13. The United Daughters of the Confederacy praised the Ku Klux Klan
At the annual convention held by the UDC in 1913, a book written by one of its more prominent members and president of the group’s Mississippi division, Laura Martin Rose, came under consideration. The book was entitled The Ku Klux Klan, or the Invisible Empire. In its introduction, the author wrote, “For the purpose of giving the youth of our land true history of this remarkable organization, whose services were of untold value to the South, during a dark period of her history, this book is written”. The author went on to claim complete historical accuracy for the work, “recorded from the lips of the survivors themselves”.
The United Daughters of the Confederacy unanimously endorsed the book, and recommended it as supplementary reading for students throughout the South. In many school districts, it served as mandatory reading in high schools during the 1920s and 1930s. The book unabashedly lauded the Klan of the Reconstruction period as protectors of Southern white women and society in general. Endorsement of the book by the UDC came at a time when the construction and dedication of memorials to the Confederacy throughout the South was at its height. The UDC continued to support the Ku Klux Klan during its second appearance in the early twentieth century, and constructed a memorial to the Klan near Concord, North Carolina, in 1926.