By John Cox, November 12, 2018.
Europe and the United States recognized two somber anniversaries over the weekend: The Armistice that ended the “war to end all wars” (November 11, 1918) and the murderous pogrom in the Third Reich called Kristallnacht (November 9, 1938), which heralded a more openly violent policy toward the Jews that culminated in the Holocaust.
November 10th marks another important date that should be widely known – especially in North Carolina – but received little attention. Last Saturday was the 120th anniversary of a pogrom against the Black community of Wilmington, NC, and the overthrow of the city’s progressive government – the only successful coup in this country’s history.
These three events have some connections that are obvious and could be summarized with the sort of vague platitudes that the 1918 and 1938 anniversaries evoke: “the senselessness of violence and bloodshed” and “we must reject hatred.”
Yet, there are deeper patterns and histories that connect all three, which should instill in us a sense of profound moral urgency, rather than with the temptation to mumble a hollow sentiment or two.
“Wilmington Messenger.” Nov 9, 1898. Wikipedia Commons
The 1898 massacre and coup represented a violent backlash to progress, a recurring theme in race relations in this country. “At the end of the 19th century, Wilmington was a symbol of black hope. Thanks to its busy port, the black majority city was North Carolina’s largest and most important municipality…. Blacks owned 10 of the city’s 11 eating houses and 20 of its 22 barbershops. The black male literacy rate was higher than that of whites.” (from Timothy Tyson; more below)
These are also the moments when Confederate monuments are erected as a warning and a powerful form of intimidation. And the pogrom and coup of 1898 was not a matter of “uneducated mobs running wild,” but of a concerted, well-organized campaign by the racist power structure, led by such figures as future governor Charles Aycock and long-time US Senator Ben Tillman.
New York Herald. Nov 11, 1898
We advise our students to avoid a certain online encyclopedia, but it seems that Wikipedia’s entry for Wilmington’s “race riot” has been heavily edited and improved by historians and experts, and (unless someone tampers with it!) it’s an excellent source. From the intro:
It is considered a turning point in post-Reconstruction North Carolina politics. The event initiated an era of more severe racial segregation and effective disenfranchisement of African Americans throughout the South, a shift already underway since passage by Mississippiof a new constitution in 1890, raising barriers to voter registration. Laura Edwards wrote in Democracy Betrayed (2000): “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 of blacks.
It was originally described by white Americans as a race riot caused by blacks. However, over time, with more facts publicized, the event has come to be classified as a coup d’état (violent overthrow of a government), with complex causes that were social, political, and economic. It is the only successful coup d’état on record in the U.S.
The coup occurred after the state’s white Democratic Party conspired and led a mob of 2,000 white men to overthrow the legitimately-elected local Fusionist government. They expelled opposition black and white political leaders from the city, destroyed the property and businesses of black citizens built up since the Civil War, including the only black newspaper in the city, and killed an estimated 60 to more than 300 people.
Men gather outside the charred remains of The Daily Record after the 1898 massacre. The newspaper was launched by Alex and Frank Manly a few years earlier, and was the only African-American newspaper in the state, and perhaps the only Black paper published daily in the entire country. Seven issues of the paper are available here. Newspapers such as the Daily Record served a vital function in the Black communities and therefore were often the targets of racist violence.
Timothy Tyson is one of our best historians of race & racism. Blood Done Sign My Name and Radio Free Dixie, about Robert F. Williams of Monroe, NC, are essential, classic works. And he’s not exactly resting on his laurels: Last year’s book on Emmett Till (and Mamie Till’s fight for justice) is another pathbreaking work.
Tyson has also done much to recover and contextualize the story of the Wilmington coup. From a lengthy 2006 article he wrote for the News & Observer of Raleigh:
On Nov. 10, 1898, heavily armed columns of white men marched into the black neighborhoods of Wilmington. In the name of white supremacy, this well-ordered mob burned the offices of the local black newspaper, murdered perhaps dozens of black residents — the precise number isn’t known — and banished many successful black citizens and their so-called “white nigger” allies. A new social order was born in the blood and the flames, rooted in what The News and Observer’s publisher, Josephus Daniels, heralded as “permanent good government by the party of the White Man.”
The Wilmington race riot of 1898 stands as one of the most important chapters in North Carolina’s history. It is also an event of national historical significance. Occurring only two years after the Supreme Court had sanctioned “separate but equal” segregation in Plessy v. Ferguson, the riot marked the embrace of virulent Jim Crow racism, not merely in Wilmington, but across the United States….
At the end of the 19th century, Wilmington was a symbol of black hope. Thanks to its busy port, the black majority city was North Carolina’s largest and most important municipality. Blacks owned 10 of the city’s 11 eating houses and 20 of its 22 barbershops. The black male literacy rate was higher than that of whites.
Black achievement, however, was always fragile. Wealthy whites were willing to accept some black advancement, so long as they held the reins of power. ….
North Carolina became a hotbed of agrarian revolt as hard-pressed farmers soured on the Democrats because of policies that cottoned to banks and railroads. Many white dissidents eventually founded the People’s Party, also known as the Populists. Soon they imagined what had been unimaginable: an alliance with blacks, who shared their economic grievances.
As the economic depression deepened, these white Populists joined forces with black Republicans, forming an interracial “Fusion” coalition that championed local self-government, free public education and electoral reforms that would give black men the same voting rights as whites. In the 1894 and 1896 elections, the Fusion movement won every statewide office, swept the legislature and elected its most prominent white leader, Daniel Russell, to the governorship.
In Wilmington, the Fusion triumph lifted black and white Republicans and white Populists to power. Horrified white Democrats vowed to regain control of the government…..
White-supremacist terrorism 120 years later
A blog post I wrote two weeks ago, after the massacre at the synagogue in Pittsburgh. The perpetrator was driven not simply by “hatred” but by racialized antisemitism and xenophobia.
More on Wilmington 1898:
Tyson, Timothy B. (November 17, 2006). “The Ghosts of 1898. Wilmington’s Race Riot and the Rise of White Supremacy”
http://media2.newsobserver.com/content/media/2010/5/3/ghostsof1898.pdf
1999 book: Democracy Betrayed: The Wilmington Race Riot of 1898 and Its Legacy
The Lost History of an American Coup D’État: from The Atlantic, 2017
Excellent book, published in January 2020: WILMINGTON’S LIE
The Murderous Coup of 1898 and the Rise of White Supremacy
By David Zucchino