Well, we are back with part II of the Wilmington Massacre Of 1898. Now some of the situations in the rest of the story might want to make some of ya’ll go out side, take that shirt off, throw then hands up and get to getting that thang right. Don’t do it. This happened a long time ago and besides its cold out there. Now where were we… oh yes…
The Fusion leaders were some prominent black and white politicians and they was making enemies like Oscar Myer makes baloney. It was getting ready to go down in Wilmington. 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” 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. Remember, back in those days the Democrats were the racist political party. The Fusion even charged a $10.00 tax on any negro that was harassed after dark, $5.00 during the day. Of course that’s hearsay, but I believe em… anywho…
The nine men (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. Parsley – banded 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.
Mario Butler, a local racist editor, wrote in his newspaper:
There is but one chance and but one hope for the railroads to capture the next legislature, and that is for the nigger to be made the issue.
So Simmons decided to build a campaign around the issue of white supremacy, 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. Let’s see, rides a horse and be intimidating? I wonder who that could be?
Simmons began by recruiting media outlets sympathetic to white supremacy. These publications presented blacks 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, “North Carolina is a WHITE MAN’S STATE and WHITE MEN will rule it, and they will crush the party of Negro domination beneath a majority so overwhelming that no other party will ever dare to attempt to establish negro rule here again!!” Daniel Schenck, a party leader and fully loaded racist added, ” It will be the meanest, vilest, dirtiest campaign since 1876. The slogan of the Democratic party from the mountains to the sea will be but one word … ‘Nigger’!” The election of 1876 between Rutherford B. Hayes and Democrat Samuel Tilden of New York was one of the most hostile, controversial campaigns in American history. Hayes won, but if you didn’t know it, you might of thought Tilden was black. They put sand in they grits in those days.
As the fall of 1898 approached, prominent Democrats began organizing white supremacy clubs, known as the White Government Union. The clubs demanded that every white man in Wilmington join. Alderman, Benjamin F. Keith reported,” Many good people were marched from their homes … taken to headquarters, and told to sign. Those that did not were notified that they must leave the city … as there was plenty of rope in the city.” Now, I don’t know about you, but that’s saying something right there. If you was black, you need to get yo wagon ready or get yo gun loaded and buy as much rope as you can afford.
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 Manly”, 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 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, ” We will never surrender to a ragged raffle of Negroes, even if we have to choke the Cape Fear River with carcasses. This I do not believe for a moment that they will submit any longer it is time for the oft quoted shotgun to play a part, and an active one, in the elections … We applaud to the echo your determination that our old historic river should be choked with the bodies of our enemies, white and black, but what his state shall be redeemed. It has reached the point where blood letting is needed for the health of the commonwealth and when [it] commences let it be thorough! Solomon says ‘there is a time to kill.’ That time seems to have come so get to work … You go forward to your work bloody tho’ it may be, with the heart felt approval of many good women in the State. We say AMEN.” Second thought, just get yo wagons ready.
Waddell’s closing became a rallying cry, for white men and women alike.
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, “The Anglo Saxon planted civilization on this continent and wherever this race has been in conflict with another race, it has asserted its supremacy and either conquered or exterminated the foe. This great race has carried the Bible in one hand and the sword in the other. Resist our march of progress and civilization and we will wipe you off the face of the earth.” Forget the wagons, leave now… no really..
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. 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. I don’t know if I covered this or not, but the Red Shirts wore red shirts instead of hoods and eventually folded into the Klu Klux Klan.
A few days before the election, on November 1, 1898, a parade of 1,000 men, rode 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, 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, a drunken Irishman named 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” What, you ain’t gone yet?
The atmosphere in the city made blacks anxious and tense. 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 the Winchester Arms Company of New Jersey. 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.
The day before the election, Waddell excited a large crowd at Thalian Hall when he told them, “You are Anglo-Saxons. You are armed and prepared and you will do your duty … Go to the polls tomorrow, and if you find the negro out voting, tell him to leave the polls and if he refuses, kill him, shoot him down in his tracks. We shall win tomorrow if we have to do it with guns.” Most blacks and many Republicans did not vote in the 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. Wilmington NC, has just made it into my Malcolm X “BHSA” Highly Classified Top Secret Confidential File. Level: X1 GLOCK: WHITE DEVIL SIGHTING CONFIRMED: ONE ALPHA ONE.
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. 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 untrammeled ballot; and a Democratic victory here, as in other parts of the State, was largely the result of the suppression of the Negro vote.” Despite the Democrats’ inflammatory rhetoric in support of white supremacy, and the Red Shirt armed display, the Fusionist government still remained in power in Wilmington.
The White Declaration of Independence
The “Secret Nine” had charged 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”.
“We the undersigned citizens of the city of Wilmington and county of New Hanover, do hereby declare that we will no longer be ruled and will never again be ruled, by men of African origin.
This condition we have in part endured because we felt that the consequences of the war of secession were such as to deprive us of the fair consideration of many of our countrymen.
While we recognize the authority of the United States and will yield to it if exerted, we would not for a moment believe that it is the purpose of 60 million of our own race to subject us permanently to a fate to which no Anglo-Saxon has ever been forced to submit.
We, therefore, believing that we represent unequivocally the sentiments of the white people of this county and city, hereby for ourselves, and as representatives of them, proclaim:
- That the time has come for the intelligent citizens of this community owning 95 percent of the property and paying taxes in proportion, to end the rule by Negroes.
- That we will not tolerate the action of unscrupulous white men in affiliating with the Negroes so that by means of their vote they can dominate the intelligent and thrifty element in the community, thus causing business to stagnate and progress to be out of the question.
- That the Negro has demonstrated by antagonizing our interests in every way, and especially by his ballot, that he is incapable of realizing that his interests are and should be identical with those of the community.
- That the progressive element in any community is the white population and that the giving of nearly all the employment to Negro laborers has been against the best interests of this county and city, and is sufficient reason why the city of Wilmington, with its natural advantages, has not become a city of at least 50,000 inhabitants.
- That we propose in the future to give to white men a large part of the employment heretofore given to Negroes because we realize that white families cannot thrive here unless there are more opportunities for employment of the different members of their families.
- That we white men expect to live in this community peaceably; to have and provide absolute protection for our families, who shall be safe from insult or injury from all persons, whomsoever. We are prepared to treat the Negroes with justice in all matters which do not involve sacrifice of the intelligent and progressive portion of the community. But are equally prepared now and immediately to enforce what we know to be our rights.
- That we have been, in our desire for harmony and peace, blinded both to our interests and our rights. A climax was reached when the Negro paper of this city published an article so vile and slanderous that it would in most communities have resulted in a lynching, and yet there is no punishment, provided by the courts, adequate for the offense. We, therefore, owe it to the people of this community and city, as protection against such license in the future, that “The Record” cease to be published and that its editor be banished from this community.
- We demand that he leave the city forever within 24 hours after the issuance of this Proclamation. Second, that the printing press from which “The Record” has been issued be shipped from the city without delay; that we be notified within 12 hours of the acceptance or rejection of this demand.
If the demand is agreed to, we counsel forbearance on the part of the white men. If the demand is refused or no answer is given within the time mentioned, then the editor, Manly, will be expelled by force.” You know they got another agenda. What they mean is Manly’s dead body will be expelled. The group then decided to give the city’s black residents 12 hours to comply with it. 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. I don’t know what that brother wrote about them racist, but they wasn’t going to settle for nuthin but dead black Manley au Rop’e Burn. That’s Manley in the next picture.
When Waddell and the Committee did not receive a response by 7:30 a.m. (it is unclear when Waddell checked his mailbox), about 45 minutes later, he gathered about 500 white businessmen and veterans to the Wilmington’s armory. After heavily arming themselves with rifles and the Gatling gun, Waddell then led the group to the two-story publishing office of “The Daily Record”. They broke into 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 blacks 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 blacks 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, and the federal Naval Reserves, taking them into Brooklyn to quell the “riot”. They intimidated both black and white crowds with rapid-fire weapons, and killed several black men. Hundreds of blacks fled the town to take shelter in nearby swamps.
As the violence spread, Waddell led a group to 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 4 p.m. that day.
Once he was officially 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 blacks 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.
It is estimated that by the end of the day (November 10), Waddell’s orders led to the killing of between 60 and 300 black people, and to the banishment of about 20 more. Subsequent to Waddell’s usurping power, he and his team were re-elected in March 1899 to city offices. Waddell would hold the mayorship until his death in 1905.
So that’s the story of “the Wilmington Massacre Of 1898.” I like to thank you for reading Hill1news and traveling with me through history. Now let me go back inside, it’s getting cold out here.
Source: Wikipedia
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