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2 Reading the Riot Act The Teleology of Charles Chesnutt's The Marrow of Tradition and the Wilmington Race Riot of1898 I was at the ironing table, when one of my little ones ran in and told me that the school house was on fire. I hurried out to join the crowd of anxious mothers ... but we were not able to get past the crowd of men who surrounded the Record building. The cries of the frightened children could be heard, and the inability of the mothers to reach them added to the horror of the scene.... One little girl died of sheer fright. The shooting without, mingled with the oaths of the men and the frantic wails of the women within, were too much for the little one to bear. - Adelaide Peterson, 1899 [G]o to the polls tomorrow and if you find the Negro out voting, tell him to leave the polls and if he refuses, kill him, shoot him down in his tracks. - Alfred Moore Waddell, 1898 On the morning of November roth, when the party of men led by Colonel A. M. Waddell, destroyed the newspaper plant, the riot ... started. - Thomas W. Clawson, n.d. It was claimed among the political campaigners that in the eastern portion of North Carolina, the white people were under Negro rule. They took advantage of this scarecrow, and held it up before the white friends of the Negro in all their political speeches, using also the Manly article to create anger among the loyal and conservative white citizens. -Rev. J. Allen Kirk, 1898 In her witness narrative of the race riot in Wilmington, North Carolina, in 1898, Adelaide Peterson provides us with a provocative remembrance of the scene. Included in Jack Thorne's novel, Hanover; or, The Persecu- 32 Reading the Riot Act tion of the Lowly, the narrative was one of many witness statements David Bryant Fulton collected for his novel about the incident which he published under the Thorne pseudonym. Peterson ends her narrative by texturizing the racial and sexual undercurrents of the violence. Note her description of the following scene: I will not close this narrative without mentioning an act of bravery performed by a lone woman which stopped the vulgar and inhuman searching of women in our section of the city. The most atrocious and unpardonable act of the mob was the wanton disregard for womanhood. Lizzie Smith was the first woman to make a firm and stubborn stand against the proceeding in the southern section. It was near the noon hour when Lizzie, homeward bound, reached the corner of Orange and Third Street. A block away she saw a woman struggling to free herself from the grasp of several men who were, in turn, slapping her face and otherwise abusing her. The woman fought until her clothes were torn to shreds; then with a shove the men allowed her to proceed on her way. Lizzie could have saved herself by running away, but anger at such cowardice had chased away every vestige of her fear. She leisurely walked up to where the fight was going on. "Halt," said one ofthe ruffians to Lizzie, "an' let's see how many razors you got under them duds. That tother wench was er walkin' arsennel. Come now!" roared the man, "none er your cussed impert'nence." Lizzie, instead of assaying to comply, akimbowed and looked defiantly at the crowd about her. "Oh, yo' po' white trash." "Shut up or we'll set you an' have done with it," said the leader, making a motion toward his hip pocket. "Yo' will, eh!" answered the girl, "yo' kan't skeer me. But ef yo' wanter search me I'll take off rna clothes, so yo' won't have ter tear 'em," and Lizzie began to hurriedly unfasten her bodice. "You've got ter search me right," she continued, throwing off piece after piece; "yo'll fin' I am jes' like yo' sisters an' mamies, yo' po' tackies." "That'll do," growled one of the men, as Lizzie was unbuttoning the last piece. "Oh, no," returned the girl, "I'm goin ter git naked; yer got ter see that I'm er woman." White women were looking on from their windows at this sight so shocking. One had the courage to shout "Shame! How dare you expose that woman in that manner?" "Them's the curnel's orders," replied the leader, raising his hat. "Who is the Colonel, and what right...

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