Chapter I: Introduction

This work is undertaken with the wish to gratify a popular desire for addition to the scant literature relating to the Reconstruction Era and that most remarkable organization of modern times--begotten of conditions unparalleled in history, conditions which can never recur, and vanishing with the emergency which created it--the militant Ku Klux Klan. Only one writer has ventured far into this field of research, which until then seemed forbidden, and in his contribution to history, fact and fiction are so interwoven as to be almost indistinguishable. But the widespread and intense interest manifested in his revelations of the origin and purposes of the Klan indicates that the present generation eagerly imbibes knowledge of the sacrifices and achievements of the men who in the awful crisis of reconstruction, and against almost insuperable obstacles, rescued the commonwealth from the control of corrupt adventurers and ignorant freedmen, and established orderly government, without which the subsequent marvelous development of natural resources and advancement in education which have placed the state in the forefront of progress would have been impossible. This evident interest encourages the hope that a simple narrative of facts connected with the struggle in that part of the Black Belt of Alabama which formed the Fourth Congressional District, by one who was in the midst of it and a close observer, will receive a welcome.

CONTENTS

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CHAPTER ONE--PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT 9

CHAPTER TWO--NATIVE GOVERNMENT 14

CHAPTER THREE--MILITARY GOVERNMENT 19

CHAPTER FOUR--A GRAVE PROBLEM 26

CHAPTER FIVE--THE FREEDMEN'S BUREAU 34

CHAPTER SIX--MILITARY REGULATIONS 38

CHAPTER SEVEN--THE UNION LEAGUE 47

CHAPTER EIGHT--A REPUBLICAN BLUNDER 51

CHAPTER NINE--CARPETBAG GOVERNMENT 54

CHAPTER TEN--RUINOUS MISGOVERNMENT 74

CHAPTER ELEVEN--THE WHITES AROUSED 84

CHAPTER TWELVE--THE KU KLUX KLAN 90

CHAPTER THIRTEEN--A MISCARRIAGE 99

CHAPTER FOURTEEN--A CONVENTION SUPPLEMENTS KU KLUX 104

CHAPTER FIFTEEN--FOILED THE KU KLUX 107

CHAPTER SIXTEEN--IN TUSCALOOSA 114

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN--A SERIES OF TRAGEDIES 116

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN--DISAPPEARANCE OF PRICE 124

CHAPTER NINETEEN--RIOTS IN MARENGO 127

CHAPTER TWENTY--KILLINGS AND RIOTING IN GREENE 132

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE--RESTORATION OF WHITE SUPREMACY 148

WHEN THE KU KLUX RODE