The Modern Ku Klux Klan

by Henry P. Fry

There were several different organizations which sprang into existence in the South during the reconstruction periods, each one operating along the same general lines but bearing different names. There were the Ku Klux Klan, the White Brotherhood, the Pale Faces, the Constitutional Union Guards, and the Knights of the White Camelia, which was larger than any of them. In the latter days of the reconstruction, when acts of lawlessness in the South were so bad that an investigation was held by Congress, the general name of Ku Klux was applied to all extra-legal Southern movements. As this narrative deals only with the Ku Klux Klan, a discussion of the other movements is unnecessary.

The Ku Klux Klan was organized in Pulaski, Tenn., in May, 1866. Several young men who had served in the Confederate Army, having returned to their homes, found themselves suffering from the inactivity and reaction that followed army life. There was nothing to do in which to relieve it. There was but little work to do, and but few had capital to engage in new mercantile or professional pursuits. The amusements and diversions of normal society were lacking, and to meet this situation, it was decided to form a secret society merely for the purpose of burlesque and fun-making. After the society was organized, and a name was sought, one of the members suggested the word “kukloi” from the Greek word “Kuklos” meaning circle. Another member then suggested: “Call it ‘Ku Klux,’” and this suggestion was at once adopted, with the addition of the word Klan.

The new society was a success from the start. The “joiner” of 1866 was no different from the “joiner” of 1921. The boys made the organization one of deep mystery; they adopted grotesque and hideous costumes which they wore to and from their places of initiation; they gave out hints of the wonders of the new society, which played on the curiosity of the public; and they had mysterious communications printed in the local newspapers. The members were required to maintain profound and absolute secrecy with reference to everything connected with the order, and went at their work with great glee, to the added mystification of the community. The result was that everybody in the city of Pulaski and all throughout the surrounding country, became possessed of the “joiner’s itch” and sought admission. No applications were solicited for membership, because the organizers knew human nature well enough to know that if they gave out the impression that they wished to be exclusive the applications would be both voluntary and numerous. The organization grew very rapidly, and strangers coming to Tennessee from other Southern States learned of it, became members, and secured permission to start local organizations. By the fall and winter of 1866 the order had grown all over the South, and in nearly every community there was a “Den” of Ku Kluxes enjoying the baffled curiosity and wild speculations of a mystified public.

In March, 1867, the Reconstruction Acts were passed by Congress, and in the month of April the actual work of reconstruction began. Then it was that the Ku Klux Klan underwent its second stage of development and became transformed into a band of regulators to handle the alarming situation that immediately followed. Perhaps the best available authority on the Klan in the country today is a little book written by Capt. John C. Lester and Rev. D. L. Wilson, giving an insight into its organization and real history. Captain Lester was one of the six original organizers, and Mr. Wilson, while not a member, was a resident of Pulaski and was closely in touch with the entire movement. In this work they stated that the transformation of the society was effected in three ways:

(1) The impressions made by the order upon those who joined it; (2) the impressions made upon the public by it; (3) the anomalous and peculiar condition of affairs in the South at the time. The impression made upon the man who joined was that behind all the amusement features of the organization and, unexpressed in its ritualistic work, was a deep purpose—a solemn mission that would be undertaken later. What it was none knew, but the feeling existed that a mission existed, just the same. The impressions made upon the public immediately showed the Klansmen that the organization possessed a certain power that nobody had imagined it would possess. This power was largely one of fright and intimidation, and was shown in the case of the ignorant and superstitious negro more than in that of the white people. Negroes would see the ghostly nocturnal Ku Kluxes and imagine that they were spirits of deceased Confederate soldiers, and the Klansmen were very quick to grasp the idea and use it to the fullest advantage. In some cases a figure in white would ride up to a negro’s house, dismount and ask for a drink of water. The frightened negro would hand him a gourd, which the rider would pour into a rubber bag, concealed under his robe, and then demand a whole bucketful of water, which he would dispose of in the same way, remarking, “That was the first drink of water I have had since I was killed at Shiloh.” In other cases the Ku Klux members would wear false heads, ride up to a negro and, removing the head, ask the negro to hold it. Skeleton hands would be fastened to the wrist and held out for a handshake, which procedure usually caused the terrified negro to make a hasty retreat. With the superstition and natural tendency of their race to magnify happenings, the negroes soon spread alarming tales among themselves as to the Ku Klux and its doings, until presently the name was one that invoked horror and terror. It is but natural, therefore, that knowing this new power of frightening the negro, the members of the strange order exercised it to the fullest extent.

In May, 1867, in order to form a strong sectional organization, a convention was secretly held at Nashville, Tenn., and the Prescript of the order was revised and amended by delegates from all of the States. Plans were made for extensive work, and for propagating the order in every community in the South. Gen. Nathan B. Forrest, having previously heard of the organization made a careful investigation of it, and consented to become its head, assuming the office of Grand Wizard immediately after the Nashville Convention. He had been one of the South’s most successful and distinguished cavalry officers, was recognized as being able to handle men in a masterful manner, and was a person of coolness and clear-headed judgment. He at once set to work to reorganize the order, which had become more or less demoralized under loose management, and made it a real factor in handling the serious situation which grew more serious as the reconstruction proceeded. He brought the membership in Tennessee up to 40,000 and the total membership in the South to 550,000, and did all he could to keep the force in strong control.

A great many of the most prominent men in the South became members of the organization, and were either active in the work or served in an advisory capacity. Among them were Generals John B. Gordon, A. H. Colquitt, G. T. Anderson and A. R. Lawton, of Georgia, Gen. W. J. Hardee, Gen. John C. Brown, Capt. John W. Morton, Gen. George W. Gordon, and Gen. Albert Pike, who later became one of the foremost Masonic authorities in the country. Gen. Pike was the chief judicial officer of the Klan.

Among the first policies inaugurated by General Forrest was the courting of widespread publicity, and an order was issued for a parade in full regalia on July 4, 1867. In every Southern city parades of the Ku Klux Klans were held, and served to act as an advertisement to the people of the South that they were being protected, and to serve notice on the carpetbagger and the negro that a new force had arisen for the purpose of meeting their encroachments upon the liberties of the white people.

Then began the reign of the mysterious organization that ended in the various restorations of the State government to the white people of the South, most of which occurred in 1870, the last States to throw off the yoke being South Carolina and Louisiana. What occurred during that time in the way of actual events is but vaguely stated.

The fact that the whole period was one of the bitterest of partisan politics makes it necessary to discount to a large degree the statements of both sides of the controversy. It has been told by some that the original Ku Klux Klan enforced its decrees and maintained law and order, not so much by the overt acts it committed but by reason of the vague fear and surmises on the part of the negro and carpetbagger as to what the Klan could do.