1619: The Year The Troubles Began

 On August 20 1619 America’s original sin took place. The English privateer White Lion arrived at Point Comfort, Virginia with a cargo of 30 Africans.

These men and women were stolen from a Portuguese ship by the privateers and then when they landed in Virginia the Africans were traded primarily for goods. They went into immediate indentured servitude.

A few days later the White Lion’s companion ship the Treasurer did the same. The first Africans were sold for food as Virginia Governor George Yeardly and his head of trade Abraham Piersey made the deal. 

This initial group of Africans were part of a group of 50,000 war prisoners from the Kingdom of Portuguese’s war with the African Kingdom of Ndongo in what is modern Angola. The Portuguese had already begun using these captured Africans as slaves in their territories in the Americas

These Africans were not the first in what would become the US but they were the first to be used by the English and northern European settlers that would form the majority of Americans. There were Spanish slaves in Florida. 

From this point forward things began to snowball and by 1661 Virginia set the standard for African chattel slavery. In 1661 the laws stated a free white man can own Negro slaves and that a child born to a woman is also a slave.

Strange Fruit: The Indiana Lynching That Inspired The Billie Holiday Classic

 

In 1930 there were some 250 “Sundown Towns” in Indiana a reflection of deep-seated, continuing prejudice. These were towns where law enforcement and town government agreed to laws to remove anyone who was black from the town. Historically there had been 21 previous lynchings in the state, so there was fertile ground for racial violence by the night of August 7, 1930.

On the night of Aug 6th, a 23rd-year-old man named Claude Deeter and his fiancée Mary Bell had been attacked. Deeter was shot and he died at the hospital in the early morning. Ball reported that she had been raped and said it was four Black men who did the heinous crime. By afternoon Grant County Sheriff Jacob Campbell had arrested four young African American men and had them in jail. 

Word of the crime and the arrests had been spreading among local communities and by late evening the lawn of the jail and courthouse in Marion a mob estimated at 10,000 to 15,000 angry white people had gathered. Word had spread that there would be a hanging that night and apparently, people wanted to be there for the spectacle.

Although there was great menace oozing from the crowd Sheriff Campbell and all his men stayed at the jail to protect the men in lock up. What the crowd did not know was that Ball had recanted when asked to identify the men. It probably wouldn’t have mattered because the mob was heated and looking for blood.

First, they attempted to break in and steal the men from their cells. The sheriff and his men repelled the first attack. The mob redirected themselves and got crowbars and sledgehammers and quickly made a hole in the wall where the mob pulled out a man named Thomas Shipp. The crowd pulled Shipp screaming his innocence to a tree on the courthouse lawn, as they beat him and drug him to the tree where they strung him up. They turned their attention to Abram Smith, Smith tried to fight back and at one point was able to remove the noose but the crowd further beat him and broke both his arms. 

Finally, the mob pulled James Cameron out and they were taking him to the same offending tree, however, someone in the crowd called out, “Take this boy back. He had nothing to do with any raping or killing.” With blood lust sated the mob allowed Cameron to return to jail, where he was evacuated by the sheriff to a neighboring county.

The mob had moved the body of Shipp to the same tree as Smith and had tried to burn them but were unable to. It took hours for the massive crowd to disperse, some of them taking souvenirs

James Cameron was convicted for participating in the killing of Claude Deeter and spent four years in prison. He left prison at the age of twenty-one determined, "to pick up the loose threads of my life, weave them into something beautiful, worthwhile and God-like.” He went on to become an important Civil Rights activist. He founded several NAACP chapters and worked for voting rights. His memoir, “A  Time of Terror: A Survivor's Story” was published in 1982, and in 1988 he founded America’s Black Holocaust Museum. He was pardoned by the state of Indiana in 1991 for his participation in the Deeter murder.

Even with multiple photographs taken of the lynching, primarily by local photographer and eye witness statements, Flossie Bailey, a local NAACP official in Marion, and Attorney General James M. Ogden worked to gain indictments but could not. The grand jury refused to examine the testimony and brought no charges. 

The iconic photograph of the two swaying bodies taken by Lawrence Beitler was sold several 1,000 times in the next week and it inspired Abel Meeropol to write the poem “Bitter Fruit” which he later put to music and renamed “Strange Fruit” which became a signature song of Billie Holiday and has been covered by Nina Simone, UB40, Annie Lennox and others. Strange Fruit became the anthem for the anti-lynching movement and an important part of the Civil Rights movement.

Sources:

https://www.abhmuseum.org/an-iconic-lynching-in-the-north/

https://www.abhmuseum.org/about/dr-cameron-founder-lynching-survivor/

https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/marion-indiana-lynching-1930/

Detail of photo by Lawrence Beitler, Fair use image

Officials Allow Lynching And Blacks Questioning The Action Are Run Out Of Town

In the Jim Crow period of the South Lynching was so common and so condoned by authorities and others in the dominant white society that often reports were bareboned and lacking in details as to when, why or how an African American was murdered by the mob.

Such was the case on August 5, 1907, when a Black man named Thomas Hall was killed by a mob. News reports appeared all over the country and were all identical from Houston to Honolulu to New York City.

The story was that Hall was in jail after being arrested for attempted assault on two young White girls. The story didn’t say when, who, or even where. What they did report was that Hall attempted to assault the two girls and said lewd things to them. Then the story reported he had been arrested at 9:00 p.m. then was found dead hanging from a tree near the jail two hours later.

The story made no mention of how he was taken from the jail, or if there were attempts to settle the mob. All that is reported is that Hall’s body was found and the order was returned to the town of Runge in Texas. 

What was unexplained is how Hall was taken from jail or if law enforcement was a causal supporter of the mob. No details about Hall’s life are given or if there had been a court date or if there was going to be an inquest into the young man’s death.

What is stated is that any black person questioning the lynching, the failure of law enforcement to protect Hall was asked to leave town and not return. So both the hanging of a man and the creation of a “Sundown Town” in Runge went unquestioned by anyone working for a newspaper and was just another fact of life in the segregated South.

Labor Violence Turns Into Racial Violence In Arkansas Causing Black Exodus

Even though the White laborers had suspicions and even dislike of European immigrants there was one thing they could agree upon; they hated the Black workers who were also working for the Kansas City, Pittsburgh, and Gulf Railway. The railroad was building a line in Polk and Sevier County in Arkansas. When a group of approximately 30 Black laborers arrived to begin work on Aug 5th, 1896 they were attacked by a group of White laborers with the tools being used for the railroad.

Of the 30, three were killed, another eight were severely injured, and all were forced into railroad cars and out of Polk County. Soon reports began to trickle out of Polk County regarding the incident and citizens of the county didn’t deny it. They celebrated the incident and the violence. A quote, unattributed, appeared in several stories stating, “The natives have served notice that Sambo must move on, as it is against their religion to permit them to desecrate their soil with pick and shovel or otherwise.”

What is critical to understand is that Italian, Hungarian, and Swedish immigrants took part in this violence and forced Negros out of Polk County, immigrants that otherwise would themselves face prejudice for their skin tone and religion. However as both a labor attack and a racial one workers for the railroad and other Polk County companies such as the Canfield lumber mill and Hawthorne Mills. The fierce labor competition allowed racial extremists to manipulate emotions and rally mobs even to the point that both local law enforcement and the railroad bulls didn’t have an opportunity to stop the mob from driving the Black workers away.

The town of Mena, the county seat, became what was known as a “Sundown Town” at this time with posted warnings that anyone of Negro ancestry must be out of town and out of Polk County by the time the sun went down. This practice lasted well into the 1940s in many Arkansas locations. 

Sources:

https://www.jstor.org/stable/23188017?read-now=1&seq=5#page_scan_tab_contents

https://encyclopediaofarkansas.net/entries/polk-county-race-war-of-1896-7390/

 

Paul Robeson Punished By The State Department For Not Keeping Quiet

 

Paul Robeson was quite possibly the most identifiable African American in the world in 195o. His incredible baritone voice was heard on records, stage, and screen, he was known for his posture in civil rights for American Blacks and equality and for his anti-Imperialist politics, which were seen by many as being pro-communist and anti-American

Robeson gained fame in 1925 when he got his first staring role in Eugene O’Neill’s “All God’s Chillun Got Wings” and then the lead in the play “Emperor Jones” his success in theater led him to be part of the  Harlem Renescanice with a social circle of Langston Hughes and W.E.B. Dubois.

Robeson went to London in the late 1920s to perform “Emperor Jones” and he began to see the world through very different eyes. He played Joe in the London production of “Showboat” and his version of “Old Man River” became the international standard. His travels led him to meet a new class of intellectuals and stimulated in him a desire to learn more about Africa and his heritage. He also became a film star and became more vocal about the roles he would not take if they were anti-Negro or supported the colonial view of history in Africa.

He met and formed a close friendship with Einstien over music when the professor came backstage at one of his concerts in 1935

Robeson became increasingly an activist by standing with the Spanish loyalist and Republicans during the Spanish Civil War and then with Jewish refugees during World War II although he had issues with the segregated military of the United States he supported the war effort.

After the war his controversial anti-imperialist stances caught the ear and eye of the attorney general’s office and after a failed meeting with President Truman regarding anti-lynching legislation. Robeson Robeson founded the American Crusade Against Lynching organization in 1946, the organization was then put on the list of “Subversive” organizations by the House UnAmerican Activities Committee. Robeson was also very vocal in supporting labor unions and the Civil Rights Congress. He was called to testify before HUAC because of his friendship with known American Communists. In 1949 his concert in Peekskill, New York led to riots and had to be rescheduled because he had become such an outspoken activist for civil rights, peace, and against the HUAC, he was also seen as a sympathizer with the U.S.S.R. 

It was against this backdrop and history that the United States Department of State rescinded his passport on Aug. 4th, 1950. This led to an eight-year struggle between Robeson and the Federal Government. Unable to travel Robeson saw much of his income cut and in the U.S. he struggled to find work because of the perception that he was a communist sympathizer, this idea was reinforced when he came out against the Korean action by the U.S. He was very much opposed to the war and spoke out against it in “Hands Off Korea” rallies, he also was very outspoken about the inequality in the U.S. while the nation was intervening in Korea for ‘Freedom’. Robeson and his with were very aware of the times and how, in their view, the United States was acting as an imperialist power in Korea but also puppet regimes in Iran and the activities in Africa especially in Egypt during the 1950s. His career suffered greatly and he was all but black-listed from TV and radio for his views. Without the passport, he couldn't travel to more friendly European countries to perform and thus his income was greatly reduced. Despite this Robeson persevered.

He began a monthly magazine with DuBoise named “Freedom” and he wrote the lead editorial on the front page for five years. He presented the United Nations with a petition claiming genocide by the United States over slavery, Jim Crow, and lynching. He performed at peace concerts at the Peace Arch by the Canadian Border in Washington State. 

In 1956, Robeson was called before HUAC again. In his testimony, he invoked the Fifth Amendment and refused to reveal his political affiliations. However, he did state, “My father was a slave and my people died to build the United States and, I am going to stay here, and have a part of it just like you and no fascist-minded people will drive me from it!”

Given the Cold War politics and the segregation of America, it is no surprise that Robeson faced the problems he did. Yet none of this deterred him, his ethos, as he stated before HUAC in 1956, “Whether I am or not a Communist is irrelevant. The question is whether American citizens, regardless of their political beliefs or sympathies, may enjoy their constitutional rights.”

Robeson’s passport was returned to him after the 1958 Supreme Court decision in Kent v Dulles ruled that no one could be denied their passport without due process. 

Sources:

https://www.biography.com/actors/paul-robeson 

https://tinyurl.com/2e7pwn8t

https://tinyurl.com/5yxjw6wp

Rumors Of Police Killing Lead To Riot In War Time Harlem

 

On the warm summer night of August 1st an African American solider Robert Bandy met his mother for dinner at the historic Hotel Braddock in Harlem, as they walked through the lobby, and saw a White officer trying to hit an African American woman with his nightstick as he tried to arrest her. Bandy attempted to intervene and was shot by the officer.

Rumors then flew through the city like fiery embers and Blacks started throwing rocks and breaking out the windows of businesses. Although Bandy received just a superficial wound the rumor was that he had been killed, and thousands of people filled the streets attacking not just shops but the 28th Street Police Precinct and Sydenham Hospital. 

Because of the rationing, price gouging, and racism, the African Americans of Harlem were acutely feeling the economic effects of the war. Blacks had hoped that their service to the country would change some of the segregation laws and open opportunities, however, this did not happen sending citizens into a violent rage.

Rioters looted shops, broke hundreds of windows, and vandalized street lights and other public utilities. Mayor Fiorello La Guardia sent in nearly 6,000 officers and 8,000 National Guardsmen to quell the riot He also met with Black leaders and set a curfew. He went on the radio and requested rioters to stand down and observe the curfew. The riot did end in the early morning of Aug, 2nd. 

In the aftermath, La Guardia continued to meet with the NCAAP and immediately had city works and sanitation start on clean up. He ordered the taverns to stay closed until the 4th of August and made sure the hospitals were able to meet the demand by asking for aid from other hospitals outside Harlem.

Six people were killed in the night, 700 were injured and another 600 were arrested. It was estimated 4,000 windows were broken out. The Mayor had food delivered to the residents of Harlem and the Red Cross provided lemonade and curlers. 

To meet some of the underlying issues exposed by the riot and how many African Americans felt like second-class citizens. The Federal Office of Price Administration set up an office on 135th Street in Harlem and was soon flooded with complaints. La Guardia pressured all city agencies to make sure rent controls were practiced and forced landlords to go ahead with renewals of leases. These small acts it is believed forestalled another riot

Sources:

https://www.baruch.cuny.edu/nycdata/disasters/riots-harlem_1943.html

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Harlem-race-riot-of-1943

https://www.jstor.org/stable/40999915

Top Image: Bettmann Archive / Getty Images