Part two of two parts

EDITOR’S NOTE: In part one of this story (appearing in the April 26 edition of the Daily Planet), Dr. Steven Nash, a history professor at East Tennessee State University, spoke in detail about “The Asheville Riot of 1868,” which, he contended, undermined Reconstruction in Western North Carolina after the Civil War. Because of space limits in the newspaper, the Daily Planet is publishing the story in two parts to be able report Nash’s complete 90-minute address, including the question-and-answer session that followed.  

By JOHN NORTH

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Nov. 3, 1868 — when the “The Asheville Riot of 1868” occurred — was a significant date in the history of Asheville in particular, and of Western North Carolina in general, according to Dr. Steven E. Nash, history professor at East Tennessee State University.

And the year 1868, overall, was a pivotal year — politically — in local history, as it signaled the end of Reconstruction in WNC, Nash said in his April 11 address at Pack Memorial Libary in downtown Asheville that drew about 80 people.

For starters, he noted mounting tensions between black and white voters reportedly erupted on Nov. 3, 1868 in a flurry of gunfire, leaving one black man, James Smith, dead, while at least 18 other blacks and two white men were wounded. The details of exactly what happened remain contested — and were covered extensively in part one of this story.

According to records, early that day, unidentified county clerk denied Smith his right to vote, citing a previous criminal conviction. Smith and a few other black voters — reportedly — clashed with white men in the streets, and at some point in the afternoon, a black man named Silas reportedly voted for the straight Democratic/conservative ticket, much to the chagrin of other blacks who confronted him. 

The coroner’s report stated that Smith threw a rock at Silas — or his white protectors, who began shooting and, in the aftermath, Smith was soon to die from a gunshot wound. 

As Nash noted, the previously highly effective Freedmen’s Bureau, however, was powerless to protect voters or to restore order in the aftermath, as federal troops were soon withdrawn from the state. 

Also in 1868, William W. Holton, a Republican who supported the Union during the Civil War, was elected North Carolina’s  governor, “when Reconstruction had established a Republican majority in the state,” Nash said.

(Holton’s predecessor, Jonathon Worth, a Democrat, served as North Carolina’s governor from 1865 to 1868 — and did not run for re-election. However, according to the website www.nga.com, Worth “refused to relinquish his duties to Governor-elect William Holden. Consequently, Worth was removed from office by military decree on July1, 1868.”)

Over and above that, in 1868, the proposed new state Constitution (abolishing slavery and providing for universal male suffrage, among other provisions) was ratified by “a sizable majority of the vote” (93,086 to 74,016 votes), Nash reported.

In Buncombe County in the 1868 election, the victory margin (for Holton and the new Constitution) was“200 (votes) and ‘change’ for the Republicans,” Nash noted, adding that “there were about 200 African-American men” in Buncombe at the time.

“They (blacks) voted overwhelmingly Republican. If even half of the black men voted Republican in 1858, that was the difference” in the election.

After a pause, Nash said, “That (show of black voter power) didn’t go over very well for Randolph Shotwell and others... Then you see the backlash (from the Democrats). It didn’t take long for the backlash to happen....”

(Shotwell was a Confederate soldier, newspaperman (including founder of The Citizen in Asheville), state legislator and author, who dealt with the Ku Klux Klan, but — reportedly — never was a member.)

Nash added, “All of the Freedman’s Bureau” in Asheville’s resources were “going to the military,” the WNC hub of which was located in Morganton, instead of being used to defend and protect Asheville-area blacks.

 At the end of April 1868, posted on the door of the Asheville Freedmen’s Bureau office, Nash said, was the following note:

“When darkness reigns, that is the hour to strike.” 

“To me,” the historian opined, “that says, when African-American men start voting and the Republicans gain control,” then it is time for whites, who favored the Democrats, to arise and fight back.

In the aftermath, Nash noted, “(Oscar) Eastman (head of the Asheville Freedmen’s Bureau office) is repeatedly telling his higher-ups (in Washington, D.C.) that African-American men aren’t going anywhere around town (Asheville) unarmed... And the ‘payoff’ was the Asheville riot of 1868. The Asheville riot, to me, was the ‘coming-out party’ for the (local) Ku Klux Klan.” 

Next, Nash told of Alexander Hamilon Jones, who, in 1866, started a newspaper in nearby Hendersonville named The Hendersonville Pioneer. 

(By 1867, “Jones and his paper sided completely with the congressional Republicans’ Reconstruction policies,” according to the website ncpedia.org. “Jones became a charter member of North Carolina’s Union League and an active politician in the Republican party.”

(The website added, “In July 1867, he moved his newspaper to Asheville, where it continued as a Republican paper under Jones’s editorship, until he turned to a new career the following year. In July 1868, Jones was elected to U.S. Congress” and served two terms.)

Then, the historian returned to the subject of Smith’s death, noting that he “was living with some woman’s (Harriet Jones’) family at the time. 

“He (Smith) allegedly let out a big harrah after the vote became known — and then he was shot...  Jones wrote to her friend that this was political... 

“She said the violence was initiated and carried out by the Ku Klux (Klan),” Nash said. “She blamed the shooting on the Ku Klux....”

 Meanwhile, in 1869, Nash said that “an armed group of men on the Buncombe-Madison (counties’) border attacked a group that included some blacks.”

In the aftermath, Col. Virgil S. Lusk, an attorney who recently took the job of 12th District solicitor, responded to the alleged attack and “his first action (in office) was to charge a group of men from Madison” in the assault. 

After Lusk charged the group of men in Madison County, Thomas D. Carter wrote an editorial in the Democrat-leaning Asheville Citizen “chastising Lusk for prostituting his job,” Nash asserted. 

“Lusk wrote a counter-editorial in (the Republican-leaning) Pioneer (newspaper), taking Carter to task, he added.

“It was decided by local leaders that Lusk needed to be disciplined.... Lusk was talking to a fellow lawyer (at Public Square — now called Pack Square), when up came Shotwell, who beat him with a cane, knocking him to his knees...'

From his knees, “Lusk pulled his pistol and shot Shotwell through both legs, wounding him...”

Nash noted that Shotwell then “uttered, ‘I’m unarmed!’” (Also, reportedly Shotwell gave Lusk a Masonic sign and Lusk fired no more. This incident purportedly happened about 1870 or 1871.)

“Then, some friends of Shotwell led him away,” as he was wounded in both legs and unable to walk, Nash said. Despite being smacked in the knees with Shotwell’s cane in a surprise attack, “Lusk was able to walk away. That didn’t go well with the Ku Klux.”

Worse, the history professor stated, “in 1869, the Freedman’s Bureau was shut down in Western North Carolina.”

Also, “Shotwell doesn’t go away. He materializes in a Ku Klux raid down in Rutherford (County). Shotwell was arrested and sent to the penitentiary in Albany, New York,” Nash reported.

At that the same time, “the state is attempting to deal wth matters in its own hands. “ Officials “decided to organize a state militia to put down the Ku Klux. They brought in a Col. James Kirk in 1870 in Western North Carolina...

“It all illustrates the role that Western North Carolina played in this — and the fact that mostly white Unionists from Western North Carolina were in the unit that Kirk organized to try to putdown the Ku Klux. 

“In the meantime, Holton was removed from office,” allegedly for violating “the Constitution by not executing habeas corpus. Those who instigated the effort against Holton were, in fact, members of the Ku Klu Klan,” Nash said.

Then, “in 1872, Todd Caldwell was elected North Carolina governor, overwhelmingly by African-American voters in Eastern North Carolina.”

To leave time for a question-and-answer period to follow his address, Nash wrapped up his speech by asking, rhetorically, “So what did we learn?”

In answering his own question, Nash said, “For one, the Asheville riot of 1868 was a high-water mark” — and a warning — “for the Republicans in Western North Carolina... For one, that ‘you will not infringe upon people’s right to vote...’

“It also prompted opposition by people like Randolph Shotwell...

“This also highlights the best and worst of the federal government... That they could actually bring change to a region... Yet, it also showed the worst of the federal government — as they needed to stand fast and they needed to stand up against the Ku Klux Klan through the 1870s.” 

Nash concluded his address by stating, “It’s important that we learn and understand ‘the history.’ It’s important that we don’t allow the more common memory” to prevail.

During a Q&A that followed, an unidentified woman asked, “What happened to Augustus Merrimon?”

“He resigned,” Nash replied. “He (Merrimon) said he couldn’t hold his post if the military was going to interfere with the law.”

The history professor then said that the back-story on Merrimon was that he had said privately that “he wasn’t making enough money as a judge, and was going to Raleigh, where he could make more money.

An unidentified man then asked, “What charges were filed against (then-governor) Holton?”

“Technically, they said he mainly violated habeus corpus,” Nash answered. “But they had a number of charges against him....”

Another unidentified man asked, “Did they (the KKK) target people of significance?”

“In Jackson County, there actually was a fair amount of Ku Klux community (activity) as well,” Nash replied. 

In the case one prominent Jackson County man, the historian said, “They came to his house multiple times and threatened to chase him out of town. All sorts of threats” were made against him.

Speaking generally, he added, “I don’t think there were many African-Americans in the 1866 Constitional Convention...”

(“The convention was called in Philadelphia before of the midyear elections of 1866 in an attempt to encourage political support for U.S. President Andrew Johnson, who was under attack by both moderate and Radical Republicans,” Wikipedia noted. “Johnson’s friends tried to rally support for his lenient pro-South Reconstruction policies.”)

In response to another question, Nash said, “An interesting thing is the Republicans don’t just fade away... The Klan violence shifted a number of those whites to be Conservatives, as it wasn’t worth their lives. That was one of the things that helped to shatter the Republicans in the 1860s and ‘70s,” along with blacks asking for influential party and political positions — “and that was something they (many Southern whites, at the time) couldn’t” accept.  

An unidentified man asked Nash to tell a bit about the history of the WNC Railroad?

“The gist of it was... there were many people interested in the bonds, but it (the WNC Railroad) kept going into bankruptcy,” Nash answered.

“People kept suing and counter-suing. It’s always painted as a ‘Republican scandal,’ but both sides were mixed up in it. Merrimon was the personal lawyer that negotiated some of those (WNC Railroad) deals. It was a mess…” 

As part of his research, Nash said that “I’m reviewing a manuscript on the WNC Railroad” now. “It (the railroad) definitely undermined Republican power in the state.”