Virginia Vignettes

The constitutional convention of 1901-1902 was called to revamp state government and eliminate what remained of the black vote, whose manipulation, reformers claimed, corrupted politics. After considering a number of franchise options, the delegates settled on provisions that eventually disfranchised most black Virginians and about half of the white electorate as well through the imposition of [...]

The Ku Klux Klan was formed in Tennessee during Reconstruction, but it was not active in the Old Dominion. However, thanks to antiforeign hysteria generated by World War I, the “Invisible Empire” made a comeback across America in the 1920s. It again had little influence in Virginia–one historian estimates it had 20,000 members in the state–but in [...]

Post-Civil War Reconstruction was an uncomfortable time for many Virginians, but it was not the “living hell” described by many historians for years thereafter. Indeed, it was relatively mild compared to other end-of-war reprisals. Jail time for Confederate leaders was negligible, except for Jefferson Davis, who spent two years in a Fort Monroe cell; loss of [...]

Leaving their old plantations, the emancipated slaves went in search of families and jobs, experiencing the emotional release of being free. They legalized their marriages, seized control of their churches, and avidly pursued education through missionary and Freedmen’s Bureau schools. Despite white charges of idleness, freedpeople sought any kind of employment, many going to towns [...]