They Overthrew The Vote
In 1898 a white mob in Wilmington, North Carolina overthrew the city's elected government and murdered Black residents. It is the only successful coup on American soil.
In 1898, Wilmington, North Carolina was a prosperous, majority-Black city with a multiracial, democratically elected government. That November, a mob of armed white supremacists overthrew it by force — burning Black businesses, killing residents, and marching elected officials out of town at gunpoint.
The Coup
It was no spontaneous riot. It was planned and led by prominent white political leaders. To this day it stands as the only successful armed overthrow of a government in United States history. Black residents who survived fled for their lives.
The only coup in American history that worked.
Rewritten
For a century, the official record called it a "race riot" started by Black residents — the exact opposite of the truth. The men who seized power got to write the history.
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For a hundred years the record called it a riot. It was a coup — and the men who led it wrote the story.
You've Seen the File.
An elected government overthrown by a white mob, then recast as a 'riot' for a century. History's mistake, or a deliberate lie?
Wilmington's Lie — David Zucchino
The Pulitzer-winning account of the 1898 coup and the lie that buried it.
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