The Wilmington Insurrection of 1898, also known as the Wilmington Massacre of 1898 or the Wilmington Race Riot of 1898, occurred in Wilmington, North Carolina on November 10, 1898 and following days; it is considered a turning point in North Carolina politics following Reconstruction. Originally labeled a race riot, it is now also termed a coup d'etat, as insurrectionists displaced the elected local government.[1] This event is the only instance of a municipal government being overthrown in US history.[2] (During the fall of 1874, however, after a contested gubernatorial election, thousands of insurrectionist militia of the Democrat John McEnery fought the Battle of Liberty Place, displaced the elected state government based in New Orleans, and occupied government buildings for a few days before retreating before federal forces.[3])
In the Wilmington Insurrection, Democratic white supremacists illegally seized power from an elected government, running officials out of the city, and killing many blacks in widespread attacks. Among their weapons, they used a Gatling gun mounted on a wagon. They took photographs of each other during the events. Although residents appealed for help to Governor Daniel Lindsay Russell and President William McKinley, they did nothing in response.
Contents |
Wilmington, then the largest city in the state, had a majority-black population, numerous black professionals and a rising middle class, and a strong, biracial Republican Party. In the 1894 and 1896 elections, North Carolina’s Populist Party fused with the Republican Party to gain control of the state government; they were known as the Fusionists. The Fusionists won the elections and passed laws increasing the franchise for blacks for the first time since the Reconstruction era.
During the 1898 election, however, the Democratic Party was able to gain government control at the state level, in part due to widespread violence and intimidation of blacks by the paramilitary Red Shirts, acting on behalf of the Democratic Party, which suppressed black voting. Further, Daniel L. Russell was unable to satisfy both the Populist and Republican parties to keep the Fusion coalition viable.[4]
Because Wilmington was a black-majority city, its election was followed statewide. Despite the Democrats' inflammatory rhetoric in support of white supremacy, and an extensive Red Shirt campaign of intimidation against opponents, a biracial fusionist government was elected to office in Wilmington on November 8. White supremacists led by Alfred Moore Waddell had organized a secret committee of nine and made plans to replace the government in such an eventuality. During the election campaign, whites had criticized Alexander Manly, editor of Wilmington's Daily Record, the state's only black-owned newspaper, and wanted to close him down.
For some time, Josephus Daniels, editor of the Raleigh News and Observer, used Wilmington as a symbol for “Negro domination” because of its government. Many newspapers published pictures and stories implying that African American men were attacking white women. Manly denied the charges, claiming the stories represented consensual relationships and suggested "white men [should] be more protective of their women against sexual advances from males of all races." White supremacists publicized his words as a catalyst for violence against the black community.[5]
After the election, whites created a Committee of Twenty-Five, all supremacists, and presented their demands to the Committee of Colored Citizens (CCC), a group of politicians and leaders of the African-American community. Specifically, the whites wanted a promise that Manly would be evicted. The CCC was supposed to respond on November 10, 1898. When Alfred Moore Waddell and the Committee had not received a response by 7:30 a.m., he gathered a group of white businessmen and Confederate veterans at the Wilmington Light Infantry armory.[2] By 8:00 a.m., Waddell led the armed group to the Daily Record office, where they destroyed the equipment and burned down the building of the only African-American newspaper in the state.[6]
By this time, Manly, along with many others, had hidden or fled Wilmington for safety. Throughout the rest of the day, rioting and gunfire took place throughout Wilmington. The insurrectionists drove political and business leaders from the town. The estimated number of deaths ranges from six to 100, all blacks. Because of incomplete records by the hospital, churches and coroner's office, the number of people killed remains uncertain, but only blacks died. Hundreds fled the town to take shelter in nearby swamps. After the violence settled, so many blacks left Wilmington that the demographics changed.[7]
Waddell and his mob forced white Republican Mayor Silas P. Wright and other members of the city government (both black and white) to resign. (Their terms lasted until 1899). They installed a new city council that elected Waddell to take over as mayor by 4 p.m. that day.[6] Subsequent to Waddell's usurping power, the Democratic state legislators (see North Carolina General Assembly of 1899-1900) passed the first Jim Crow laws for North Carolina. The Democrats had essentially created martial law for African Americans in North Carolina, setting an example that had influence beyond the state's borders for at least fifty years. The legislature circumscribed federal rights which blacks had secured in constitutional amendments after the Civil War; for instance, by imposing poll taxes and literacy tests, the legislators sharply reduced voting by most blacks.[1] Not until the African-American Civil Rights Movement and passage of national laws several generations later would African Americans regain their civil rights in North Carolina.
Among the nine conspirators to plan the insurrection was Hugh MacRae. He later donated land to New Hanover County outside Wilmington for a park, which was named in his honor. His descendant contributed to the 1998 commemoration.
In 1900, a second "white supremacy" political campaign cemented the Democrats' domination in the state; they elected Charles B. Aycock as governor. Party agitators used photos suggesting "Negro domination" to raise fears and tensions. The crude strategy, plus state changes in electoral rules that sharply reduced African-American voting, brought the Democrats to power again.
The night before the election, Waddell spoke: "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." The Democratic Party won by a landslide.[8]
By the early 1990s, many residents and officials of Wilmington thought that the events of November 10, 1898, needed to be commemorated and discussed openly. Different histories were referred to by different groups in the city. Similar to efforts to acknowledge riots in Rosewood, Florida, and Tulsa, Oklahoma, commemoration organizing began at the grassroots level. In 1995, informal conversations began between the African-American community, UNC-Wilmington's university faculty, and civil rights activists. The intention was to inform residents fully about what really happened on that day, and to agree on a monument in remembrance of 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 came to the program, 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, which brought in political leaders, academic specialists and civic rights activists, as well as facilitators such as Common Ground. Word spread that George Rountree III was to attend the discussion to be held at St. Stephen's A.M.E. Church. As his grandfather was known to have been one of the leaders of the white violence in 1898, Rountree attracted a large crowd. Following a speech by John Haley, a noted African-American historian of race relations from UNC-Wilmington, Rountree rose to speak. He started by making known his personal support for equality. Rountree went on to talk about his relationship with his grandfather, saying that he "refused to apologize for his grandfather's actions, insisting that he was the product of his times." Rountree did not apologize for what his ancestor had done. Some descendants felt that way because they had no part in their family's actions.[5]
Many listeners argued with Rountree about his position and refusal to apologize. Some stated that "although he bore no responsibility for those events, he personally had benefited from them." An African American, Kenneth Davis, spoke of his own grandfather's achievements during those times, which Rountree's grandfather had "snuffed out" by his violence. Davis said that the "past of Wilmington's black community…was not the past Rountree preferred."[5] After much debate among the listeners, backed up by countless people giving "muffled shouts of approval," Davis rose to thank Rountree for speaking at the event.[5]
Recognizing that the black community had suffered economically following the insurrection, the Commission grappled with a response. It adopted a two-part approach: the "first was the creation of an economic development committee to explore the possible economic benefits of black-heritage tourism, a concept that was strongly endorsed by a number of African Americans within the organization. The second approach, accomplished through cooperation with the Greater Wilmington Chamber of Commerce, was the creation of the community-based Partners for Economic Inclusion, which sponsored a major conference in September 1998 to address "the issue of inclusion of the black community in the greater business environment."[5]
Several histories of the event have been published over the years. African-American historian Helen Edmunds began to address the violence in her work, Negro in Fusion Politics in the 1950s. Leon Prather's work, We Have Taken a City, in the 1980s gave a full view of events. Democracy Betrayed, edited by David Cecelsi and Timothy Tyson, was published during the centennial.
In 2000, the North Carolina General Assembly established the 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.[9] The commission was co-chaired by state legislator Thomas E. Wright. Some people felt his 2007 campaign finance scandal tainted the work of the commission and its proposed legislation.[10]
The Commission's history by LeRae Umfleet was released in 2006. In January 2007, the North Carolina Democratic Party officially acknowledged and renounced the actions by party leaders during the Wilmington insurrection and the white supremacy campaigns.[11]
Historians noted that the press in Raleigh 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 and participate in the upcoming coup d'état. Articles in the Charlotte Observer have also been cited as adding to the inflamed emotions.
The Wilmington Insurrection of 1898 is fictionalized, with great attention to contemporary documents, within Book Two of John Sayles' 2011 novel, A Moment in the Sun, where it takes up roughly 20% of Sayle's narrative. While many of the characters are fictional, Sayles' account does include some historical figures.
The Marrow of Tradition was written by African-American author Charles Waddell Chesnutt in 1901 as a plea for racial justice.[12]