The record of murders and outrages : racial violence and the fight over truth at the dawn of Reconstruction / William A. Blair.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Blair, William Alan, author.

Series:

Civil War America (Series)

Civil War America

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

United States. Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands--Records and correspondence.

United States.

United States. Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands.

Freed persons--Southern States--History--19th century--Sources.

Freed persons.

African Americans--Violence against--Southern States--Sources.

African Americans.

Reconstruction (U.S. history, 1865-1877)--Public opinion.

Reconstruction (U.S. history, 1865-1877).

Race relations.

History.

Public opinion.

African Americans--Violence against.

United States--Race relations--History--19th century.

United States--Politics and government--1865-1877.

Politics and government.

Southern States.

Genre:

History.

Records and correspondence.

Sources.

Physical Description:

173 pages ; 23 cm.

Place of Publication:

Chapel Hill : The University of North Carolina Press, [2021]

Summary:

"After the Civil War's end, reports surged of violence by whites against Black men, women, and children. Leaders of the new southern governments and northern Democrats typically denied that the atrocities were happening, or they professed that the levels of violence were nothing more than typical criminal behavior. But as occupying Federal troops grew increasingly aware of and even targeted by violent assaults, in September 1866, Freedmen's Bureau commissioner O. O. Howard requested that assistant commissioners in the states compile reports of 'murders and outrages' to catalog the extent of violence. The Records Relating to Murders and Outrage were assembled to prove that the reports of a peaceful South were wrong. The Freedmen's Bureau papers are one of the most utilized sources for the Reconstruction era, yet the Record of Murders and Outrages has rarely been explored in depth. In this book, William A. Blair takes the full measure of the Bureau's attempt to document and deploy hard information about the reality of the violence that Black communities endured in the wake of Emancipation. A former journalist, Blair is highly attuned to the ways this history reflects on ongoing and contemporary struggles over how trustworthy data is gathered, packaged, shared, and utilized in policymaking and daily life"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Machine generated contents note: 1. The Battle for Credibility

2. Black Lives in the Record

3. And the Military Comes

4. The Killing Fields of 1868

5. The Problem of Texas.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Other Format:

ebook version :

ISBN:

9781469663449

1469663449

9781469663456

1469663457

OCLC:

1237650928