Southern Horrors
Also known as Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases
Ida B. Wells's 1892 pamphlet arguing that rape charges hid the real motives for lynching.
At a glance
Key ideas
A pretext, Economic competition, Second-class status …
See all 4Influence
Tours of Britain
Connections
Also on this page: Key facts · Links · Sources · Related pages
- Wells began publishing her research on lynching in this pamphlet, after a mob destroyed her Memphis newspaper.
- Having examined many accounts of lynchings blamed on the alleged rape of white women, she concluded the charge hid the real reasons.
- Those were Black economic progress, which white Southerners saw as a threat, and the enforcing of Black second-class status.
- She used the pamphlet heavily on her first speaking tour of Britain.
Why it matters
- With The Red Record, it brought lynching to the attention of Northerners who knew little about it or accepted that the victims deserved their fate.
Key facts
- Author
- Ida B. Wells1
- Published
- 26 Oct 1892, New York Age Print, New York1
- Followed by
- A Red Record (1895)1
Key ideas
-
A pretext1
Southerners accused Black men of rape to hide why lynchings really happened.
-
Economic competition1
Black economic progress was seen by white Southerners as a threat to their own.
-
Second-class status1
Lynching enforced white ideas of keeping Black people in a second-class place.
-
"Poor, blind Afro-American Sampsons"1
Her phrase for Black men as victims of "white Delilahs", drawn from Longfellow's poem "The Warning".
Influence
-
Tours of Britain1
She relied heavily on the pamphlet on her first tour of England, Scotland and Wales.
Connections
Written by
Links
Sources
Last checked against its sources today
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