News & Observer | newsobserver.com | Red shirt vigilantes

Published: Nov 17, 2006 12:00 AM
Modified: Nov 17, 2006 09:05 AM

Red shirt vigilantes

 

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The white sheets of the Ku Klux Klan have become the enduring symbol of racist vigilantism, but Red Shirts also struck fear in the hearts of black people. First coming to prominence in South Carolina in the elections of 1876 that would spell the end of Reconstruction, red shirts were donned by men eager to commit violence against blacks and their white allies. During Wilmington's white supremacy campaign of 1898, Red Shirts patrolled the city's streets to intimidate blacks.

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