Ramcharan 1

Hannah Ramcharan
Professor. Gray
History 202
10 September 2015
Hardships during the Reconstruction Period
The ratification of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments during the
1800s improved the lives of freedmen. These laws abolished slavery, allowed black senators to
be elected and gave freedmen the ability to vote. Military troops regulated the Southern states to
enforce these laws and establish the importance of the new modifications that were made to the
country. Republicans supported the governments struggle for Reconstruction and did not have
many issues expressing their political views. However, there were many people who violently
resisted these changes especially when the Union troops began to leave the southern areas. As a
result, the Ku Klux Klan formed, causing hardships for freedmen, scalawags and Carpetbaggers,
workers who desired the use the opportunities in the southern states for their own economic
benefit. This can be examined by comparing how the Klan was described in South Carolina
versus Washington D.C., and by analyzing if race was a factor in analyzing the type of evidence
that was collected which describes the actions taken against witnesses.
After interviewing citizens in both Washington, D.C. and in South Carolina, the data that
members of the Joint Select Committee collected differed because of location. The two witnesses
in Washington D.C. were both white Republicans so they had enough money to be able to travel

Ramcharan 2
compared to black Republicans. The people who testified in D.C., where there is no threat of the
Klan, presented in bold answers because they were not afraid to say exactly what happened. For
example, when the Chairman asked Samuel T. Poinier if he knew that the Klan existed in South
Carolina, he did not hesitate to say, Yes Sir; I have no doubt about it in the world.1 However,
the people examined in South Carolina who lives where the Klan existed, gave testimonies that
were more constrained and hesitant. When Mr. Van Trump asked Marvin Givens if he told
...anybody else it was John Thomson2 who had come to his house and assaulted him he
answered no because he simply, was afraid to.3 The location had an impact on how safe the
witnesses felt which affected their verbal expression of the recounted events.
Not only did the testimonies vary because of different locations, but the essence of the
evidence also varied because of race. Many Republicanswhite or blackwere targeted for
their political views. Although, not as many white witnesses were personally encountered by the
Klan, they either heard or saw what happened which made evidence more like hearsay. When
D.H. Chamberlain was being interviewed, he confessed, I speak now, of course of what I have
heard; I have never seen any outrages committed myself; I am simply stating what I believe to be
fact 4Most of the stories about the Klan are being told about someone else like when Samuel
T. Poinier said that the Parties of disguised men go to a colored mans house and take him out

1 Brown, Victoria Bissell, and Timothy J. Shannon. Going to the Source : The Bedford Reader in
American History. Third ed. Vol. 2. Boston [u.a.: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2012. 12.
2 Ibid,21.
3 Ibid,21.
4 Ibid,14.

Ramcharan 3
and whip him5. However, the black witnesses tell stories from their point of view so the
evidence is more detailed. They can recall conversations that they had with Klan members.
When Elias Thompson specifically recalled telling a Klan member who he voted for who
remarked, You thought it was right? It was right wrong6, which unfairly ridiculed his political
standpoint. Race among these people not only had an impact on how elaborate the testimonies
were but also affected the type of crimes committed against the victims.
Although the acts of the Klan were harsh, unfair and brutal for all, they differed between
freedmen and white Republicans. White victims did not suffer many physical detriments because
of the Klan; they were involved in less dangerous circumstances. Samuel T. Poinier was
threatened because he received anonymous communications signed by the order of the
K.K.K., directing [him] to leave the county7 The reported attacks toward freedmen were
physically brutal which included drowning people, and whipping people, and killing them."8
When the Klan came to Elias Thomsons house he testified that they whipped him with Thirteen
of the hardest cuts he ever gotand cut a piece about as wide as my two fingers in one place.9
In addition, after Lucy McMillans confrontation with the Klan she told them that they came

5 Ibid,12.
6 Ibid,17.
7Brown, Victoria Bissell, and Timothy J. Shannon. Going to the Source : The Bedford Reader in
American History. Third ed. Vol. 2. Boston [u.a.: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2012. 12.
8Ibid,19.
9Ibid,17.

Ramcharan 4
there [and] burned my house down10. Although both races faced danger from the Ku-Klux
Klan, they were more violent to the former slaves. The KKK did not want to accept the fact that
they would now be equal to the freedmen according to the revolutionary law.
Reconstruction was a grueling process but it was an important start to building a better
country. It was not easy to enforce the racial equality goals that the government strived for
through the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, especially because of the KuKlux Klan. The evidence collected by the Joint Select Committee can be used to examine the
Souths conditions at the time by looking at how evidence was presented based on where the
witnesses were located, and how race among many Republicans affected both the degree that the
Klan was described and the types of crimes committed against innocent victims.

Works Cited
Brown, Victoria Bissell, and Timothy J. Shannon. Going to the Source : The Bedford Reader in
American History. Third ed. Vol. 2. Boston [u.a.: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2012.

10Ibid,19.