Episodes Located: Alexandria City, Virginia in the 1890's

  1. Benjamin Thomas Lynched
    date August 8, 1899map Alexandria City, Virginiatags African-Americans, Crime/Violence, Law, Race-Relations

    On Tuesday, August 8, 1899 in Alexandria Virginia, news about the alleged assault on eight-year-old Lilly Clark by Benjamin Thomas, a black male, spread rapidly. On Sunday August 6, Clark claimed she went over to Thomas's home to retrieve an axe, which had been loaned to him. When she reached his house and explained why she had come, Thomas allegedly grabbed Clark and drew her to him. Clark, however,...

  2. Racial Intolerance in the Military
    date June 10, 1898map Alexandria City, Virginiatags African-Americans, Race-Relations, War

    Many in the South could still taste the bitterness of defeat from the Civil War. The structure of society was changing around them, and many had trouble with the rising stature of blacks in society, even when it came to matters of national security. Raleigh Green, in a June 10, 1898 editorial, expressed his particular aggravation that white southern men were expected to salute African American officers....

  3. Segregation of Railroad Cars
    date December 11, 1891map Alexandria City, Virginiatags African-Americans, Race-Relations

    Race relations between African-Americans and whites in Virginia were tense at the end of the nineteenth century, and whites tried to minimize interactions between themselves and blacks. To create greater distance between the two, the Virginia state government decided to segregate railroad cars based on race. In 1900, the state of Virginia passed a law that mandated all railroad companies to furnish...

  4. Mob Carries out Death Sentence
    date March 19, 1892map Alexandria City, Virginiatags Crime/Violence

    In the small village of Haymarket, about 38 miles north of Alexandria, two white men, Lee Heflin and Joseph Dye, were lynched on March 19, 1892. The two men had been recently convicted of murder and sentenced to death. At 12 A.M. on March 19, a mob gathered outside the jail and demanded that the prisoners be handed over. The prisoners were taken away before the mob could reach them. The pair was...

  5. Emancipation Celebration
    date January 1, 1891map Alexandria City, Virginiatags African-Americans, Law, Race-Relations

    African Americans gathered in large numbers in Alexandria on New Year's night, January 1, 1891, to celebrate the twenty-eighth anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation. Magnus L. Robinson, editor of the Weekly Leader noted with chivalry that in Lannon's Opera House every orchestra chair was filled with the fair sex--never have there been before such an array of Afro-American ladies at a public...

  6. Benjamin Thomas Lynched
    date August 8, 1899map Alexandria City, Virginiatags African-Americans, Crime/Violence, Law, Race-Relations

    On Tuesday, August 8, 1899 in Alexandria Virginia, news about the alleged assault on eight-year-old Lilly Clark by Benjamin Thomas, a black male, spread rapidly. On Sunday August 6, Clark claimed she went over to Thomas's home to retrieve an axe, which had been loaned to him. When she reached his house and explained why she had come, Thomas allegedly grabbed Clark and drew her to him. Clark, however,...