February 11, 2021 • 35 mins
Though there have been several attempted coup d'états on American soil, this is the story of the only successful one to date.
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
You're listening to American Shadows, a production of I Heart
Radio and Grim and Mild from Aaron Minky. As a rule,
people are afraid of change. With change comes uncertainty, of
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feeling that life is out of control. As creatures of habit,
the status quo feels safer, and there are often consequences
from prior actions to consider. It's easy to see that
fear can be a strong motivator. Such was the case
in Louisiana in eighteen seventy two. Like the rest of
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the South, the end of the Civil War brought economic, social,
and political changes known as the Reconstruction Era. White Southerners
struggled to adjust to life that didn't include slavery or
Confederates shion. As the nation's political powers began to shift,
some felt that elections were their only voice. Eighteen seventy
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two was also the year the gubernatorial election in Louisiana
pitted lawyer and conservative Democrat John mcgennery against Republican Senator
William Kellogg. Before election day, rumors of intended voter fraud
began to circulate, adding to the turmoil and resentment. It
came as no surprise then, that when mckennery was declared
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the winner. Republicans contested the accuracy of the ballots and
filed a complaint. Federal court decided in the Republican's favor
and reversed the election results, putting Kellogg in power, and
some members of the public thought the federal government had
not only interfered, they had dismissed the will of the voters.
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Back then, the Republican Party was considered liberal, and it
wasn't particularly popular with the conservative segments of the South.
Lincoln had been a Republican after all, and Kellogg's political
base was primarily black, which didn't go over well with
some Louisiana's population, who harbored resentment from being on a
losing end of the war. In an attempt to keep
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some sense of control, the Democrats ignored the Republican victory
and established a shadow government. In January of eighteen seventy three,
mcgennery called upon the volunteer militia to attack the Metropolitan
Police and overthrow Kellogg's government by force. When the coup failed,
the police broke up the shadow government, though no arrests
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were made and mcgennery went unpunished. With Kellogg's enforcement of
civil rights legislation. Some white people in the South harbored
of fear that black people would soon retaliate and dominate
their way of life. The White League formed and assembled
enough men to defeat the state militia and the Metropolitan Police.
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The group released propaganda playing on citizens fears regarding the
state's direction. A call for volunteers to rise up began
in Earnest, and fi hundred men, many of whom were
bitter soldiers from the war, signed up. Others who had
been raised to believe in the tyranny of the federal
government also joined. Word leaked to the Metropolitan Police that
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the League planned on receiving a large shipment of arms
on September four of eighteen seventy four. A confrontation was
brewing at the worst possible time, during an outbreak of
yellow fever. On September, the League announced a meeting of
the people at the intersections of Royal and Canal Streets
and Saint Charles Avenue. Five thousand people showed up, each
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chanting and calling for Kellogg's resignation. Kellogg refused. The White
League promptly severed the telegraph lines. The mob headed downtown,
where they clashed with the Metropolitan Police. Within fifteen minutes,
the League had control of the city. Eighteen people were
dead and countless others injured. With the city overtaken, the
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League set up their own government, with the risk of
yellow fever looming. The federal government arrived soon after and
reinstated Kellogg as governor. Despite the second coup's failure, the
White League had done what they had set out to accomplish.
The Metropolitan Police force was shattered, and national opinion on
Kellogg was split. Federal government was the only thing keeping
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him in power. But this conflict wasn't the first attempted
coup on American soil, and sadly it wouldn't be the last.
I'm Lauren Bogelbaum. Welcome to American Shadows. The port city
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along the Cape Fear River had seemingly adjusted to life
after the Civil War. Are Many emuncipated people found the
town of Wilmington, North Carolina, a good place to call home.
They set up shops alongside wide owned businesses, purchased fine
homes with lace curtains and pianos, and some were wealthy
enough to have servants. They found jobs as health inspectors
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and sorted and delivered mail alongside white female clerks. All
but one of the city's restaurants were black. Owned of
the barbers were black, and so were thirty percent of
the skilled laborers. The black police officers could arrest white people.
The jailer corner and county treasurer were black. President Benjamin
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Harrison appointed John C. Darcy, a black Republican, as the
federal customs collector for the port of Wilmington's African American
holidays were celebrated without fear of retaliation. The city had
one of the highest literacy rates among black people in
the state, while almost a quarter of the state's white
population was still illiterate. In eighteen black and white people
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alike packed the Opera House side by side to hear poetry,
listened to choirs, and hear Patrick Henry's speech on liberty
and Death. That's not to say racism didn't exist. It did,
but Wilmington had a reputation of being one of the
most progressive cities for its time when it came to race.
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Alexander Manley was a North Carolina native. Those who passed
him on the street probably assumed he was white, but
alex Manly had both white and black family. His grandmother
had been an enslaved woman the property of his grandfather,
the former state governor Charles Manly. Charles had released all
his children from slavery and granted them farmland and farming equipment.
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According to the eight nine census, Alex grew up in
a successful working class household. He attended the Hampton Normal
and Agriculture Institute in Virginia. When he returned home, though,
finding work in his hometown of Rally proved difficult, so
he moved to Wilmington's. There he found social, political, and
economic prospects more to his liking. Instead of becoming a laborer,
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he set up the city's only black newspaper, called The
Daily Record. By the mid eighteen nineties, Alex Manly dove
into the political foray, writing articles that challenged white power structures,
and for some the paper posed note threat. It even
had plenty of white advertisers who called Manly a friend.
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By the lady eighteen nineties, the Daily Record had become
immensely popular. Manly was appointed to Deputy Register of Deeds
and he taught Sunday school. He had even fallen in
love and was set to marry for Manly. Life was
good right up until August of eight. That's when one
Rebecca Latimer felt In, a prominent societal woman who believed
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in prison reform, women's suffrage, and white supremacy, gave a
speech on lynching as a form of punishment for black
men who assaulted white women. She also insisted that giving
black men the right to vote led directly to these assaults,
and the Conservative Democratic Party delighted in her speech and
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in newspapers printing it. They knew that small fires often grow.
Her words helped fuel fear among the ill informed white
population and furthered their political agenda to reduce black rights
and equality. We won't go into all of what felt
in speech entailed, but it's safe to say that it
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did not sit well with Alex Manly. He debated, posting
his response, and, deciding it was worth the risk, fired
back with an editorial in his own paper. In it,
he called out Felton's and other white writers and speakers
racist pretense that only black men, or based on the
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guilt of a few, all black men, are criminals who
commit assault. He turned her own words against her, agreeing
with Felton that women should receive better educations in order
to prevent abuse, and that white women should in general
be better treated by white men, cannily pointing out not
just Felton's racism, but her sexist placement of white women
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as white men's property. And he addressed the larger cultural
discourse about interracial relationships, asserting the reality that white women
sometimes fall in love with black men. In the end,
his response was a lengthy and biding one, and the
city had never read anything like it. Democratic Party Chairman
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Furnifold Simmons, who had been placed in charge of developing
a campaign strategy for North Carolina's election, saw an opportunity
to return power to the Democrats. He'd use the easiest
method possible, fear. He'd use Manly's response to seed discord
among the population about a potential black uprising. Since the
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Republican Party had several black leaders, kindling a racial divide
would mean more votes for the predominantly white Democrats. Simmons
recruited media outlets sympathetic to his cause. Then he hired
speakers to spread rumors, fear, and misconceptions. One of those
men was Alfred Waddell, a former congressman and die hard
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white supremacist adept at inciting racism, shaming so called race traders,
and painting the Republicans as liberals set out to destroy
white citizen's way of life. Waddell had a long reputation
for being combative and power hungry. During the Civil War,
he became part of the white Resistance, and while serving
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as Congressman, he was a member of the Ku Klux Klan.
He had grown up wealthy, wanting for nothing. His family
hadn't been a stranger to politics either. His grandfather had
been a U. S. Supreme Court justice. Though Waddell had
once been in the political limelight as a lawyer, historian,
and public speaker, had long faded had long since faded
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from the public eye. Simmons offer had put him back
into the spotlight, and Waddell wasted no opportunity to speak.
As the election approached, he employed a group known as
the White Government Union, who began demanding that every white
man in Wilmington join any method would do, shame, fear,
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and even bullying those who befriended or stood alongside the
black population. Under the beliefs that the Fusionist Republican political
party reforms had been fixed and that the laws favored
black people over white people. Nine men banded together, known
as the Secret Nine. They began to work closely with
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Waddell to present the black community is insolent and disrespectful.
The Republican Party, due to their sympathy with the black community,
was effectively painted in the same light. That August, the
atmosphere in the city shifted and tension grew as thick
as the humidity. Neighbors, once friendly, began to look at
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each other differently. Manly fully expected a backlash from his
rebuttal to Felton little came. Although he could feel a
storm brewing, everyone could. What they didn't know was just
how catastrophic it would be. The Winchester Repeating Arms Company
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in New Jersey received a couple of alarming requests. In
mid September. Two men in Wilmington's placed an order for
dozens of sixteen shot pistols. The company manager had read
the headlines about the upcoming election. Given the party tactics
and placement in the South, he figured a race war
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was brewing. He refused to fulfill the orders and promptly
contacted the Rally newspaper. Unfortunately, the paper saw a headline
grabbing story and printed the company's concern as proof that
black men were buying guns and planning and uprising against
the white community. The odd thing, though the manager never
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revealed who the would be customers were. A month later,
Democrats held a rally in Fayetteville. Among the attendees were
three hundred Red Shirts, a paramilitary supremacist group that openly
engaged in acts of violence to keep the Democrats in power.
One of their tactics was to show up at the
polls wearing red shirts to intimidate black men and white
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Republicans from voting. One of the speakers openly chastised white
men in North Carolina for not burning down family's paper
and lynching him. Four days later, Waddell followed up with
his own speech on white supremacy, stating that race was
the most important issue in the upcoming election. His rallying
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cry was that the white men would never surrender to
black authority, even if they had to fill the Cape
Fear River with bodies to maintain their freedom. The rallies
became nothing short of brimstone and fire at a fever
pitch calling for white people to stand up against the
black community. Within days, late night attacks began as men
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raided the homes of black people and white sympathizers, ostensibly
looking first dashes of weapons. Governor Russell ordered an immediate
cease of the raids and attacks instead of a decrease
in crimes. The call for peace incensed the Red Shirts
and other groups like them, spurring a fresh wave of violence.
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Continuing to fan the flames, Simmons spoke before a large crowd,
telling them that Alexander Manley's letter was instigating black men
to rise up, and that he had insulted the purity
of white women and must be dealt with. The crowd
chanted lynch him. Simmons assigned twenty five Red Shirt members
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to be observers at the polls. Their job was to
strong arm all white men to vote Democrat and prevent
black men from voting at all. Later, they planned to
remove Republican ballots and replace them with votes for the Democrats.
Waddell continued to speak at rallies, shouting that white men
should be armed and ready to do their duty in
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preventing the black vote by force if necessary. Simmons authorized
him to select a group of twenty five citizens, two
of whom were reverends to assist in getting the word out,
called the Committee of twenty five. They knew that the
more people who repeated their rhetoric, the more believable that
rhetoric would become. By now, so much of the city
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had lost sight of the real issues behind the democrats
agenda for tax laws, stockholder shares, and shifting railroad regulations
that it was difficult for those with holdings to capitalize
on them, but making race the only issue was the
easiest path to victory at the Poles. November eighth election
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day started sunny and clear. When the polls opened at
seven a m. Anxious voters were already waiting. Of the
one thousand, four hundred and nineteen registered black voters, eight
hundred and twenty went to the Poles. To avoid tensions
that might very well build throughout the day, people voted
early and promptly went home. The Red Shirts, however, walked
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the streets carrying firearms and kerosene as means to intimidate.
Black men. Weren't the only ones targeted. The Red Shirts
were after black sympathizers statewide. White and black voters, having
been convinced trouble would surely start at the polls, carried
weapons just in case, and rally Republican Governor Daniel Lindsay
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Russell received numerous death threats for him, voting day required
both preparation and protection. He took the train to Wilmington's,
telling a waiting reporter that he realized voting might just
get him killed. Two men accompanied Russell, one of whom
was a commander in the Wilmington Light Infantry, and despite
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the bodyguards, the governor became the target of taunts. Someone
in the jeering crowd asked him what he thought about
the anticipated violence from the black community. All wrought, he replied,
his return trip proved to be more perilous. They had
been informed that Red Shirt's plan to intercept him on
one of the train stops, so he took a different route.
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It didn't work, though, and the group caught up with
them just north of Wilmington's. He remained jovial and the
terrorists let him go. At the next stop, another group
of Red Shirts wasn't as accommodating. They stormed the train,
loudly calling for the governor and threatening to lynch him.
Like the black men he supported, Russell took refuge in
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the baggage car until the men left. His trip to
the governor's mansion was equally difficult. Extra bodyguards and authorities
had to escort him past a mob calling for his execution.
Guards stood outside his home until the mob disbanded. Yet,
despite the propaganda, there had been no shootings, no uprising.
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People sighed in relief, thinking that now with voting over,
tensions would die down. Around nine p m. A hundred
and fifty men surrounded the voting precinct. Some forced their
way inside, shoving the policeman on guard into a water
barrel while holding the vote counters at gunpoint. Men stuffed
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Democratic ballots into the ballot box. Two Democratic precinct judges
and a populous Democrat sat and took over counting the
votes as though nothing had happened. The scenario played out
in other precincts throughout the city, finally announcing the conservative
Democrats had swept the state in every single office that
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had been up for election. The newly elected officials immediately
began the work of restoring only white men to appointed offices.
The next morning, the Wilmington's paper published an article calling
for all white men to show up at the courthouse
at eleven am, many citizens, especially those in the black community,
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realized that the trouble was far from over. In fact,
the worst was yet to come. The newspaper reporter had
never seen so many people gathered at the court house.
People jockeyed for a place to stand. Democratic stump speaker
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Alfred Waddell stood before the crowd and delivered a lengthy speech.
He warned that the black man was still planning to
overtake the city. He argued that the United States Constitution
had envisioned a government of enlightened men, and it would
not stand for the inclusion of an inferior race. They
must act now, he said. He put forth seven resolutions
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that would prevent an imminent attack from the black community.
White people would no longer be ruled by black people,
he said, and only unscrupulous white men would associate with them.
He said that the black community was antagonistic and incapable
of putting the community's interests first. Therefore, he continued to
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rant the majority of jobs held by black men were
to be turned over to white men. But he didn't
stop there. He said that the Daily Record was to
cease immediately, that the printing press must be shipped out
of the city. Alex Manly should also be forever banished
from the city for publishing such a vile and slanderous
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article against their white women. Slyly he seated the idea
that in any other proper city, Manly would have already
been lynched. The speech had been designed to incite fear
and hate, and it worked. The crowd began to call
for Manly's death. Appearing to show compassion, Waddell told them
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that the paper editor had twenty four hours to obey
if he dismantled the press and left the city. Waddell
said that white men should show some restraint. Having convinced
the white men that their black neighbors posed a threat
to their safety and livelihoods, Waddell presented his proclamation to
sign men added their names. While crowds gathered outside the
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court house. One of Manly's white friends arrived at the
paper and told him what had just happened. Since Manly
passed for white, his friends supplied him with the money
and passwords needed to get past the red Shirts guarding
roots in and out of the city. Manly easily passed
the checkpoints. One red shirt even invited him to the
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lynching they had planned for. The No Good newspaper owner,
Waddell and Simmons drew up a list of names of
non white leaders to inform them of the proclamation, including
one Native American. All told, there were seven names left
off the list had been Federal customs collector John Darcy
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and his deputy. Waddell, Simmons, and the other organizers knew
that including them might bring federal investigation. Armed Red Shirts
were sent to inform the rest of the men on
the list that they had until six p m. To
show up at the court house. When they arrived, Waddell
read the proclamation. They sat and stunned silence as he
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informed them that they had until seven and thirty the
following morning to give him their response in writing. What
he didn't tell them was that he planned on reading
that response to a group of armed white supremacists half
an hour later. This had been the plan for months,
and on the morning of November tenth, the Red Shirts,
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secret nine and armed white citizens stood in the streets
waiting for Waddell's word. When no one arrived at Wadel's
home with a letter of concession, he walked down the
street to the waiting men. By now the crowd was
five hundred strong. Once in front of the waiting mob,
Waddell told them that the black leaders had ignored their request,
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an intolerable act of defiance. The men cried out for
Captain Thomas James, the commander of the Wilmington Light Infantry,
to lead them to the Daily Records Office. It was
time to stand up against the black community. James wanted
no part of the mob and said to telegraph to
his superiors asking for advice. Relieved that his orders were
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to stay put and report back once the mob moved off,
he returned to the crowd outside. Unfortunately, some of his men,
having believed what else lies, now, wanted to join the terrorists.
To prevent his men from becoming part of the escalating problem,
James ordered them to march around the field. Realizing the
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infantry wouldn't join them, Waddell led his mob to the newspaper.
By the time they reached the building, the crowd had
grown to a thousand men. James sent the telegraph to
his superior informing him of the situation. Soon Governor Russell
heard the news and ordered the infantry to intervene. There
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was a problem though most of the infantry now sided
with the mob. The crowd of angry men vandalized the
newspaper then set it on fire. Afterward, Waddell led them
back to the armory, where he suggested they had done
their duty for now and to go home, knowing some
of them would not. While the majority did go home,
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a few hundred men remained, convinced that they needed to
search for the weapons that had been told the black
community planned to use against them. Stoked on the hatred
lies in mob mentality, the men marched into the city,
targeting businesses that employed mostly black workers. Three black men
were shot as they tried to flee. In another part
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of the city, six more black men were shot and killed.
The black community wasn't entirely unarmed, and they fired back,
fueling the conspiracy that Waddell and Simmonds had started. Doctors
and nurses rushed to tend to the injured black and
white while the gunfire continued around them. A white reporter
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found an injured black man and followed him as he fled.
The man ran into a house with the reporter in pursuit.
Inside he found three terrified women and one dead man
who had been shot several times. The reporter ran for help,
and the injured man survived. Others weren't as fortunate. As
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the black community fled, the angry mob kept firing. When
the streets were empty, the mob went from house to
house looking for the armed black men and weapons that
Simmons and Waddell had warned them about. Reports from that
day are horrifying. One minister witnessed the reverend from another
church shooting at black residents. Corpses were scattered in the streets.
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By mid afternoon, most of the surviving black community had
fled the city. The mob, however, continued to search for
the invading Black army, chasing shadows that didn't exist. While
the massacre continued, Waddell led a group of men to
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city Hall to complete the coup. They burst in, holding
the mayor, police chief, and alderman at gunpoint. Waddell leveled
his gun at the mayor and demanded his resignation. By
four p m. Waddell had declared himself the new mayor.
As his first order of business, he appointed a new
police chief and new city Alderman from the Committee of
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twenty five. When the magazine Collier's Weekly published an article
on the massacre, Wadell painted himself as a reluctant and
non violent participant. He stated that he'd merely had been
called upon to lead in a time of need, adding
that any violence had been accidental and purely in self defense.
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In recounting what had happened at the Daily Record, Waddell
insisted he hadn't been the one to break down the
door nor start the fire that he said had unintentionally
been set. Playing the part of a reluctant hero, he
claimed that the events that followed were indeed the strangest
had ever seen, but as mayor he was called upon
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to end the violence. He went on to say that
he and the others broke no laws and had acted
appropriately given the circumstances. The leaders of the black militia
had been captured and had marched them down to the
train station the next morning, where he had personally paid
for their tickets out of town. Had he not intervened,
he said, the others would surely have killed them. After
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the chaos, he falsely claimed that the remaining black citizens
had faith in him and that they were happy that
order had been restored. History and other recorded accounts do
not support his claims of black residence starting a riot.
The aftermath of these tragic events doesn't offer a story
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book ending. When elections rolled round again, Wadell was re
elected it and served as Wilmington's mayor until in fact,
all of his allies were re elected, and unlike in Louisiana,
no one from the federal government ever stepped in, including
President McKinley, who claimed that he could not act without
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a call from the governor. Waddel, Simmons and their white
supremacist groups had successfully pulled off the only coup diacht
to occur on American soil. They overturned votes they didn't
like and toppled a multiracial government with violence. Under Waddell's orders,
upwards of sixty black citizens were murdered, all in the
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name of political control. There's more to this story. Stick
around after this brief sponsor break to hear all about it.
It's room that over six hundred attempts were made on
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his life. He once said that if surviving assassination attempts
were an Olympic event, I would win the gold medal.
How many of those attempts were allegedly by the CIA,
isn't exactly clear the bane of many world leaders. His
reign spanned over eight US presidencies. Though he was aging,
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he still had plenty of aspirations and held high hopes
for his country. He used to like walking the streets alone,
giving him time to think and reflect. Now he had
become a hunted man, with over twenty different addresses. He
had overthrown the country's a military dictatorship in a coup
when he was thirty three years old and ruled for
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fifty more years. In the time of his rule, he
had created schools and reduced illiteracy. Hospitals were built, improving healthcare.
The countryside now had electricity, and legal discrimination was a
thing of the past. The positives didn't outweigh the negatives,
though newspapers that opposed his views were shut down. The
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amount of land any one person could own was severely limited.
Private businesses were banished, and he governed all matters of
housing and distribution of consumer goods. When it came to challengers,
thousands of his political opponents were jailed, though he had
once himself run in an election. He then declared that
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any that were not under his control were illegal. In short,
he had become the very thing he had sought to overthrow.
Despite the advances in education and healthcare, his people lived
in poverty, and even while living in deplorable conditions, many
believed him nothing short of a messiah. He told his
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people that he lived frugally, though the opposite was true.
Forbes magazine listed him as one of richest rulers, which
he immediately and angrily declared a lie. He owned yachts
and twenty different residences. Among the amenities and his homes
were bowling alleys, saunas, basketball courts, seaside pools, a lagoon
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with dolphins, and an abundance of sea turtles. He even
had a home where he met up with his countless mistresses.
Having successfully converted his country into a one party socialist state,
he began backing Marxist governments. In nineteen sixty President Eisenhower
authorized the CIA to overthrow his government as retaliation. In
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nineteen sixty one, he managed to convince a large group
of Americans to protest American imperialism in Eisenhower as well.
It wasn't until after an instant involving the explosion of
a French vessel, an alignment with Russia and the threat
of nuclear war that he reportedly found himself the target
of assassinations when the CIA bombed three of his air fields,
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he told his people the news was false. Later he
claimed that the U S had purposely engaged in biowarfare
against him. When an outbreak of dengie fever hit. It
was blame shifting, sure, but perhaps he had grown a
little fearful. His worst fear was being poisoned. He had
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his food grown locally and had his own cow to
supply all his dairy products. A few of the plots
to assassinate him involved of former classmate with a plan
to shoot him in broad daylight as sniper, poisoned tea,
and cooperation between the CIA, the mafia, and a former mistress.
The mistress had been given pills laced with poison, and
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she put them into a jar of face cream. She
couldn't quite get the cream off the pills and decided
that placing pills in his mouth covered in cold cream
wouldn't work, so she flushed them down the toilet and confessed.
All the attempts killed, and he lived to the age
of ninety. When he did die, no cause of death
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was given, though many of his people despised him, others
adored him and mourned his passing. The biographer said the
ruler was hard working and had a sense of humor,
but added that he was a bad loser, through temper
tantrums and was vindictive. Though he's gone, the United States
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still has an embargo against the country he ruled, and
that man Fidel Castro. American Shadows is hosted by Lauren Vogelbaum.
This episode was written by Michelle Muto with researcher Robin Miniter,
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and produced by Miranda Hawkins and Trevor Young, with executive
producers Aaron Minky, Alex Williams, and Matt Frederick. To learn
more about the show, visit grim and mild dot com.
For more PA podcasts from my Heart Radio, visit the
I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get
your podcasts. M M HM
You're listening to American Shadows, a production of I Heart
Radio and Grim and Mild from Aaron Minky. As a rule,
people are afraid of change. With change comes uncertainty, of
(00:26):
feeling that life is out of control. As creatures of habit,
the status quo feels safer, and there are often consequences
from prior actions to consider. It's easy to see that
fear can be a strong motivator. Such was the case
in Louisiana in eighteen seventy two. Like the rest of
(00:47):
the South, the end of the Civil War brought economic, social,
and political changes known as the Reconstruction Era. White Southerners
struggled to adjust to life that didn't include slavery or
Confederates shion. As the nation's political powers began to shift,
some felt that elections were their only voice. Eighteen seventy
(01:09):
two was also the year the gubernatorial election in Louisiana
pitted lawyer and conservative Democrat John mcgennery against Republican Senator
William Kellogg. Before election day, rumors of intended voter fraud
began to circulate, adding to the turmoil and resentment. It
came as no surprise then, that when mckennery was declared
(01:30):
the winner. Republicans contested the accuracy of the ballots and
filed a complaint. Federal court decided in the Republican's favor
and reversed the election results, putting Kellogg in power, and
some members of the public thought the federal government had
not only interfered, they had dismissed the will of the voters.
(01:52):
Back then, the Republican Party was considered liberal, and it
wasn't particularly popular with the conservative segments of the South.
Lincoln had been a Republican after all, and Kellogg's political
base was primarily black, which didn't go over well with
some Louisiana's population, who harbored resentment from being on a
losing end of the war. In an attempt to keep
(02:14):
some sense of control, the Democrats ignored the Republican victory
and established a shadow government. In January of eighteen seventy three,
mcgennery called upon the volunteer militia to attack the Metropolitan
Police and overthrow Kellogg's government by force. When the coup failed,
the police broke up the shadow government, though no arrests
(02:36):
were made and mcgennery went unpunished. With Kellogg's enforcement of
civil rights legislation. Some white people in the South harbored
of fear that black people would soon retaliate and dominate
their way of life. The White League formed and assembled
enough men to defeat the state militia and the Metropolitan Police.
(02:58):
The group released propaganda playing on citizens fears regarding the
state's direction. A call for volunteers to rise up began
in Earnest, and fi hundred men, many of whom were
bitter soldiers from the war, signed up. Others who had
been raised to believe in the tyranny of the federal
government also joined. Word leaked to the Metropolitan Police that
(03:19):
the League planned on receiving a large shipment of arms
on September four of eighteen seventy four. A confrontation was
brewing at the worst possible time, during an outbreak of
yellow fever. On September, the League announced a meeting of
the people at the intersections of Royal and Canal Streets
and Saint Charles Avenue. Five thousand people showed up, each
(03:43):
chanting and calling for Kellogg's resignation. Kellogg refused. The White
League promptly severed the telegraph lines. The mob headed downtown,
where they clashed with the Metropolitan Police. Within fifteen minutes,
the League had control of the city. Eighteen people were
dead and countless others injured. With the city overtaken, the
(04:04):
League set up their own government, with the risk of
yellow fever looming. The federal government arrived soon after and
reinstated Kellogg as governor. Despite the second coup's failure, the
White League had done what they had set out to accomplish.
The Metropolitan Police force was shattered, and national opinion on
Kellogg was split. Federal government was the only thing keeping
(04:28):
him in power. But this conflict wasn't the first attempted
coup on American soil, and sadly it wouldn't be the last.
I'm Lauren Bogelbaum. Welcome to American Shadows. The port city
(04:55):
along the Cape Fear River had seemingly adjusted to life
after the Civil War. Are Many emuncipated people found the
town of Wilmington, North Carolina, a good place to call home.
They set up shops alongside wide owned businesses, purchased fine
homes with lace curtains and pianos, and some were wealthy
enough to have servants. They found jobs as health inspectors
(05:19):
and sorted and delivered mail alongside white female clerks. All
but one of the city's restaurants were black. Owned of
the barbers were black, and so were thirty percent of
the skilled laborers. The black police officers could arrest white people.
The jailer corner and county treasurer were black. President Benjamin
(05:41):
Harrison appointed John C. Darcy, a black Republican, as the
federal customs collector for the port of Wilmington's African American
holidays were celebrated without fear of retaliation. The city had
one of the highest literacy rates among black people in
the state, while almost a quarter of the state's white
population was still illiterate. In eighteen black and white people
(06:03):
alike packed the Opera House side by side to hear poetry,
listened to choirs, and hear Patrick Henry's speech on liberty
and Death. That's not to say racism didn't exist. It did,
but Wilmington had a reputation of being one of the
most progressive cities for its time when it came to race.
(06:24):
Alexander Manley was a North Carolina native. Those who passed
him on the street probably assumed he was white, but
alex Manly had both white and black family. His grandmother
had been an enslaved woman the property of his grandfather,
the former state governor Charles Manly. Charles had released all
his children from slavery and granted them farmland and farming equipment.
(06:48):
According to the eight nine census, Alex grew up in
a successful working class household. He attended the Hampton Normal
and Agriculture Institute in Virginia. When he returned home, though,
finding work in his hometown of Rally proved difficult, so
he moved to Wilmington's. There he found social, political, and
economic prospects more to his liking. Instead of becoming a laborer,
(07:13):
he set up the city's only black newspaper, called The
Daily Record. By the mid eighteen nineties, Alex Manly dove
into the political foray, writing articles that challenged white power structures,
and for some the paper posed note threat. It even
had plenty of white advertisers who called Manly a friend.
(07:33):
By the lady eighteen nineties, the Daily Record had become
immensely popular. Manly was appointed to Deputy Register of Deeds
and he taught Sunday school. He had even fallen in
love and was set to marry for Manly. Life was
good right up until August of eight. That's when one
Rebecca Latimer felt In, a prominent societal woman who believed
(07:57):
in prison reform, women's suffrage, and white supremacy, gave a
speech on lynching as a form of punishment for black
men who assaulted white women. She also insisted that giving
black men the right to vote led directly to these assaults,
and the Conservative Democratic Party delighted in her speech and
(08:19):
in newspapers printing it. They knew that small fires often grow.
Her words helped fuel fear among the ill informed white
population and furthered their political agenda to reduce black rights
and equality. We won't go into all of what felt
in speech entailed, but it's safe to say that it
(08:41):
did not sit well with Alex Manly. He debated, posting
his response, and, deciding it was worth the risk, fired
back with an editorial in his own paper. In it,
he called out Felton's and other white writers and speakers
racist pretense that only black men, or based on the
(09:01):
guilt of a few, all black men, are criminals who
commit assault. He turned her own words against her, agreeing
with Felton that women should receive better educations in order
to prevent abuse, and that white women should in general
be better treated by white men, cannily pointing out not
just Felton's racism, but her sexist placement of white women
(09:24):
as white men's property. And he addressed the larger cultural
discourse about interracial relationships, asserting the reality that white women
sometimes fall in love with black men. In the end,
his response was a lengthy and biding one, and the
city had never read anything like it. Democratic Party Chairman
(09:45):
Furnifold Simmons, who had been placed in charge of developing
a campaign strategy for North Carolina's election, saw an opportunity
to return power to the Democrats. He'd use the easiest
method possible, fear. He'd use Manly's response to seed discord
among the population about a potential black uprising. Since the
(10:09):
Republican Party had several black leaders, kindling a racial divide
would mean more votes for the predominantly white Democrats. Simmons
recruited media outlets sympathetic to his cause. Then he hired
speakers to spread rumors, fear, and misconceptions. One of those
men was Alfred Waddell, a former congressman and die hard
(10:32):
white supremacist adept at inciting racism, shaming so called race traders,
and painting the Republicans as liberals set out to destroy
white citizen's way of life. Waddell had a long reputation
for being combative and power hungry. During the Civil War,
he became part of the white Resistance, and while serving
(10:53):
as Congressman, he was a member of the Ku Klux Klan.
He had grown up wealthy, wanting for nothing. His family
hadn't been a stranger to politics either. His grandfather had
been a U. S. Supreme Court justice. Though Waddell had
once been in the political limelight as a lawyer, historian,
and public speaker, had long faded had long since faded
(11:16):
from the public eye. Simmons offer had put him back
into the spotlight, and Waddell wasted no opportunity to speak.
As the election approached, he employed a group known as
the White Government Union, who began demanding that every white
man in Wilmington join any method would do, shame, fear,
(11:37):
and even bullying those who befriended or stood alongside the
black population. Under the beliefs that the Fusionist Republican political
party reforms had been fixed and that the laws favored
black people over white people. Nine men banded together, known
as the Secret Nine. They began to work closely with
(11:58):
Waddell to present the black community is insolent and disrespectful.
The Republican Party, due to their sympathy with the black community,
was effectively painted in the same light. That August, the
atmosphere in the city shifted and tension grew as thick
as the humidity. Neighbors, once friendly, began to look at
(12:19):
each other differently. Manly fully expected a backlash from his
rebuttal to Felton little came. Although he could feel a
storm brewing, everyone could. What they didn't know was just
how catastrophic it would be. The Winchester Repeating Arms Company
(12:47):
in New Jersey received a couple of alarming requests. In
mid September. Two men in Wilmington's placed an order for
dozens of sixteen shot pistols. The company manager had read
the headlines about the upcoming election. Given the party tactics
and placement in the South, he figured a race war
(13:07):
was brewing. He refused to fulfill the orders and promptly
contacted the Rally newspaper. Unfortunately, the paper saw a headline
grabbing story and printed the company's concern as proof that
black men were buying guns and planning and uprising against
the white community. The odd thing, though the manager never
(13:28):
revealed who the would be customers were. A month later,
Democrats held a rally in Fayetteville. Among the attendees were
three hundred Red Shirts, a paramilitary supremacist group that openly
engaged in acts of violence to keep the Democrats in power.
One of their tactics was to show up at the
polls wearing red shirts to intimidate black men and white
(13:51):
Republicans from voting. One of the speakers openly chastised white
men in North Carolina for not burning down family's paper
and lynching him. Four days later, Waddell followed up with
his own speech on white supremacy, stating that race was
the most important issue in the upcoming election. His rallying
(14:13):
cry was that the white men would never surrender to
black authority, even if they had to fill the Cape
Fear River with bodies to maintain their freedom. The rallies
became nothing short of brimstone and fire at a fever
pitch calling for white people to stand up against the
black community. Within days, late night attacks began as men
(14:36):
raided the homes of black people and white sympathizers, ostensibly
looking first dashes of weapons. Governor Russell ordered an immediate
cease of the raids and attacks instead of a decrease
in crimes. The call for peace incensed the Red Shirts
and other groups like them, spurring a fresh wave of violence.
(14:56):
Continuing to fan the flames, Simmons spoke before a large crowd,
telling them that Alexander Manley's letter was instigating black men
to rise up, and that he had insulted the purity
of white women and must be dealt with. The crowd
chanted lynch him. Simmons assigned twenty five Red Shirt members
(15:17):
to be observers at the polls. Their job was to
strong arm all white men to vote Democrat and prevent
black men from voting at all. Later, they planned to
remove Republican ballots and replace them with votes for the Democrats.
Waddell continued to speak at rallies, shouting that white men
should be armed and ready to do their duty in
(15:39):
preventing the black vote by force if necessary. Simmons authorized
him to select a group of twenty five citizens, two
of whom were reverends to assist in getting the word out,
called the Committee of twenty five. They knew that the
more people who repeated their rhetoric, the more believable that
rhetoric would become. By now, so much of the city
(16:03):
had lost sight of the real issues behind the democrats
agenda for tax laws, stockholder shares, and shifting railroad regulations
that it was difficult for those with holdings to capitalize
on them, but making race the only issue was the
easiest path to victory at the Poles. November eighth election
(16:23):
day started sunny and clear. When the polls opened at
seven a m. Anxious voters were already waiting. Of the
one thousand, four hundred and nineteen registered black voters, eight
hundred and twenty went to the Poles. To avoid tensions
that might very well build throughout the day, people voted
early and promptly went home. The Red Shirts, however, walked
(16:48):
the streets carrying firearms and kerosene as means to intimidate.
Black men. Weren't the only ones targeted. The Red Shirts
were after black sympathizers statewide. White and black voters, having
been convinced trouble would surely start at the polls, carried
weapons just in case, and rally Republican Governor Daniel Lindsay
(17:10):
Russell received numerous death threats for him, voting day required
both preparation and protection. He took the train to Wilmington's,
telling a waiting reporter that he realized voting might just
get him killed. Two men accompanied Russell, one of whom
was a commander in the Wilmington Light Infantry, and despite
(17:32):
the bodyguards, the governor became the target of taunts. Someone
in the jeering crowd asked him what he thought about
the anticipated violence from the black community. All wrought, he replied,
his return trip proved to be more perilous. They had
been informed that Red Shirt's plan to intercept him on
one of the train stops, so he took a different route.
(17:54):
It didn't work, though, and the group caught up with
them just north of Wilmington's. He remained jovial and the
terrorists let him go. At the next stop, another group
of Red Shirts wasn't as accommodating. They stormed the train,
loudly calling for the governor and threatening to lynch him.
Like the black men he supported, Russell took refuge in
(18:15):
the baggage car until the men left. His trip to
the governor's mansion was equally difficult. Extra bodyguards and authorities
had to escort him past a mob calling for his execution.
Guards stood outside his home until the mob disbanded. Yet,
despite the propaganda, there had been no shootings, no uprising.
(18:38):
People sighed in relief, thinking that now with voting over,
tensions would die down. Around nine p m. A hundred
and fifty men surrounded the voting precinct. Some forced their
way inside, shoving the policeman on guard into a water
barrel while holding the vote counters at gunpoint. Men stuffed
(18:59):
Democratic ballots into the ballot box. Two Democratic precinct judges
and a populous Democrat sat and took over counting the
votes as though nothing had happened. The scenario played out
in other precincts throughout the city, finally announcing the conservative
Democrats had swept the state in every single office that
(19:19):
had been up for election. The newly elected officials immediately
began the work of restoring only white men to appointed offices.
The next morning, the Wilmington's paper published an article calling
for all white men to show up at the courthouse
at eleven am, many citizens, especially those in the black community,
(19:41):
realized that the trouble was far from over. In fact,
the worst was yet to come. The newspaper reporter had
never seen so many people gathered at the court house.
People jockeyed for a place to stand. Democratic stump speaker
(20:03):
Alfred Waddell stood before the crowd and delivered a lengthy speech.
He warned that the black man was still planning to
overtake the city. He argued that the United States Constitution
had envisioned a government of enlightened men, and it would
not stand for the inclusion of an inferior race. They
must act now, he said. He put forth seven resolutions
(20:27):
that would prevent an imminent attack from the black community.
White people would no longer be ruled by black people,
he said, and only unscrupulous white men would associate with them.
He said that the black community was antagonistic and incapable
of putting the community's interests first. Therefore, he continued to
(20:47):
rant the majority of jobs held by black men were
to be turned over to white men. But he didn't
stop there. He said that the Daily Record was to
cease immediately, that the printing press must be shipped out
of the city. Alex Manly should also be forever banished
from the city for publishing such a vile and slanderous
(21:07):
article against their white women. Slyly he seated the idea
that in any other proper city, Manly would have already
been lynched. The speech had been designed to incite fear
and hate, and it worked. The crowd began to call
for Manly's death. Appearing to show compassion, Waddell told them
(21:29):
that the paper editor had twenty four hours to obey
if he dismantled the press and left the city. Waddell
said that white men should show some restraint. Having convinced
the white men that their black neighbors posed a threat
to their safety and livelihoods, Waddell presented his proclamation to
sign men added their names. While crowds gathered outside the
(21:54):
court house. One of Manly's white friends arrived at the
paper and told him what had just happened. Since Manly
passed for white, his friends supplied him with the money
and passwords needed to get past the red Shirts guarding
roots in and out of the city. Manly easily passed
the checkpoints. One red shirt even invited him to the
(22:15):
lynching they had planned for. The No Good newspaper owner,
Waddell and Simmons drew up a list of names of
non white leaders to inform them of the proclamation, including
one Native American. All told, there were seven names left
off the list had been Federal customs collector John Darcy
(22:36):
and his deputy. Waddell, Simmons, and the other organizers knew
that including them might bring federal investigation. Armed Red Shirts
were sent to inform the rest of the men on
the list that they had until six p m. To
show up at the court house. When they arrived, Waddell
read the proclamation. They sat and stunned silence as he
(22:58):
informed them that they had until seven and thirty the
following morning to give him their response in writing. What
he didn't tell them was that he planned on reading
that response to a group of armed white supremacists half
an hour later. This had been the plan for months,
and on the morning of November tenth, the Red Shirts,
(23:19):
secret nine and armed white citizens stood in the streets
waiting for Waddell's word. When no one arrived at Wadel's
home with a letter of concession, he walked down the
street to the waiting men. By now the crowd was
five hundred strong. Once in front of the waiting mob,
Waddell told them that the black leaders had ignored their request,
(23:41):
an intolerable act of defiance. The men cried out for
Captain Thomas James, the commander of the Wilmington Light Infantry,
to lead them to the Daily Records Office. It was
time to stand up against the black community. James wanted
no part of the mob and said to telegraph to
his superiors asking for advice. Relieved that his orders were
(24:05):
to stay put and report back once the mob moved off,
he returned to the crowd outside. Unfortunately, some of his men,
having believed what else lies, now, wanted to join the terrorists.
To prevent his men from becoming part of the escalating problem,
James ordered them to march around the field. Realizing the
(24:28):
infantry wouldn't join them, Waddell led his mob to the newspaper.
By the time they reached the building, the crowd had
grown to a thousand men. James sent the telegraph to
his superior informing him of the situation. Soon Governor Russell
heard the news and ordered the infantry to intervene. There
(24:48):
was a problem though most of the infantry now sided
with the mob. The crowd of angry men vandalized the
newspaper then set it on fire. Afterward, Waddell led them
back to the armory, where he suggested they had done
their duty for now and to go home, knowing some
of them would not. While the majority did go home,
(25:12):
a few hundred men remained, convinced that they needed to
search for the weapons that had been told the black
community planned to use against them. Stoked on the hatred
lies in mob mentality, the men marched into the city,
targeting businesses that employed mostly black workers. Three black men
were shot as they tried to flee. In another part
(25:34):
of the city, six more black men were shot and killed.
The black community wasn't entirely unarmed, and they fired back,
fueling the conspiracy that Waddell and Simmonds had started. Doctors
and nurses rushed to tend to the injured black and
white while the gunfire continued around them. A white reporter
(25:54):
found an injured black man and followed him as he fled.
The man ran into a house with the reporter in pursuit.
Inside he found three terrified women and one dead man
who had been shot several times. The reporter ran for help,
and the injured man survived. Others weren't as fortunate. As
(26:15):
the black community fled, the angry mob kept firing. When
the streets were empty, the mob went from house to
house looking for the armed black men and weapons that
Simmons and Waddell had warned them about. Reports from that
day are horrifying. One minister witnessed the reverend from another
church shooting at black residents. Corpses were scattered in the streets.
(26:40):
By mid afternoon, most of the surviving black community had
fled the city. The mob, however, continued to search for
the invading Black army, chasing shadows that didn't exist. While
the massacre continued, Waddell led a group of men to
(27:03):
city Hall to complete the coup. They burst in, holding
the mayor, police chief, and alderman at gunpoint. Waddell leveled
his gun at the mayor and demanded his resignation. By
four p m. Waddell had declared himself the new mayor.
As his first order of business, he appointed a new
police chief and new city Alderman from the Committee of
(27:25):
twenty five. When the magazine Collier's Weekly published an article
on the massacre, Wadell painted himself as a reluctant and
non violent participant. He stated that he'd merely had been
called upon to lead in a time of need, adding
that any violence had been accidental and purely in self defense.
(27:48):
In recounting what had happened at the Daily Record, Waddell
insisted he hadn't been the one to break down the
door nor start the fire that he said had unintentionally
been set. Playing the part of a reluctant hero, he
claimed that the events that followed were indeed the strangest
had ever seen, but as mayor he was called upon
(28:10):
to end the violence. He went on to say that
he and the others broke no laws and had acted
appropriately given the circumstances. The leaders of the black militia
had been captured and had marched them down to the
train station the next morning, where he had personally paid
for their tickets out of town. Had he not intervened,
he said, the others would surely have killed them. After
(28:34):
the chaos, he falsely claimed that the remaining black citizens
had faith in him and that they were happy that
order had been restored. History and other recorded accounts do
not support his claims of black residence starting a riot.
The aftermath of these tragic events doesn't offer a story
(28:55):
book ending. When elections rolled round again, Wadell was re
elected it and served as Wilmington's mayor until in fact,
all of his allies were re elected, and unlike in Louisiana,
no one from the federal government ever stepped in, including
President McKinley, who claimed that he could not act without
(29:17):
a call from the governor. Waddel, Simmons and their white
supremacist groups had successfully pulled off the only coup diacht
to occur on American soil. They overturned votes they didn't
like and toppled a multiracial government with violence. Under Waddell's orders,
upwards of sixty black citizens were murdered, all in the
(29:41):
name of political control. There's more to this story. Stick
around after this brief sponsor break to hear all about it.
It's room that over six hundred attempts were made on
(30:02):
his life. He once said that if surviving assassination attempts
were an Olympic event, I would win the gold medal.
How many of those attempts were allegedly by the CIA,
isn't exactly clear the bane of many world leaders. His
reign spanned over eight US presidencies. Though he was aging,
(30:24):
he still had plenty of aspirations and held high hopes
for his country. He used to like walking the streets alone,
giving him time to think and reflect. Now he had
become a hunted man, with over twenty different addresses. He
had overthrown the country's a military dictatorship in a coup
when he was thirty three years old and ruled for
(30:46):
fifty more years. In the time of his rule, he
had created schools and reduced illiteracy. Hospitals were built, improving healthcare.
The countryside now had electricity, and legal discrimination was a
thing of the past. The positives didn't outweigh the negatives,
though newspapers that opposed his views were shut down. The
(31:10):
amount of land any one person could own was severely limited.
Private businesses were banished, and he governed all matters of
housing and distribution of consumer goods. When it came to challengers,
thousands of his political opponents were jailed, though he had
once himself run in an election. He then declared that
(31:32):
any that were not under his control were illegal. In short,
he had become the very thing he had sought to overthrow.
Despite the advances in education and healthcare, his people lived
in poverty, and even while living in deplorable conditions, many
believed him nothing short of a messiah. He told his
(31:54):
people that he lived frugally, though the opposite was true.
Forbes magazine listed him as one of richest rulers, which
he immediately and angrily declared a lie. He owned yachts
and twenty different residences. Among the amenities and his homes
were bowling alleys, saunas, basketball courts, seaside pools, a lagoon
(32:15):
with dolphins, and an abundance of sea turtles. He even
had a home where he met up with his countless mistresses.
Having successfully converted his country into a one party socialist state,
he began backing Marxist governments. In nineteen sixty President Eisenhower
authorized the CIA to overthrow his government as retaliation. In
(32:39):
nineteen sixty one, he managed to convince a large group
of Americans to protest American imperialism in Eisenhower as well.
It wasn't until after an instant involving the explosion of
a French vessel, an alignment with Russia and the threat
of nuclear war that he reportedly found himself the target
of assassinations when the CIA bombed three of his air fields,
(33:02):
he told his people the news was false. Later he
claimed that the U S had purposely engaged in biowarfare
against him. When an outbreak of dengie fever hit. It
was blame shifting, sure, but perhaps he had grown a
little fearful. His worst fear was being poisoned. He had
(33:22):
his food grown locally and had his own cow to
supply all his dairy products. A few of the plots
to assassinate him involved of former classmate with a plan
to shoot him in broad daylight as sniper, poisoned tea,
and cooperation between the CIA, the mafia, and a former mistress.
The mistress had been given pills laced with poison, and
(33:44):
she put them into a jar of face cream. She
couldn't quite get the cream off the pills and decided
that placing pills in his mouth covered in cold cream
wouldn't work, so she flushed them down the toilet and confessed.
All the attempts killed, and he lived to the age
of ninety. When he did die, no cause of death
(34:06):
was given, though many of his people despised him, others
adored him and mourned his passing. The biographer said the
ruler was hard working and had a sense of humor,
but added that he was a bad loser, through temper
tantrums and was vindictive. Though he's gone, the United States
(34:27):
still has an embargo against the country he ruled, and
that man Fidel Castro. American Shadows is hosted by Lauren Vogelbaum.
This episode was written by Michelle Muto with researcher Robin Miniter,
(34:48):
and produced by Miranda Hawkins and Trevor Young, with executive
producers Aaron Minky, Alex Williams, and Matt Frederick. To learn
more about the show, visit grim and mild dot com.
For more PA podcasts from my Heart Radio, visit the
I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get
your podcasts. M M HM
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