Book Report on Southern Horrors - AMERICAN HISTORY

Felicia McCaw
American History

Written by Ida B. Wells-Barnett

SOUTHERN HORRORS
BY IDA B. WELLS-BARNETT

This book is a compilation of cruel injustices done in the Southern states located in the United States.
Authorized and written by Ida B. Wells-Barnett who was the owner and journalist who reported the acts of unjustifiable acts of savagery aimed at Colored or Negro people in various states located in the South. This report reflects what is known that the mingling of the two races is not desired or wanted in the South in the past or the present. Further because of this attraction between the two was the eventual act of being found out sinning and the result of offspring being born reflected activity between the two races when it resulted in a mulatto offspring. Consequently, the Negro man was punished, maimed, hung and killed in various violent acts of hate and prejudice.

The Negro race is thought of as being inferior and that is why they are dehumanized and cruelly set upon by a mob that acts en masse and shows or feels no guilt for their actions of savagery and is a strong arm tactic that curtailed the acts of rape by Negro men who did not get a trial. As noted and studied people like to act in mobs to shield themselves from being charged individually for crimes committed. Ever has it been the misfortune of the Negro race to be hated, reviled, exploited, perjured against and just hated for their very differences. Harsh is the justice relayed to Negro men accused of raping a white woman because of the damage done to her very reputation or the reputation of white women. Also, if one incident is allowed then others would follow. Once a Negro man has overstepped the boundaries of correct and appropriate behavior he is summarily dealt with the harshest, cruelest punishment with swift immediacy. Sometimes he is given a trial or is left in the hands of a vigilante crowd of white men. The very thought of a Negro man being intimate with a white woman is hated, resented and will not be allowed after she has been exposed to public scrutiny and because she is held in contempt some white women cry “rape” to not be despised by her own race and spat upon.

Because of the increase of copulating between the two races Southerners took other measures to constrict and prevent this merging of the two race by incarcerating some for miscegenation whether they were demi-monde or appeared white (light complexion Negro). Any offspring from a Negro man was viewed as “rape” and the white woman who had the child was disgraced and the only way to restore her honor was to have the “alleged rapist” killed.

Further, white male aggression and acts of savagery aimed against Negro children and adult Negro females were not punished. Many crimes were committed against those who were in the wrong place at the right time and because of justice not being brought against the white men who committed these acts of rape these actions brought forth resentment by the Negro man who cried foul play by white men and started boycotting businesses by the very unfairness of a white man not being tried and punished properly. The appalled, offended, shocked refused to patronize services, businesses and companies that treated them less than human and judged them guilty of any crime committed.