49 pages • 1 hour read
Blood at the Root: A Racial Cleansing in America
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Chapters 9-11Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 9 Summary: “We Condemn This Conduct”
Though the trial had concluded, the violence against black citizens in Forsyth County did not cease. Byrd Oliver's daughter kept records of her conversations with her father about the mob violence he and his wife, Delia, experienced. Oliver “must have realized, in October of 1912, that his days in Forsyth County were numbered” (108) as he watched “the black community grow smaller and smaller” (108). When Oliver and Delia eventually left Forsyth, it was through a “landscape teeming with white mobs” (110); by the time they made it to Gainesville, half of his family—Delia and the three oldest daughters—were separated from him, and never seen again.
As the flight of black residents became more extreme, “the county’s white landowners began to feel deeply concerned about the future” (111), especially as white employers of black people began to also receive threats. A large group of white residents attempted to “address the ‘lawlessness’ that was driving black residents out of the county” (113). After writing to the governor, they received a response explaining that “‘the Governor has no authority to take any steps to give protection’” (116).
In 1915, prominent black author and political figure W.E.B. DuBois sent a journalist to Forsyth to investigate, which resulted in “one of the only written accounts of these events…from outside the southern point of view” (117). The article describes the “dire consequences if black residents tried to hold out” (118). Phillips also mentions Sheriff Reid’s noteworthy absence during this time in Forsyth: “there is no record of a single warrant or arrest for any of the crimes committed against the property and people of black Forsyth in 1912” (119).
Chapter 10 Summary: “Crush the Thing in Its Infancy”
Forsyth County was not alone in perpetrating violence towards its black residents. In nearby Hall County, “race hysteria spread…and residents there witnessed a similar spate of attacks” (120). Phillips uses Hall County to provide a counterexample to Forsyth. Why, Phillips asks, “was the expulsion of African Americans part of Forsyth County’s identity for nearly a hundred years, but only a brief episode in the history of Hall?” (122).
After one brutal evening of violence, a landowning white man in Hall County, Raymond Carlile, took prisoner the man who was trying to shoot a black sharecropper on his property. The next day, Carlile “delivered his prisoner…and gave a full report” (123). Sheriff William Crow rode out “in pursuit of the other night riders” (123) and arrested them. Crow “told reporters that he had every intention of finding and arresting whites who engaged in violence against black families” (124). Thus, unlike in Forsyth, “in Hall County, at least, it was still a crime to kill a black man” (125).
Chapter 11 Summary: “The Scaffold”
The hanging of Ernest Knox and Oscar Daniel was largely engineered by one of the wealthiest Cumming residents, a doctor named Ansel Strickland, who volunteered “to host the double hanging on his own property” (126). Judge Morris had been clear about the rules for the hanging: no more than one mile of the county courthouse and held in complete privacy, since viewing a hanging could be an obvious precedent for white mob violence.
When Sheriff Reid went to examine the potential site, which “technically complied with the judge’s order” (127), it was also clear that the hills around the site formed “a kind of natural amphitheater” (127) so that thousands of people could gather to witness the execution. The judge, angered by this decision, ordered that a blind be built so that the hanging would still remain somewhat “shielded from view” (127). On the day before the hanging, the wooden blind was torn down and burned. This was one of the first real signs to Major Catron that “Bill Reid was a large part of the problem in Forsyth County” (129).
As a large crowd gathered in the hills to witness the hangings, soldiers escorted Knox and Daniel toward the hills. There was no threat from the crowds, since they seemed to have realized “a lynching was now redundant, since Reid had arranged for them to witness all the pomp and drama of the state-sponsored killing” (132). Mae Crow’s entire family assembled to witness the hanging.
The hanging of Ernest Knox and Oscar Daniel “took less than a minute” (136). As the bodies “jerked violently” (137), the “crowd on the hillsides cheered and shouted their approval” (137). Though it was technically illegal to have souvenirs from such an event, “Reid and his men [cut] up the two hangman’s nooses and hand[ed] out small pieces” (138). One of these pieces remained in the Forsyth County Courthouse through the 1980s as a place holder in the “pages of a big leather-bound volume of superior court minutes from 1912” (138). Despite the fact that the bodies were supposed to be burned, the overseeing physician, Dr. Lindorme arranged for transport to Atlanta, where the bodies were dissected by medical students under the watchful eye of Dr. Selman.
Chapters 9-11 Analysis
Phillips’ intentional juxtaposition of Hall County and Forsyth County is a critical addition to the narrative structure of Blood at the Root. By using this example, Phillips shows how the actions of only a few individuals fundamentally altered the legacy of violence in a particular location. Forsyth’s sheriff, Bill Reid, consistently acted in ways that perpetrated and supported the violence of white citizens, whereas in Hall County, Sheriff Crow took immediate action to stop white citizens from attacking their black neighbors. Phillips is careful to note that even so, “Georgia was still Georgia” (125). The actions of one sheriff in Hall County cannot exonerate the people of that society for their actions against black people. Yet Forsyth’s white community so quickly descended into a frenzy of racially motivated violence that it is helpful to see that there were alternative paths—if only any of the white leaders stepped forward or stood up for justice.
Mob violence runs throughout Blood at the Root. While the causes of this violence vary, much of the underlying tensions and beliefs are the same for the white participants. Phillips consistently describes these motivations, including using primary sources to share the voices of the people who witnessed or were involved in the violence. Through this, Phillips is able to highlight the significant social values of the period among white residents. Much of the violence perpetrated against black people in 1912 Forsyth County was the direct result of white insecurities and fears. Additionally, white people’s abilities to separate themselves from caring about their black neighbors proliferated due to the narrative about the tragic death of a young white woman. The continued perpetration of this myth—that one white woman’s innocence was more important than hundreds of black lives—is reflected in countless stories from across the post-emancipation South and is responsible for uncountable acts of violence against black people.
Phillips weaves back and forth between a political commentary and a historical narrative of what happened in 1912 in Forsyth. This alternating structure allows the reader to understand the complexities of the social and political circumstances that not only led to the events of 1912 but also to the contemporary composition of Forsyth County (in addition to other relevant historical happenings). When Phillips inserts different pieces of non-chronological information by giving more extended history about Forsyth or by providing opinions that are rooted in a modern understanding of the vents, it shifts the overarching meaning of the text. Rather than writing Blood at the Root as if the year of 1912 happened in a vacuum, Phillips continually locates specific events within a larger, nuanced landscape of both history and politics.
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