Hamburg massacre
- Red Shirts
- Planters
- Local white supremacists
- Democrats
The Hamburg Massacre (or Red Shirt Massacre or Hamburg riot) was a riot in the United States town of
Beginning with a dispute over free passage on a public road, the massacre was rooted in racial hatred and political motives. A court hearing attracted armed white "rifle clubs," colloquially called the "Red Shirts". Desiring to regain control of state governments and eradicate the civil rights of black Americans, over 100 white men attacked about 30 black servicemen of the National Guard at the armory, killing two as they tried to leave that night. Later that night, the Red Shirts tortured and murdered four of the militia while holding them as prisoners, and wounded several others. In total, the events in Hamburg resulted in the death of one white man and six black men with several more blacks being wounded. Although 94 white men were indicted for murder by a coroner's jury, none were prosecuted.
The events were a catalyst in the overarching violence in the volatile
Background
As Democrats sought to regain control of the state legislature, their leaders planned to disrupt Republican events, as outlined in Confederate veteran General
Events
The men in the Hamburg Company militia were entirely black and mostly
The Red Shirts then went to the local court, where, at a hearing on July 6, they accused the militia with obstruction of a public road before Trial Justice
As armed white men gathered in the vicinity, the militia company refused to disarm and took refuge in the armory in the Sibley building near the Charlotte, Columbia and Augusta Railroad bridge. The white militia surrounded the building. Perhaps 25 black militia and 15 others were in the building when firing began. In the exchange of gunfire, McKie Meriwether, a local white farmer, was killed.
Outnumbered, running out of ammunition, and upon learning that the whites had brought a small cannon to the city from Augusta, the militia in the armory slipped away into the night. James Cook, Hamburg's Town Marshal, was shot and killed in the street.[6]: 233–234
The white supremacist militia rounded up around two dozen black citizens, some from the militia, and at about 2 a.m, took them to a spot near the South Carolina Railroad and bridge. There, the whites formed what was later called the "Dead Ring" and debated the fate of the black men. The whites picked out four men and, going around the ring, murdered them one at a time; these men were as follows: Allan Attaway, David Phillips, Hampton Stephens, and Albert Myniart. The Sweetwater Sabre Company, led by Ben Tillman, was chosen to execute black state legislator Simon Coker of Barnwell. After being told of his impending execution, Coker asked the unit to give instructions to his wife regarding cotton-ginning and that month's rent. He was then executed mid-prayer.[7]
Several others were wounded either during their escape or in a general fusillade as the ring broke up. According to the State Attorney General's report, freedman Moses Parks was also killed here;[4]: 316 the US Senate investigation said he had been killed earlier near Cook.[6]: 233–234
A coroner's jury indicted ninety-four white men in the attack, including "
The official report by the Attorney General of South Carolina ends with this statement:
... the facts show the demand on the militia to give up their arms was made by persons without lawful authority to enforce such demand or to receive the arms had they been surrendered; that the attack on the militia to compel a compliance with this demand was without lawful excuse or justification; and that after there had been some twenty or twenty-five prisoners captured and completely in the power of their captors, five of them were deliberately shot to death and three more severely wounded. It further appears that not content with thus satisfying their vengeance, many of the crowd added to their guilt the crime of robbery of defenceless people, and were only prevented from arson by the efforts of their own leaders. (Allen 1888, 317)
Outrage at the events led to the US Senate calling for an investigation. It gathered testimony in hearings held at Columbia, South Carolina, and published its findings in 1877.[9]
Reactions
Republicans were stunned by the massacre at Hamburg. The event deflated the "Co-operationist" faction of the Democratic party, which had anticipated a fusion with the reforming Republican Governor
The
Following the violent and bitterly contested 1876 election campaign, with suppression of black voting by actions of the Red Shirts and charges of fraud, white Democrats gained undivided control of the South Carolina legislature and narrowly won the Governor's office. They passed laws during the next two decades to impose legal segregation,
Aftermath
Politics
M. C. Butler's expectations and extent of involvement in the later events have not been proven. He was not conclusively placed in the "Dead Ring", but his association with the massacre damaged his later career in the
[A]s white men we are not sorry for it, and we do not propose to apologize for anything we have done in connection with it. We took the government away from them in 1876. We did take it. If no other Senator has come here previous to this time who would acknowledge it, more is the pity. We have had no fraud in our elections in South Carolina since 1884. There has been no organized Republican party in the State.[16]
Butler and Tillman argued vehemently during the 1894 campaign about which of them had participated more in the Hamburg massacre. In South Carolina politics at that time, it was seen as heroic for a white man to have participated in the event.[17] In 1940, the state legislature of South Carolina erected a statue honoring Tillman on the capital grounds. In 1946, Clemson University, one of South Carolina's public universities, renamed its main hall in Tillman's honor. Only after events in 2015, when a white supremacist named Dylann Roof murdered nine black church members during their prayer service, did Clemson vote to distance themselves from Tillman's "campaign of terror." In 2020, trustees of the university asked to rename the hall.[18]
Fate of the town
After these events, many blacks left Hamburg and it began to decline once more.[2] After a 1911 flood, Augusta began construction of a river levee, but Hamburg was left unprotected. Disastrous floods in 1927 and following seasons finally forced out the last residents in 1929.[19] In the 21st century, no visible remains exist of the former town of Hamburg, and it is largely covered by a golf course.[20]
See also
- List of massacres in South Carolina
- Freedmen massacres
References
- ^ a b Ehren K. Foley, "Sites of Violence: Cainhoy Riot," Citations: "Plan of the Campaign of 1876" Archived 2014-11-05 at the Wayback Machine, Papers of Martin Witherspoon Gary, South Caroliniana Library, Columbia, South Carolina, accessed 26 October 2014
- ^ OCLC 39763469.
- )
- ^ )
- ^ a b Gasper Loren Toole II, Ninety Years of Aiken County Memoirs of Aiken County and Its People (1958), Chapter IV: The Red Shirts and Reconstruction", hosted at Genealogy Trails, accessed 27 October 2014
- ^ OCLC 173350931.
- OCLC 290459602.
- ^ This refers to Colonel A.P. Butler (1826–1902), seated as State Senator from Aiken County in 1877, not U.S. Senator Andrew Butler
- ^ U. S. Congress (1877). South Carolina in 1876, U.S. Congressional Serial Set, 44th–2nd S.misdoc 48. Government Printing Office, Washington. Report of the official U.S. Senate investigation
- ^ Holt (1979), 173–207
- ^ Mark M. Smith, "'All Is Not Quiet in Our Hellish County': Facts, Fiction, Politics, and Race – The Ellenton Riot of 1876," South Carolina Historical Magazine, Vol. 95, No. 2 (April 1994), 142–155 (subscription required)
- ^ Melinda Meeks Hennessy, "Racial Violence During Reconstruction: The 1876 Riots in Charleston and Cainhoy", South Carolina Historical Magazine, Vol. 86, No. 2, (April 1985), 104–106 (subscription required)
- )
- ^ Kantrowitz, Stephen. "Book Review of Ben Tillman and the Reconstruction of White Supremacy", The New York Times, 21 May 2000, includes Chapter One of the book online.
- )
- ^ Tillman, Benjamin (March 23, 1900). "Speech of Senator Benjamin R. Tillman". Congressional Record, 56th Congress, 1st Session. (Reprinted in Richard Purday, ed., Document Sets for the South in U. S. History [Lexington, MA.: D.C. Heath and Company, 1991], p. 147.). pp. 3223–3224.
- ^ Simkins, Francis Butler (1945). Pitchfork Ben Tillman: South Carolinian, p. 270.
- ^ Nicholson, Zoe. "Clemson removes John C. Calhoun's name from Honors College, asks to rename Tillman Hall". The Greenville News. Retrieved 2020-12-13.
- )
- ^ Location on Google Maps
External links
- "Official Report of the Battle of Hamburg", Attorney General of South Carolina, 1876. Accessed March 2015
Further reading
- Allen, Walter (1969) [1888]. "Chapter XIX". Governor Chamberlain's Administration in South Carolina, A Chapter of Reconstruction in the Southern States. Negro University Press. pp. 307–330. ISBN 0-8371-1537-X.
- ISBN 978-0-670-01840-6.
- Haworth, Paul (1906). "Chapter VIII". The Hayes-Tilden Disputed Presidential Election of 1876. Burrows Brothers and various reprints. pp. 122–156. ISBN 0-548-22467-6.
- Holt, Thomas (1979). "Chapter 8". Black over White: Negro Political Leadership in South Carolina during Reconstruction. University of Illinois Press. pp. 173–207. ISBN 0-252-00775-1.
- Martin, Samuel J. (2001). Southern Hero: Matthew Calbraith Butler. Stackpole Books. ISBN 0-8117-0899-3.
- Simkins, Francis Butler (2002) [1944]. Pitchfork Ben Tillman, South Carolinian. University of South Carolina Press. ISBN 1-57003-477-X.
- Vandervelde, Isabel (1999). Aiken County: The Only South Carolina County Founded During Reconstruction. Reprint Company Publishers. ISBN 0-87152-517-8.
- U. S. Congress (1877). South Carolina in 1876, U.S. Congressional Serial Set, 44th–2nd S.misdoc 48. Government Printing Office, Washington. Report of the official U.S. Senate investigation