The Sequel of Appomattox: A Chronicle of the Reunion of the States

by Walter L. Fleming

White men who joined the order before the negroes were admitted and who left when the latter became members asserted that the negroes were taught in these meetings that the only way to have peace and plenty, to get "the forty acres and a mule," was to kill some of the leading whites in each community as a warning to others. In North Carolina twenty-eight barns were burned in one county by negroes who believed that Governor Holden, the head of the State League, had ordered it. The council in Tuscumbia, Alabama, received advice from Memphis to use the torch because the blacks were at war with the white race. The advice was taken. Three men went in front of the council as an advance guard, three followed with coal oil and fire, and others guarded the rear. The plan was to burn the whole town, but first one negro and then another insisted on having some white man's house spared because "he is a good man." In the end no residences were burned, and a happy compromise was effected by burning the Female Academy. Three of the leaders were afterwards lynched.

The general belief of the whites was that the ultimate object of the order was to secure political power and thus bring about on a large scale the confiscation of the property of Confederates, and meanwhile to appropriate and destroy the property of their political opponents wherever possible. Chicken houses, pigpens, vegetable gardens, and orchards were visited by members returning from the midnight conclaves. During the presidential campaign of 1868 the North Carolina League sent out circular instructions to the blacks advising them to drill regularly and to join the militia, for if Grant were not elected the negroes would go back to slavery; if he were elected, the negroes were to have farms, mules, and offices.

As soon as possible after the war the negroes had supplied themselves with guns and dogs as badges of freedom. They carried their guns to the League meetings, often marching in military formation, went through the drill there, marched home again along the roads, shouting, firing, and indulging in boasts and threats against persons whom they disliked. Later, military parades in the daytime were much favored. Several hundred negroes would march up and down the streets, abusing whites, and shoving them off the sidewalk or out of the road. But on the whole, there was very little actual violence, though the whites were much alarmed at times. That outrages were comparatively few was due, not to any sensible teachings of the leaders, but to the fundamental good nature of the blacks, who were generally content with mere impudence.

The relations between the races, indeed, continued on the whole to be friendly until 1867-68. For a while, in some localities before the advent of the League, and in others where the Bureau was conducted by native magistrates, the negroes looked to their old masters for guidance and advice; and the latter, for the good of both races, were most eager to retain a moral control over the blacks. They arranged barbecues and picnics for the negroes, made speeches, gave good advice, and believed that everything promised well. Sometimes the negroes themselves arranged the festival and invited prominent whites, for whom a separate table attended by negro waiters was reserved; and after dinner there followed speeches by both whites and blacks.

With the organization of the League, the negroes grew more reserved, and finally became openly unfriendly to the whites. The League alone, however, was not responsible for this change. The League and the Bureau had to some extent the same personnel, and it is frequently impossible to distinguish clearly between the influence of the two. In many ways the League was simply the political side of the Bureau. The preaching and teaching missionaries were also at work. And apart from the organized influences at work, the poor whites never laid aside their hostility towards the blacks, bond or free.

When the campaigns grew exciting, the discipline of the order was used to prevent the negroes from attending Democratic meetings and hearing Democratic speakers. The leaders even went farther and forbade the attendance of the blacks at political meetings where the speakers were not endorsed by the League. Almost invariably the scalawag disliked the Leaguer, black or white, and as a political teacher often found himself proscribed by the League. At a Republican mass meeting in Alabama a white Republican who wanted to make a speech was shouted down by the negroes because he was "opposed to the Loyal League." He then went to another place to speak but was followed by the crowd, which refused to allow him to say anything. All Republicans in good standing had to join the League and swear that secession was treason—a rather stiff dose for the scalawag. Judge (later Governor) David P. Lewis, of Alabama, was a member for a short while but he soon became disgusted and published a denunciation of the order. Albion W. Tourgée, the author, a radical judge, was the first chief of the League in North Carolina and was succeeded by Governor Holden. In Alabama, Generals Swayne, Spencer, and Warner, all candidates for the United States Senate, hastened to join the order.

As soon as a candidate was nominated by the League, it was the duty of every member to support him actively. Failure to do so resulted in a fine or other more severe punishment, and members who had been expelled were still considered under the control of the officials. The League was, in fact, the machine of the radical party, and all candidates had to be governed by its edicts. As the Montgomery Council declared, the Union League was "the right arm of the Union-Republican party in the United States."

Every negro was ex colore a member or under the control of the League. In the opinion of the League, white Democrats were bad enough, but black Democrats were not to be tolerated. It was almost necessary, as a measure of personal safety, for each black to support the radical program. It was possible in some cases for a negro to refrain from taking an active part in political affairs. He might even fail to vote. But it was actually dangerous for a black to be a Democrat; that is, to try to follow his old master in politics. The whites in many cases were forced to advise their few faithful black friends to vote the radical ticket in order to escape mistreatment. Those who showed Democratic leanings were proscribed in negro society and expelled from negro churches; the negro women would not "proshay" (appreciate) a black Democrat. Such a one was sure to find that influence was being brought to bear upon his dusky sweetheart or his wife to cause him to see the error of his ways, and persistent adherence to the white party would result in his losing her. The women were converted to radicalism before the men, and they almost invariably used their influence strongly in behalf of the League. If moral suasion failed to cause the delinquent to see the light, other methods were used. Threats were common and usually sufficed. Fines were levied by the League on recalcitrant members. In case of the more stubborn, a sound beating was effective to bring about a change of heart. The offending party was "bucked and gagged," or he was tied by the thumbs and thrashed. Usually the sufferer was too afraid to complain of the way he was treated.

Some of the methods of the Loyal League were similar to those of the later Ku Klux Klan. Anonymous warnings were sent to obnoxious individuals, houses were burned, notices were posted at night in public places and on the houses of persons who had incurred the hostility of the order. In order to destroy the influence of the whites where kindly relations still existed, an "exodus order" issued through the League directed all members to leave their old homes and obtain work elsewhere. Some of the blacks were loath to comply with this order, but to remonstrances from the whites the usual reply was: "De word done sent to de League. We got to go." For special meetings the negroes were in some regions called together by signal guns. In this way the call for a gathering went out over a county in a few minutes and a few hours later nearly all the members in the county assembled at the appointed place.

Negroes as organizing agents were inclined to go to extremes and for that reason were not so much used. In Bullock County, Alabama, a council of the League was organized under the direction of a negro emissary, who proceeded to assume the government of the community. A list of crimes and punishments was adopted, a court with various officials was established, and during the night the negroes who opposed the new régime were arrested. But the black sheriff and his deputy were in turn arrested by the civil authorities. The negroes then organized for resistance, flocked into the county seat, and threatened to exterminate the whites and take possession of the county. Their agents visited the plantations and forced the laborers to join them by showing orders purporting to be from General Swayne, the commander in the State, giving them the authority to kill all who resisted them. Swayne, however, sent out detachments of troops and arrested fifteen of the ringleaders, and the League government collapsed.