She had heard aunts say he lived in Wilmington more than a century ago. They said he had so much land and money that he rode a white horse in the daytime and a black horse at night.

And that was all she knew about Thomas C. Miller until recently, when she learned he was a leading figure in one of the darkest dramas in North Carolina history: the violence of Nov. 10, 1898, when a white mob marched through the streets of Wilmington, killing an unknown number of African-Americans. At the same time, a group of white leaders took over the city government in a coup and banished several leading blacks from the city.

Among those run out of town was Miller, a former slave who became a real-estate investor and pawnbroker and one of the wealthiest men in what was then the state's leading city. Estimates of his net worth ranged as high as $30,000 -- more than half a million dollars by modern standards.

His businesses vanished long ago, and his great-granddaughter can only wonder what might have been.

"It probably took away from our family," said Chaplin, 53, a banker who lives in Raleigh. "It's really kind of surprising that with him having had such an impact that it didn't trickle down through the family tree."

Everything changed on Nov. 10. On that day, whites arrested Miller, a man whose wealth they resented. Armed militiamen forced him onto a train and told him he could never return.

Miller was about 50 at the time. He died in exile in Norfolk, Va., five years later.

Earlier this year, a state commission published a 464-page report on the Wilmington violence and the statewide white supremacy campaign that preceded it, recommending reparations to families that could prove economic loss. On Friday, The News & Observer and The Charlotte Observer published a 16-page special section, "The Ghosts of 1898," about the events of that year.

When researchers study 1898, they find themselves drawn to Miller. How did he advance so quickly, just three decades after the end of slavery?

How far could he have gone if racism hadn't capped his rise to the top of the social order?

What, exactly, was lost?

A man to be watched

Miller's wealth made him a noted figure in 19th-century Wilmington. He became a deputy sheriff by 1880. Nine years later, he ran the city's only black restaurant and saloon.

By 1897, he was a real-estate investor and pawnbroker, a man whose wealth put him on par with many whites, historians say. He lent money to whites and blacks, and he competed with whites at property auctions.

White elites found such boldness galling. An article in one white Wilmington newspaper called him the kind of "saucy, bullying, dangerous" black man who needed monitoring.

When whites plotted to overthrow the interracial city government Nov. 10, they put Miller on a list of people to be run out of town.

As they took him to jail, Miller said he would rather be dead than endure such humiliation. A crowd surrounded the jail about 10:30 that night, calling for Miller and other prisoners to be lynched. The sheriff and others intervened.

Miller settled in Norfolk, leaving his wife and children behind to handle his businesses.

Although a contemporary had estimated his worth at $30,000 before his banishment, records show he was worth $10,000 to $15,000 at his death five years later.

He had continued making land deals from exile, but the pace of his acquisitions slowed. Blacks in Wilmington have long suspected that whites stole land from Miller and other 1898 victims, but a master's thesis in 2000 and the state's report earlier this year say that didn't happen.

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