Florida State University Libraries Electronic Theses, Treatises and Dissertations The Graduate School 2012 "Vicksburg's Troubles": Black Participation in the Body Politic and Land Ownership in the Age of Redeemer Violence Albert Dorsey Jr. Follow this and additional works at the FSU Digital Library. For more information, please contact [email protected] THE FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES “VICKSBURG’S TROUBLES:” BLACK PARTICIPATION IN THE BODY POLITIC AND LAND OWNERSHIP IN THE AGE OF REDEEMER VIOLENCE By ALBERT DORSEY JR. A Dissertation submitted to the Department of History in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Degree Awarded: Fall Semester, 2012 Albert Dorsey Jr. defended this dissertation on October 29, 2012. The members of the supervisory committee were: Maxine D. Jones Professor Directing Dissertation Maxine L. Montgomery University Representative James P. Jones Committee Member Jennifer L. Koslow Committee Member The Graduate School has verified and approved the above-named committee members, and certifies that the dissertation has been approved in accordance with university requirements. ii Dedicated to the memory of Ivory Johnson Sr., Mary Florence Johnson, and Ivory Joe Walker iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I am very fortunate to have been given the opportunity to pursue my graduate degrees at Florida State University. I owe a debt of gratitude to Dr. Maxine D. Jones for that. Her scholarly guidance has inspired my intellectual growth and forced me to reach beyond my comfort zone. I have always tried and will continue to try to make her proud. I am also inspired by the words of my late grandparents, Mr. Ivory Johnson Sr. and Mrs. Mary Florence Johnson. The wisdom that my grandparents, especially my grandmother, imbued upon me as a small child remains with me to this day. I would not be the person I am if it were not for them. I have also found motivation in the strong support given to me by my late cousin, Ivory Joe Walker. Joe, who was more like my big brother, believed in me and supported me in college, athletics, and martial arts when most everyone else turned their backs. I also want to acknowledge the support and love that my mother, Margaret E. Marshall and my sister, Mary F. Marshall have given me. Mostly, I want to thank Mrs. Betsy Dixon, my best friend forever (bff). Betsy constantly reminded me (especially when I felt overwhelmed and discouraged) that she sees something in me she calls greatness. Although her words are motivating and my future accomplishments are unknown, I cannot, nor will I ever, claim anything like greatness. My “buddy,” Betsy has stood by me and supported me throughout my many undergraduate and graduate school years. For her selfless friendship, I am eternally grateful. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract .......................................................................................................................................... vi INTRODUCTION ...........................................................................................................................1 1. I KNOW MYNE OWN GROUND: BLACK LAND OWNERS IN WARREN COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI, DURING RECONSTRUCTION ...........................................................................15 2. REDEMPTION THROUGHOUT WARREN COUNTY .....................................................36 3. THE DECREASING VALUE OF LAND IN WARREN COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI, AND THE INCREASING BURDENS OF TAXATION .......................................................................51 4. POLITICAL TURNCOATS: RACIAL SOLIDARITY AMONG VICKSBURG’S WHITE CITIZENS DURING THE 1870S .................................................................................................73 5. WALKING THROUGH THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH: BLACK MEN IN DEFENSE OF THE DEMOCRATIC PROCESS ....................................................................94 6. TAKING REFUGE IN THE CANE BRUSH: THE AFTERMATH OF THE VICKSBURG MASSACRE ................................................................................................................................109 7. THE BLACK WOMEN OF VICKSBURG DURING THE 1874 VICKSBURG MASSACRE……………………………………………………………………………………120 CONCLUSION…………………………………………………………………………………132 REFERENCES ............................................................................................................................139 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH .......................................................................................................153 v ABSTRACT This dissertation looks at the 1874 “Vicksburg (Mississippi) Massacre” and its direct causes. Black sharecroppers, during the Reconstruction Era, have been the focus of considerable scholarship that looks at black life in relation to white landowners. Little attention, however, has been given to black landowners. An examination of the House of Representatives Reports, Land Deeds, Census Records, Tax Records, and the American Missionary Association Archival Records allow a critical examination of the agency that black landowners in Vicksburg garnered before the massacre. This dissertation focuses on the direct causes behind the massacre, including local black politicians and civic leaders, and a growing number of black landowners. More importantly, the acquisition of land by black Mississippians prompted the most prosperous white land owners to take violent action against them. Most threatening to Vicksburg’s white population was the fact that Vicksburg had a black sheriff who also served as county tax collector. As Vicksburg’s black leaders began to spend tax money on black education, and even infrastructure that benefitted all citizens, whites became infuriated. Chapter one situates Vicksburg at the end of the historic siege. The middle chapters examine the importance of the economics, culture and politics that led to the violence. The last chapters focus on the Vicksburg massacre. This micro history of Vicksburg during the Reconstruction Era demonstrates that life for these black folk must have been hard but many of them found ways to form communities independent from white landowners. vi INTRODUCTION Vicksburg’s Troubles: Black Participation in the Body Politic and Land Ownership in the Age of Redeemer Violence When staunchly conservative White League members in Warren County, Mississippi, forced out the local black sheriff in early December, 1874, black men throughout the county decided that they had been pushed around enough. They formed groups and gathered in their respective communities with the intent of entering the city to assist the recently ousted sheriff in getting his office back. But the White Leaguers’ were even more determined to keep them out of Vicksburg’s city limits. Several days earlier, Sheriff Peter Crosby had been told by the White League that his services were no longer wanted. When he refused to relinquish his office, he was arrested and placed in the same jail that he presided over. Whites met the groups of Crosby supporters at the city limits and demanded that they return to their homes. No sooner than the black men complied, whites opened fire, gunning down the fleeing men, most of whom had no weapons. The massacre lasted for more than a week. When it was over, as many as three hundred black men were dead and an untold number of black women had been attacked, robbed and sexually assaulted.1 I first became interested in the Vicksburg massacre while doing research for a graduate seminar paper on Reconstruction in Mississippi. As I was reading through Richard Aubrey McLemore's book, A History of Mississippi, I was surprised to discover that Vicksburg had a black Sheriff during this period. After becoming more familiar with Reconstruction history and reading Eric Foner's critically important survey on Reconstruction I learned that although they were not commonplace, black Sheriffs held offices in some plantation counties throughout the former Confederacy between 1870 and 1874.2 More intriguing, however, juxtaposed alongside the idea that a few black men were sheriffs across the former Confederacy only a few short years after slavery, was the fact that 1 New York Times, January 7, 1875. “The Vicksburg Massacre.” The actual number of murders is not known. Conflicting testimonies claim twenty‐nine, fifty, one hundred‐fifty, and three hundred. See also, Julius Thompson, Lynchings in Mississippi: A History, 1865 – 1965 (North Carolina and London: McFarland & Company, 2007), 12. 2 Richard Aubrey McLemore, ed., A History of Mississippi: Volume 1 (Hattiesburg: University and College Press of Mississippi, 1973), 585; Eric Foner, Reconstruction, America’s Unfinished Revolution: 1863 – 1877 (New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 1988), 356. 1 most Reconstruction historians argue that blacks during this period owned very little land. If only a handful of freed people in isolated areas of the former Confederacy had been given 40 acre plots of land to farm, what issues complicated or prevented black and white Republican politicians from passing legislation to help their black constituents acquire more real estate? This question is answered in much of the historiography on Presidential and Congressional Reconstruction. That scholarship places politics firmly in the center of the Reconstruction era. Black land ownership, although critically important to the discussion, is usually placed at the periphery. Scholarship on redeemer violence and the growing influence of the Ku Klux Klan and other vigilante groups, usually also considers politics