community had suffered severely, politically and economically, following the coup, especially due to state
disenfranchisement Disfranchisement, also called disenfranchisement, or voter disqualification is the restriction of suffrage (the right to vote) of a person or group of people, or a practice that has the effect of preventing a person exercising the right to vote. D ...
and
Jim Crow The Jim Crow laws were state and local laws enforcing racial segregation in the Southern United States. Other areas of the United States were affected by formal and informal policies of segregation as well, but many states outside the Sout ...
, created the 13-member, biracial, 1898 Wilmington Race Riot Commission to develop a historical record of the event and to assess the economic impact of the riot on blacks locally and across the region and state, co-chaired by state legislator Thomas E. Wright. The Commission studied the riot for nearly six years, after hearing from numerous sources and scholars. The Commission produced a lengthy report on the event, authored by state archivist LeRae Umfleet, finding that the violence was "part of a statewide effort to put white supremacist Democrats in office and stem the political advances of black citizens." Harper Peterson, former mayor of Wilmington and a member of the commission, said "Essentially, it crippled a segment of our population that hasn't recovered in 107 years." According to Umfleet, "'massacre', rather than 'riot', does apply. That's a big, strong word, but that's what it was." The commission made broad recommendations for reparations by government and businesses that would benefit not only African-American descendants, but also the entire community. The Commission recommended 10 bills to the North Carolina Legislature, to correct the century-old damage with reparations for victims' descendants through economic and business development, scholarships, and other programs. The Legislature did not pass any of them. Historians noted that the
Raleigh Raleigh (; ) is the capital city of the state of North Carolina and the seat of Wake County in the United States. It is the second-most populous city in North Carolina, after Charlotte. Raleigh is the tenth-most populous city in the Southe ...
News & Observer ''The News & Observer'' is an American regional daily newspaper that serves the greater Triangle area based in Raleigh, North Carolina. The paper is the largest in circulation in the state (second is the ''Charlotte Observer''). The paper has bee ...
had contributed to the riots by publishing inflammatory stories, in addition to the results of the elections in Wilmington. This encouraged white men from other parts of the state to travel to Wilmington, to take part in the attacks against blacks, including the ''coup d'état''. Articles in the ''
Charlotte Observer ''The Charlotte Observer'' is an American English-language newspaper serving Charlotte, North Carolina, and its metro area. The Observer was founded in 1886. As of 2020, it has the second-largest circulation of any newspaper in the Carolinas. I ...
'' have also been cited as adding to the inflamed emotions. The Commission asked the newspapers to make scholarships available to minority students and to help distribute copies of the commission report. The commission "also asked that
New Hanover County New Hanover County is one of 100 counties located in the U.S. state of North Carolina. As of the 2020 census, the population was 225,702. Though the second-smallest NC county in land area, it is one of the most populous, as its county seat, Wilm ...
, which includes the city, be placed under special federal supervision through the
Voting Rights Act The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is a landmark piece of federal legislation in the United States that prohibits racial discrimination in voting. It was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson during the height of the civil rights movem ...
", to ensure that current voter registration and voting are conducted without discrimination.


Reply from League of the South

In 2005, the League of the South, a
white supremacist 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 ...
group "known for opposing civil rights laws and defending the right to display the Confederate flag", set up a web site, "1898 Wilmington". Under the name of "1898 Wilmington Institute for Education & Research", they spoke of "Reconstruction horror". What is "sometimes labeled a race riot or rebellion" was actually the actions of law-abiding white Democrats rescuing the city from Republican and
carpetbagger In the history of the United States, carpetbagger is a largely historical term used by Southerners to describe opportunistic Northerners who came to the Southern states after the American Civil War, who were perceived to be exploiting the lo ...
corruption, compounded by ignorant, misled negroes who were in no way capable of voting intelligently. They quoted white supremacist governor Charles Aycock, who was "passionately interested in good government", on "the menace of negro suffrage": " e only hope of good government in North Carolina, and the other Southern States, rested upon the assured political supremacy of the white race". It quotes approvingly the pro-lynching spokeswoman Rebecca Felton, claims that blacks did not lose any property as a result of the riot, and blames the entire conflict on Alexander Manly, carpetbaggers, and other Republicans.


Commemorations

Several commemorations of the event have taken place: * Former Star-News reporter, Harry Hayden, released a romanticized accounting of the overthrow in his 1936 pamphlet, ''The Story of the Wilmington Rebellion,'' in which he rebranded the event a "Revolution" that had saved North Carolina from Reconstruction. Conversely, Helen G. Edmonds addressed the riot in her 1951 work, '' The Negro and Fusion Politics in North Carolina, 1894-1901'', writing: "In reality, the Democrats effected a coup d'etat." As the predominant view of the time reflected the
Dunning School The Dunning School was a historiographical school of thought regarding the Reconstruction period of American history (1865–1877), supporting conservative elements against the Radical Republicans who introduced civil rights in the South. It was na ...
's disparagement of Reconstruction, and white historians commonly referred to the events as a "race riot", equally attributing blame to blacks, Edmonds assessment of the events was overlooked by many. * In November 2006, the ''News and Observer'', deeming the coup as being "a giant shadow hanging over it", issued a Special Feature fully acknowledging its role as a leader in that coup's propaganda effort under Josephus Daniels. The same year, saying that it "wanted to be the right side of history", ''The Charlotte Observer'' issued an editorial with a full apology for its role in the coup: * In January 2007, the
North Carolina Democratic Party The North Carolina Democratic Party (NCDP) is the North Carolina affiliate of the Democratic Party. It is headquartered in the historic Goodwin House, located in Raleigh. Governor Roy Cooper is a North Carolina Democrat. Since the 2010 passage o ...
officially acknowledged and renounced the actions by party leaders during the Wilmington insurrection and the
white supremacy 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 ...
campaigns. * In April 2007 Representatives Wright, Jones and Harrell introduced House Bill #1558, the "1898 Wilmington Riot Reconciliation Act", into the North Carolina General Assembly. The Act would allow the estates of those injured, killed, or who suffered personal or property losses, resulting from the events on November 10 to file a lawsuit against the city for redress. The loss would have to be valued and, any payout would be adjusted by 8 percent for inflation. The Bill never advanced beyond its introduction. * In August 2007, the state senate passed a resolution acknowledging and expressing "profound regret" for the riot.AP, "Senate revives Wilmington riot bill in Wright-free measure"
August 1, 2007, WWAY TV3, accessed July 30, 2014
* In 2007, some advocates lobbied to get the coup covered in the state's school curriculum, while historians have sought to build a memorial at the corner of Third and Davis Streets in Wilmington to commemorate the incident. * In January 2017, two Wilmington writers, John Jeremiah Sullivan and Joel Finsel, backed by the creative writing department at
UNCW The University of North Carolina Wilmington (UNCW or UNC Wilmington) is a public research university in Wilmington, North Carolina. It is part of the University of North Carolina System and enrolls 17,499 undergraduate and graduate students eac ...
, began working with middle school students, at Williston School and the Friends School of Wilmington, to locate, salvage and transcribe copies of ''The Daily Record''. After the newspaper was destroyed, W.H. Bernard, the
hen Hen commonly refers to a female animal: a female chicken, other gallinaceous bird, any type of bird in general, or a lobster. It is also a slang term for a woman. Hen or Hens may also refer to: Places Norway * Hen, Buskerud, a village in Ring ...
editor of the Wilmington Morning Star, offered to purchase any outstanding copies of ''The Daily Record'' for 25 cents each. After six months, the group located eight pages; however, only seven of those pages are legible. The pages will eventually be available through the Library of Congress' "Chronicling America" digital series, and through the Digital Heritage Center's public website. * In January 2018, North Carolina's Highway Historical Marker Committee approved the installation of a plaque to commemorate the event. The plaque will be installed in March 2018, on Market Street between Fourth Street and Fifth Street, which is the location of the Light Infantry Building, where the rioting began. The plaque states:


In media

* Charles W. Chesnutt's novel, '' The Marrow of Tradition'' (1901), addressed the rise of white supremacists in North Carolina and described a fictional account of a riot in a city based on Wilmington; it was more accurate than contemporary portrayals by Southern white newspapers. He portrayed the riots as initiated in white violence against blacks, with extensive damage suffered by the black community. *In ''
The Leopard's Spots ''The Leopard's Spots: A Romance of the White Man's Burden—1865–1900'' is the first novel of Thomas Dixon's Reconstruction trilogy, and was followed by '' The Clansman: A Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan'' (1905), and '' The Traitor: A ...
'' (1902), North Carolina author
Thomas Dixon Jr. Thomas Frederick Dixon Jr. (January 11, 1864 – April 3, 1946) was an American white supremacist, Baptist minister, politician, lawyer, lecturer, novelist, playwright, and filmmaker. Referred to as a "professional racist", Dixon wrote two best- ...
(who wrote “The Clansman” upon which the 1915 film “
The Birth of a Nation ''The Birth of a Nation'', originally called ''The Clansman'', is a 1915 American silent epic drama film directed by D. W. Griffith and starring Lillian Gish. The screenplay is adapted from Thomas Dixon Jr.'s 1905 novel and play '' The Cla ...
" was based), historicizes in considerable detail the 1898 white supremacy campaign and Wilmington massacre." *Wilmington author Philip Gerard wrote a novel, ''Cape Fear Rising'' (1994), that recounts the 1898 campaign and events leading to the burning of the '' Daily Record.'' *
John Sayles John Thomas Sayles (born September 28, 1950) is an American independent film director, screenwriter, editor, actor, and novelist. He has twice been nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay, for '' Passion Fish'' (1992) and ' ...
portrayed the Wilmington Insurrection in Book Two of his novel, '' A Moment in the Sun'' (2011), based on contemporary primary sources. Sayles combines fictional characters with historical figures. * David Bryant Fulton, writing under the name Jack Thorne, wrote the novel ''Hanover; or, The Persecution of the Lowly. A Story of the Wilmington Massacre'' (2009). * Barbara Wright's young adult novel, ''Crow'' (2012), portrays the events through a fictional young African-American boy, the son of a reporter on the black newspaper. Her work was named a Notable Social Studies Trade Book in 2013 by the
National Council for the Social Studies The National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS) is a U.S.-based association devoted to supporting social studies education. It is affiliated with various regional or state level social studies associations, including: the Middle States Council ...
. *A documentary film about the Wilmington insurrection, '' Wilmington on Fire'', was released in 2016. It was directed by Christopher Everett. * David Zucchino won the 2021
Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction The Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction is one of the seven American Pulitzer Prizes that are awarded annually for the "Letters, Drama, and Music" category. The award is given to a nonfiction book written by an American author and published duri ...
for ''Wilmington's Lie: The Murderous Coup of 1898 and the Rise of White Supremacy'' (2020). The book uses contemporary newspaper accounts, diaries, letters and official communications to create a narrative that weaves together individual stories of hate and fear and brutality. *In the 2021 episode of the ''
Criminal In ordinary language, a crime is an unlawful act punishable by a state or other authority. The term ''crime'' does not, in modern criminal law, have any simple and universally accepted definition,Farmer, Lindsay: "Crime, definitions of", in Ca ...
'' podcast titled "If it ever happens, run," host
Phoebe Judge Phoebe Valentine Judge is an American journalist, best known as the host and co-creator of the podcasts ''Criminal'' and '' This Is Love.'' Early life and education Judge was born to parents Valentine and Tony Judge, and named after her aunt, Ph ...
tells the story of the Wilmington insurrection through a combination of narrative and interviews. *The November 2, 2022 episode of the
BBC World Service The BBC World Service is an international broadcaster owned and operated by the BBC, with funding from the British Government through the Foreign Secretary's office. It is the world's largest external broadcaster in terms of reception a ...
’s �
Sounds
�� discussed the Wilmington Insurrection and its impact on Black fiddler Frank Johnson.


See also

*
Attempts to overturn the 2020 United States presidential election After Joe Biden won the 2020 United States presidential election, then-incumbent Donald Trump pursued an unprecedented effort to overturn the election, with support and assistance from his campaign, proxies, political allies, and many of h ...
* * Cary's Rebellion * Colfax Massacre *
Domestic terrorism in the United States Domestic terrorism in the United States consists of incidents which are confirmed to be domestic terrorist acts. These attacks are considered domestic because they occurred within the United States and they were carried out by U.S. citizens and ...
*
Election Riot of 1874 The Election Massacre of 1874, or Coup of 1874, took place on election day, November 3, 1874, near Eufaula, Alabama in Barbour County. Freedmen comprised a majority of the population and had been electing Republican candidates to office. Members ...
*
Jaybird–Woodpecker War The Jaybird–Woodpecker War (1888–89) was a feud between two United States Democratic Party factions fighting for political control of Fort Bend County, Texas, in the southeast part of the state. The Jay Bird Democratic Association was an all- ...
*
List of attacks on legislatures The following is a list of attacks on state or national legislature A legislature is an assembly with the authority to make laws for a political entity such as a country or city. They are often contrasted with the executive and judicial ...
* List of coups and coup attempts by country#United States * List of ethnic riots#United States *
List of events named massacres The following is a list of events for which one of the commonly accepted names includes the word "massacre". Definition ''Massacre'' is defined in the '' Oxford English Dictionary'' as "the indiscriminate and brutal slaughter of people ...
* List of expulsions of African Americans *
List of incidents of civil unrest in the United States Listed are major episodes of civil unrest in the United States. This list does not include the numerous incidents of destruction and violence associated with various sporting events. 18th century *1783 – Pennsylvania Mutiny of 1783, June 20. ...
*
List of massacres in the United States This is a partial list of massacres in the United States; death tolls may be approximate. :*For single-perpetrator events and shooting sprees, see List of rampage killers in the United States, Mass shootings in the United States, :Spree shoot ...
* List of rebellions in the United States *
Lynching in the United States Lynching was the widespread occurrence of extrajudicial killings which began in the United States' pre–Civil War South in the 1830s and ended during the civil rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s. Although the victims of lynchings were ...
* Lynching of Frazier B. Baker and Julia Baker (1897) *
Mass racial violence in the United States In the broader context of racism against Black Americans and racism in the United States, mass racial violence in the United States consists of ethnic conflicts and race riots, along with such events as: * Racially based communal conflicts betwe ...
*
Nadir of American race relations The nadir of American race relations was the period in African American history and the history of the United States from the end of Reconstruction in 1877 through the early 20th century when racism in the country, especially racism agai ...
* Omaha race riot of 1919 *
Racism against Black Americans In the context of racism in the United States, racism against African Americans dates back to the colonial era, and it continues to be a persistent issue in American society in the 21st century. From the arrival of the first Africans in earl ...
*
Racism in the United States Racism in the United States comprises negative attitudes and views on race or ethnicity which are related to each other, are held by various people and groups in the United States, and have been reflected in discriminatory laws, practices and ...
*
Red Summer Red Summer was a period in mid-1919 during which white supremacist terrorism and racial riots occurred in more than three dozen cities across the United States, and in one rural county in Arkansas. The term "Red Summer" was coined by civi ...
(1919) *
Right-wing terrorism Right-wing terrorism, hard right terrorism, extreme right terrorism or far-right terrorism is terrorism that is motivated by a variety of different Right-wing politics, right-wing and far-right politics, far-right ideologies, most prominently, it ...
*
Terrorism in the United States In the United States, a common definition of terrorism is the systematic or threatened use of violence in order to create a general climate of fear to intimidate a population or government and thereby effect political, religious, or ideolog ...
*
White backlash White backlash, also known as white rage, is related to the politics of white grievance, and is the negative response of some white people to the racial progress of other ethnic groups in rights and economic opportunities, as well as their gro ...


Notes


References


Sources

*


Further reading

* Belau, Linda, and Ed Cameron. "Charles W. Chesnutt, Jack Thorne and the African American Literary Response to the 1898 Wilmington Race Riot." in ''Charles Chesnutt Reappraised: Essays on the First Major African American Fiction Writer'' (2009) pp: 7-25. * Cecelski, David S., and Timothy B. Tyson, eds. ''Democracy Betrayed: The Wilmington Race Riot of 1898 and Its Legacy'' (UNC Press Books, 2000) studies by experts. *
online review
* * * * * * Hebard, Andrew. "Romance and Riot: Charles Chesnutt, the Romantic South, and the Conventions of Extralegal Violence." ''African American Review'' 44.3 (2011): 471-487
online
* Hossfeld, Leslie. ''Narrative, political unconscious and racial violence in Wilmington, North Carolina'' (Routledge, 2005). * * Prather, H. Leon. ''We have taken a city: Wilmington racial massacre and Coup of 1898'' (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1984). * * ; Pulitzer Prize for History


Primary sources

* North Carolina. 1898 Wilmington Race Riot Commission, and LeRae Umfleet. ''1898 Wilmington Race Riot Report'' (Research Branch, Office of Archives and History, NC Department of Cultural Resources, 2006
online
.


External links

* (''The White Declaration of Independence:'' click for image of entire article)
"Fresh Air broadcast: Wilmington's Lie: The Murderous Coup of 1898 and the Rise of White Supremacy"
(37-minute audio with transcript), NPR, January 13, 2020.
archive

The Lost History of an American Coup D’État
''The Atlantic,'' August 12, 2017.
archive

"When white supremacists overthrew a government" (12-minute video)
'' Vox.com,'' June 20, 2019.
archive to Vox.com page

Wilmington 1898: When white supremacists overthrew a US government
BBC, January 17, 2021.
The Wilmington Coup D'état of 1898
Subject Guide, the University of North Carolina at Wilmington, Special Collections. {{DEFAULTSORT:Wilmington Insurrection Of 1898 1898 riots 1898 in North Carolina Conflicts in 1898 1890s coups d'état and coup attempts Riots and civil disorder in North Carolina Political violence in the United States Massacres in the United States White American riots in the United States Racially motivated violence against African Americans
Insurrection Rebellion, uprising, or insurrection is a refusal of obedience or order. It refers to the open resistance against the orders of an established authority. A rebellion originates from a sentiment of indignation and disapproval of a situation and ...
November 1898 events Mass murder in 1898 History of racism in North Carolina Lynching deaths in North Carolina African-American history of North Carolina History of racial segregation in the United States 1898 murders in the United States Killings in North Carolina Coups d'état and coup attempts in the United States Political repression in the United States