The end of the Civil War left a fearful and resentful South struggling to understand the changes the war had wrought. Southerners seeking a focus for their anger quickly drew a bead on recently emancipated blacks. Former slaves became targets of violence, and chief among the perpetrators was the newly formed Ku Klux Klan. Some of the victims of the Klan's terrorist campaign turned to armed resistance and retaliation as their only resort.Focusing on the years of the Reconstruction, this volume examines the actions of the Ku Klux Klan between the years of 1865 and 1899. It explores how the organization sponsored and promoted violence against former slaves, and how that violence eventually led to the formation of armed defensive units, which in some instances engaged in retaliatory action. The author considers both the history and the sociology behind these events, recognizing the attempts of both sides to build a society that reflected their own sense of justice and morality. The appendices provide excerpts from a variety of primary sources including contemporary newspaper articles, correspondence and personal diaries.

This is a collection of letters written by nine African American defendants in the infamous March 1931 Scottsboro, Alabama, rape case. Though most of the defendants were barely literate and all were teenagers when incarcerated, over the course of almost two decades they learned the rudiments of effective letter writing and in doing so forcefully expressed a wide range of perspectives on the falsity of the charges against them. They were known as the ""Scottsboro Boys,"" and their incarceration became a cause celebre both in the United States and internationally. Noted social activists, authors, politicians, family members and ordinary people, condemned in letters what they viewed as a prime example of southern American judicial racism. Central to this book is the chronologically structured presentation of letters (1931-1950) that exhibit an intellectual growth and ability on the part of the defendants to effectively express their thoughts about their case and their innocence. In addition there is a selected body of legal correspondence from attorneys and members of Scottsboro support committees that help to contextualise this work. The original grammar, syntax and vernacular of the defendants is maintained in a desire to preserve the original and inimitable strength of these letters.