Atlanta Race Riot – 1906
When Sherman’s army burned Atlanta in 1864, it paved the way for a great American city to rise from the ashes. After the Civil War, Atlanta built anew and became the railroad hub of the South. Soon, industry and textile mills became a beacon for tenant farmers, sharecroppers, and immigrants seeking better employment opportunities.
Black males were awarded the right to vote with the ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment; they became active and successful political contenders. Worried of the political power that black men may achieve and the upheaval of the old social order, whites and ethnic Europeans began targeting black businesses.
Whites, with the help of two prominent newspapers, began reporting that black saloons had images of nude white women on the walls. Newspapers reported on sex crimes committed on white women with the presumption that black men were the perpetrators. On September 22, 1906, a newspaper ran a report that four women were sexually assaulted and soon, a seemingly utopian Atlanta was engulfed in violence.
In response to the sexual assault reports, white men and boys began pulling black people off of trolley cars and beating them. Blacks were gathered, beaten, stabbed, and killed in retaliation for the sexual assaults. Black men and women were pelted with stones and clubbed. A national newspaper ran an article during the three-day unrest stating that the only way to ensure peace was for the races to be separated. The state militia was called in to end the violence. African-Americans who once advocated for change through peaceful and non-violent means began calling on their followers to arm themselves with as many guns as possible.