Hamburg Massacre

The Hamburg Massacre (or Hamburg Riot) was a key event of South Carolina Reconstruction. Beginning with a dispute over free passage on a public road, this racially motivated incident concluded with the death of seven men. It launched the furious 1876 Democratic campaign for South Carolina's redemption, leading to nearly a century of "Jim Crow" denial of civil rights.

About

Hamburg, a defunct market town across the Savannah River from Augusta, Georgia, had been repopulated by black freedmen since the end of the War. On July 4, 1876, two neighboring white farmers drove in a carriage down Hamburg's capacious Market Street, meeting the Hamburg company of the National Guard, State of South Carolina, which was drilling (or parading) under command of Captain D. L. "Dock" Adams. According to one version of the story, the militia company purposely deployed to block the street and deny passage, and in another, the carriage intentionally drove up against the head of the column. In any case, after an exchange of words, the farmers passed through the ranks of the parade (Haworth 1906, 131 and Allen 1888, 314).

The farmers complained of obstruction of a public road before the local court in Hamburg, Trial Justice Prince Rivers presiding, at a hearing on July 6. The case was continued until the afternoon of July 8 when Matthew Calbraith Butler, Edgefield attorney, appeared as the farmer's counsel. (Of the many men surnamed Butler involved in this incident, he was referred to as 'General' Butler based on his former service in the Confederate Army.) Despite the lack of any official standing, M. C. Butler demanded that the Hamburg company disband, and turn their guns over to him personally (Allen 1888, 314-315).

As hundreds of armed white men gathered in the vicinity, the militia company refused to disarm, and took refuge in their armory in the Sibley building near the Charlotte, Columbia and Augusta Railroad bridge. Perhaps twenty-five militia and fifteen townsmen were in the building when firing began. One man fell in the heat of battle - McKie Meriwether, a local white farmer.

Outnumbered, running out of ammunition, and discouraged by a small cannon brought from Augusta, the men in the armory slipped away into the night. At least one was shot to death during the getaway: Hamburg's Town Marshal, James Cook. Two dozen more were rounded up from their hiding places and taken near the South Carolina Railroad to what was later called the "Dead Ring", where their fate was debated. Four prisoners were picked out and executed: Allan Attaway, David Phillips, Hampton Stephens, and Albert Myniart. Several others were wounded either in escape or in a general fusillade as the ring broke up. The white invaders finished by looting the town (Budiansky 2008 226-237, Allen 1888 314-317). Moses Parks was also killed; the Attorney General's report placed this in the Ring (Allen 1888 316), but accounts based on the Senate report find him shot down in the street near James Cook (Budiansky 2008 233-234).

The official report ends with this statement:

Consequences

The shots fired at the Hamburg Massacre stunned the Republicans and deflated the 'Co-operationist' faction of the Democratic party, which until then had anticipated a fusion with the reforming Republican Governor Daniel H. Chamberlain. Support crystallized around the uncompromising 'Straight-Outs' who launched the terroristic Edgefield Plan for South Carolina's Redemption (Holt 1979, 173-207). The ensuing violent and bitterly contested election campaign gained undivided control of South Carolina for the white Democrats, leading to nearly a century of black disenfranchisement. Possibly, the Democratic victory influenced the Presidential election through the Compromise of 1877.

The Massacre gained nationwide attention (e.g. Harper's Weekly, August 12, 1876). White South Carolinians saw virtue in necessity and repeated the lesson in full at the town of Ellenton, also in Aiken County, two months later (Allen 1888, 385-387). M. C. Butler's expectations and the depth of his involvement were unproven: in particular he was not conclusively placed in the "Dead Ring", but nevertheless his association with the bloody violence damaged his later career in the U. S. Senate (Martin 2001, 226). Benjamin Ryan Tillman magnified his role in the "stirring events" (Budiansky 2008, 237) and used it to spur his 1890 campaign for Governor of South Carolina (Simkins 1944). Nobody was ever convicted for their involvement.

External links

* [http://www.arete-designs.com/shultz/black/report.html Official Report of the Battle of Hamburg by the Attorney General of South Carolina]

References

*cite book | last = Allen | first = Walter | title = Governor Chamberlain’s Administration in South Carolina, A Chapter of Reconstruction in the Southern States | origyear = 1888 | year = 1969 | publisher = Negro University Press | isbn = 0-8371-1537-X | url = http://books.google.com/books?id=aXIlAAAAMAAJ Chapter XIX - 307-330. Republican view with official reports and statements

*cite book | last = Budiansky | first = Stephen | title = The Bloody Shirt: Terror After Appomattox | year = 2008 | publisher = Viking Penguin | id = ISBN 0670018406 Section VI - pages 221-254. Strongly written Reconstruction version of "Profiles in Courage"

*cite book | last = Haworth | first = Paul | title = The Hayes-Tilden Disputed Presidential Election of 1876| year = 1906 | publisher = Burrows Brothers and various reprints | id = ISBN 0-54822-467-6 | url = http://books.google.com/books?id=m9lBAAAAIAAJ Chapter VIII - pages 122-156. Political significance of the Massacre

*cite book | last = Holt | first = Thomas | title = Black over White: Negro Political Leadership in South Carolina during Reconstruction | year = 1979 | publisher = University of Illinois Press | id = ISBN 0-252-00775-1 Chapter 8 - 173-207 Republican view of the political situation

*cite book | last = Martin| first = Samuel J. | title = Southern Hero: Matthew Calbraith Butler| year = 2001 | publisher = Stackpole Books | id = ISBN 0811708993 A rather soft biography of the main actor

*cite book | last = Simkins | first = Francis Butler | title = Pitchfork Ben Tillman, South Carolinian| origyear = 1944 | year = 2002 | publisher = University of South Carolina Press | id = ISBN 157003477X

*cite book | last = Vandervelde | first = Isabel | title = Aiken County: The Only South Carolina County Founded During Reconstruction| year = 1999 | publisher = Reprint Company Publishers | id = ISBN 0-87152-517-8 Interesting compilation of local history

*cite book | last = U. S. Congress | title = South Carolina in 1876, U.S. Congressional Serial Set, 44th-2nd S.misdoc 48 | year = 1877 | publisher = Government Printing Office, Washington Report of the official U.S. Senate investigation, key source document with two thousand pages of unredacted testimony taken at Columbia, SC