Wilmington Coup Essay

The violent and tragic Wilmington Coup of 1898 not only resulted in the overthrow of the city's elected biracial government and the placement of a white supremacist government, but it also indicated the start of a period of violent repression of African Americans in North Carolina and established the foundation for the rise of Jim Crow laws and other forms of segregation in the South (Smith, 2021). Even though the circumstances leading up to the coup were complex, they ultimately had their roots in the long history of racial conflict and tension in the American South. The location of the 1898 Coup on Market Street in Wilmington, North Carolina, is a significant location in state history. The city's African American community, which had developed

The white nationalists took this as a threat and started preparing for their takeover. On November 10, two days later, a group of white nationalists marched on Wilmington's city hall while carrying firearms and other weapons. They ran into supporters of the elected government who were African Americans, and the violent altercation began. Black American defenders were soon routed by white supremacists, and the elected government was violently overthrown. Black Americans were forced to flee their homes and places of business while the city's multiracial leaders were arrested and relocated. A white nationalist government was installed in Wilmington after the coup was successfully carried out. The deaths that resulted from this coup are still unknown but projected at around 60 casualties (Williams,

The KKK was a white supremacist group that utilized intimidation and violence to keep white control over the political and economic structures of the state. Despite being outlawed in the early 1870s, the Klan continued to operate in North Carolina and had a crucial part in the establishment of the Democratic Party in the state in the late nineteenth century. During this period, North Carolina was also home to a number of other white supremacist organizations, such as the Red Shirts and the White Brotherhood, in addition to the Ku Klux Klan. For the sake of maintaining their hold on political power, these organizations engaged in acts of violence and