In modern times, cross burning or cross lighting is a practice which is associated with the
Ku Klux Klan. However, it was practiced long before the Klan's inception. Since the early 20th century, the Klan burned crosses on hillsides as a way to
intimidate
Intimidation is to "make timid or make fearful"; or to induce fear. This includes intentional behaviors of forcing another person to experience general discomfort such as humiliation, embarrassment, inferiority, limited freedom, etc and the victi ...
and threaten black Americans and other non-whites.
Scottish origins
In
Scotland
Scotland (, ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a Anglo-Scottish border, border with England to the southeast ...
, the
fiery cross, known as the , was used as a declaration of war. The sight of it commanded all
clan members to rally to the defence of the area. On other occasions, a small burning cross would be carried from town to town. It was used in the
War of 1812
The War of 1812 (18 June 1812 – 17 February 1815) was fought by the United States, United States of America and its Indigenous peoples of the Americas, indigenous allies against the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, United Kingdom ...
between Britain and the U.S. as a means of mobilizing the Scottish
Fencibles
The Fencibles (from the word ''defencible'') were British regiments raised in the United Kingdom, Isle of Man and in the colonies for defence against the threat of invasion during the Seven Years' War, the American War of Independence, the Frenc ...
and militia which were settled in
Glengarry County, Ontario against the invaders, In 1820, over 800 fighting men of Clan Grant were gathered, by the passing of the fiery cross, to come to the aid of their Clan Chieftain and his sister in the town of
Elgin, Scotland. In Scotland itself, the last significant use of the burning cross was made in 1745, during the
Jacobite rising,
[The Capital Scot](_blank)
and it was subsequently described in the novels and poetry of Sir
Walter Scott
Sir Walter Scott, 1st Baronet (15 August 1771 – 21 September 1832), was a Scottish novelist, poet, playwright and historian. Many of his works remain classics of European and Scottish literature, notably the novels '' Ivanhoe'', '' Rob Roy ...
, particularly ''
The Lady of the Lake
The Lady of the Lake (french: Dame du Lac, Demoiselle du Lac, cy, Arglwyddes y Llyn, kw, Arloedhes an Lynn, br, Itron al Lenn, it, Dama del Lago) is a name or a title used by several either fairy or fairy-like but human enchantresses in the ...
'' of 1810.
Symbol of the Ku Klux Klan
In the
first era,
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 Unio ...
Klans did not burn crosses. The belief that reconstruction Klans burned crosses was introduced by
Thomas Dixon Jr., in his novel ''
The Clansman: A Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan'' (1905). A cross burning is first described in Book IV Chapter 2 "The Fiery Cross" on pages 324–326 of the 1905 edition. It is introduced by one of the characters as "the old Scottish rite of the burning cross. It will send a thrill of inspiration to every clansmen in the hills." It is further elaborated that
In olden times when the Chieftain of our people summoned the clan on an errand of life and death, the Fiery Cross, extinguished in sacrificial blood, was sent by swift courier from village to village. This call was never made in vain, nor will it be to-night in the new world. Here, on this spot made holy ground by the blood of those we hold dearer than life, I raise the ancient symbol of an unconquered race of men—
This scene is accompanied by an unnumbered plate illustration by
Arthur I. Keller, captioned "'The fiery cross of old Scotland's hills'", showing two robed, unmasked Klansmen, one of whom is holding a lighted cross, over a bound, blindfolded and gagged black American, while robed and hooded klansmen look on. The novel ends with a Klansman waiting for election results stating "Look at our lights on the mountains! They are ablaze - range on range our signals gleam until the Fiery Cross is lost among the stars" meaning that he had won and civilization had been saved in the South. The fiery cross is mentioned once again in the final novel of Dixon's Klan trilogy, ''The Traitor: A Story of the Fall of the Invisible Empire'', when a
Grand Dragon
Ku Klux Klan (KKK) nomenclature has evolved over the order's nearly 160 years of existence. The titles and designations were first laid out in the original Klan's prescripts of 1867 and 1868, then revamped with William J. Simmons's '' Kloran'' of ...
tosses a burning cross on a heap of discarded Klan robes and regalia in obedience to the order of the
Grand Dragon
Ku Klux Klan (KKK) nomenclature has evolved over the order's nearly 160 years of existence. The titles and designations were first laid out in the original Klan's prescripts of 1867 and 1868, then revamped with William J. Simmons's '' Kloran'' of ...
to dissolve the order. This scene is accompanied by an illustration captioned "Some of the men were sobbing" by Charles David Williams featuring a gathering of Klansmen over a burning pile of robes, carrying three burning crosses.
''The Birth of a Nation''
In
D.W. Griffith's 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 Clan ...
'' (1915), an adaptation of Thomas Dixon's novel, ''The Clansman'', two sequences depict cross-burnings.
The first sequence depicts a
Confederate colonel's little sister, who rejects a marriage proposal by a black captain (of the
occupying Union force) and then he must flee after he chases her (the
Piedmont, South Carolina legislature had legalized interracial marriages, and the story imagines the social chaos that whites feared would develop). She is cornered at the edge of a cliff and threatens to jump off the cliff unless he stops. He continues his pursuit, and she jumps.
Her brother finds her dying at the bottom of the cliff and holds her in his arms; she identifies her attacker before she passes away. The few members of the local clan burn a small (around ) cross, drenched in the young girl's blood. A
kangaroo court
A kangaroo court is a court that ignores recognized standards of law or justice, carries little or no official standing in the territory within which it resides, and is typically convened ad hoc. A kangaroo court may ignore due process and come ...
is
convened, hears
the girl's dying words when the colonel gives his testimony, finds the captain guilty of
murder, and
executes him. The clan members
place his body on the front porch of the South Carolina governor's mansion with a square piece of white sheeting with the initials KKK.
The second sequence depicts the aftermath of two
home invasions. The first home invasion occurs at the governor's mansion. A
black member of the South Carolina legislature proposes marriage to the governor's daughter and, when she rejects his proposal, he threatens her with weapons. The governor attempts to intervene but his attempt fails and he is taken captive. The second home invasion occurs at the house of the Confederate colonel; his mother was revealed to be a clan sympathizer and she expressed her sympathy for the clan by making clan uniforms. The clan wishes to intervene in these
hostage
A hostage is a person seized by an abductor in order to compel another party, one which places a high value on the liberty, well-being and safety of the person seized, such as a relative, employer, law enforcement or government to act, or refr ...
situations but it is prevented from doing so by the occupying Union troops. The colonel requests help by burning a cross in the daytime; the black smoke which is produced by the burning cross signals clans from neighboring counties to come to their aid and contest the Union military's control of the town. Each clan wears distinct head-dresses and robes. They greet each other with their faces uncovered although they ride into town with sheeting over their faces. The colonel's uniform has two adjacent square crosses on his robe, presumably from the original clan in Scotland.
In the United States, the first recorded cross burning occurred on November 25, 1915, ten months after the debut of ''The Birth of a Nation'', when a group of men which led by
William J. Simmons burned a cross atop
Stone Mountain
Stone Mountain is a quartz monzonite dome Inselberg, monadnock and the site of Stone Mountain Park, east of Atlanta, Georgia. Outside the park is the small city of Stone Mountain, Georgia. The park is the most visited tourist site in the state o ...
, Georgia, inaugurating the revival of the Ku Klux Klan. The event was attended by 15 charter members and a few aging former members of the original Klan.
Crosses were burned during the
Tallahassee bus boycott of 1956.
According to journalist and civil rights advocate
Carey McWilliams, in California during the '30s, several crosses were burned as part of the intimidation practices of the
vigilante groups which were organized to break off pickers' strikes by the Associated Farmers.
In France
''
Croix-de-Feu
, logo = Croix de Feu.svg
, logo_size = 200px
, leader1_title = President
, leader1_name = François de La Rocque
, foundation = 11 November 1927
, dissolution = 10 January 1936
, successor = F ...
'' (, ''Cross of Fire'') was a
nationalist
Nationalism is an idea and movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the state. As a movement, nationalism tends to promote the interests of a particular nation (as in a group of people), Smith, Anthony. ''Nationalism: Th ...
French league of the
Interwar period.
Legal position in the United States
In 2003, the
Supreme Court of the United States invoked a stage adaptation of Sir Walter Scott's ''
The Lady of the Lake
The Lady of the Lake (french: Dame du Lac, Demoiselle du Lac, cy, Arglwyddes y Llyn, kw, Arloedhes an Lynn, br, Itron al Lenn, it, Dama del Lago) is a name or a title used by several either fairy or fairy-like but human enchantresses in the ...
'' in its ''
Virginia v. Black'' decision as an example of a display of cross burning that was not
intended "to intimidate a person or group of persons" when they struck down a Virginia statute that included the language "Any such burning of a cross shall be ''
prima facie'' evidence of an intent to intimidate a person or group of persons" because it ''presumes'' that the "intent
sto intimidate."
[Erwin Chemerinsky]
The First Amendment
Wolters Kluwer.
See also
*
*
Lewes Bonfire
Lewes Bonfire, or Bonfire for short, describes a set of celebrations held in the town of Lewes, Sussex, England, that constitute the United Kingdom's largest and most famous Bonfire Night festivities, with Lewes being called the bonfire capi ...
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cross Burning
Cross symbols
Ku Klux Klan
Racially motivated violence against African Americans
Traditions involving fire
White nationalist symbols