"Wilmington Race Riot" of 1898.

A politically motivated attack by whites against the city's leading African American Race Riot of

1898 documents the lengths to which Southern White Democrats went to regain political domination of the South after Reconstruction.The violence began on Thursday,November began 10th in the predominately African American City of Wilmington,North Carolina at that time the state's largest metropolis.Statewide election returns had recently signaled a shift in power with Democrats taking over the North Carolina State Legislature.The city of Wilmington remained in Republican hands primarily because of its solid base of African Americans voters.On November 10th,Alfred Moore Waddell,a former confederate officer and a white supremacist,led a group of townsmen to force the ouster of Wilmington's city of officials.Alfred relied on an editorial printed in the African-American-owned Daily Record,as the catalyst for the riot.Alex Manly,the editor of the Daily Record,had published and editorial in early November arguing that "poor white men are careless in the matter of protecting their women."Paraphrasing articles by Ida B.Wells on the subject of lynching,Alex opined that "our experiences among poor white people in the country teaches us that women of that race are not any more particular in the matter of clandestine meetings with colored men than the white men with the colored women."His public discussion of the taboo subject of interracial sex exposed the realty of sexual exploitation of black women by white men and challenged the myth of pure-white womanhood.Forty-eight hours after Alex editorial led 500 white men to the headquarters of the Daily Record on 7th Street.The mob broke out windows and set the building on fire.Alex and other high profile African Americans fled the city;sadly fourteen African Americans were slain on that day.An eye witness later wrote that African Americans fled to the swamps,or hid in the African American cemetery at the edge of town.When their criminal behavior resulted in neither Federal sanctions nor condemnation from the state,Alfred and his men formalized their control of Wilmington.The posse forced the republican members of the city council and the mayor to resign and Alfred assumed the mayoral seat.Over the next two years North Carolina passed the "grandfather clause,"as one in a series of laws designed to limit the voting rights African Americans.