Friday Faves and Feels, #2
WILMINGTON’S LIE: The Murderous Coup of 1898 and the Rise of White Supremacy
Not all “feels” are pleasant. Nonetheless, we grow when we sit and consider the discomfort some subjects or ideas demand of us. This week’s recommendation, Wilmington’s Lie: The Murderous Coup of 1898 and the Rise of White Supremacy, is a book that brought me information I needed to better understand my nation’s history.
On Wednesday this week, I shared my belief that paying reparations for slavery is a Christian mandate. Part of the reason I believe this is so, is because our national government has never enacted laws to be sure we paid back what we stole.
Last week I shared a book with you about how the north was also complicit in the evil of enslaving people. The use of chattel slavery was an American family affair, so to speak.
We’d like to think that when the Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation freed the enslaved people, and the end of the Civil War kept the Union in tact, the combination of these two things ensured a path to equality for everyone, regardless of skin color.
It was never that simple. In fact, the closer equality came to being a reality, the more white populations did to thwart the progress.
In recent years we’ve begun to learn the reality of what happened in the decades after the Civil War. Likely you’ve heard of the Tulsa Race Massacre by now, when white mobs destroyed “Black Wall Street,” and killed at least 36, but likely anywhere from 100-300 black people. Things like this happened all over the country. As black populations began to grow, succeed, and thrive in communities around our nation, white populations did everything they could to counteract the progress. We threatened, beat, and murdered our way back to power. Such was the case in Wilmington, NC, decades before Tulsa.
I won’t sugar-coat it. From an emotional standpoint, Wilmington’s Lie is not an easy read. Introspection rarely is. When I put this book down I was a combination of sad and irate.
Consider this portion of a review by Eddie S. Glaude Jr.:
The details contained […] [in] the book are heart-wrenching. With economy and a cinematic touch, Zucchino recounts the brutal assault on black Wilmington. A town that once boasted the largest percentage of black residents of any large Southern city found itself in the midst of a systematic purge. Successful black men were targeted for banishment from the city, while black workers left all their possessions behind as they rushed to the swamps for safety. Over 60 people died. No one seemed to care. The governor of North Carolina cowered in the face of the violent rebellion, worried about his own life. President William McKinley turned a blind eye to the bloodshed. And Waddell was selected as mayor as the white supremacists forced the duly elected officials to resign.
In the aftermath of it all, the white community of Wilmington told itself a lie to justify the carnage, a lie that would be repeated so often that it stood in for the truth of what actually happened on Nov. 10.
It’s stories like this that remind me that reparations aren’t only addressing our country’s history of slavery, but also our pattern of holding back our black brothers and sisters. We not only refused to pay back what we owed, but we fought and killed to make sure that only white people remained in power.
I’m glad we’ve made progress here. We need to continue in that manner. Part of this means understanding and acknowledging the hard parts of our past. Acknowledging that we’ve wronged and then making amends is honorable.
Wilmington’s Lie won a Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction in 2021.
Makes me very sad when I think about what the black people have endured!