Figure 5

Citation

Robinson and Murphy (Hunstville, Alabama). “Men in Ku Klux Klan uniforms.” 1868. Greg French Collection. Mirror of Race, 11 Feb. 2021, mirrorofrace.bc.edu/items/show/129. Accessed 30 Jan. 2025.

Title

Men in Ku Klux Klan uniforms

Subject

Men in Ku Klux Klan uniforms

Creator

Robinson and Murphy (Hunstville, Alabama)

Date

1868

Type

Studio Portrait

Identifier

Figure 5

Rights Holder

Greg French Collection

Original Format

Carte de visite (albumen print)

Factual Commentary

On the night of Oct. 31, 1868, approximately 150 armed men in Ku Klux Klan regalia rode into Huntsville, Alabama to break up a meeting of the Republican Party and to terrorize the Blacks of the city, who had been free since the Emancipation Proclamation and the Union victory in the Civil War. The KKK shot and killed a judge and two African American men. That night, Federal troops captured three of the KKK men and confiscated their robes. In this photo, Federal soldiers wear the robes and show the confiscated weapons to record the practices of the KKK. The jailers in Huntsville simply let go the three captives, who rearmed, took back their horses by force, and left town. For an account of the Huntsville raid and other KKK activity, see the <a href=”http://archive.org/stream/reportofjointcom00alab/reportofjointcom00alab_djvu.txt“ target=” _blank”=””>1868 report</a> of the Joint Committee on Outrages.