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“…the slave went free; stood a brief moment in the sun; then moved back again toward slavery.” W.E.B. du Bois
Initiated before the end of the Civil War, Reconstruction held the promise of freedom, full citizenship, and (for men) the franchise for African Americans. But even before the Federal troops that were enforcing Reconstruction withdrew from the former Confederate States, Southern communities and legislatures set about to return the freed men and women to their former condition.
Despite the guarantees of the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments, blacks were denied their new rights through legal and extra-legal means. In the decades after the war, many blacks did make legislative, educational, and financial gains. However, many more faced limited economic opportunity and the constant threat of violence.
Seeking information about opportunities in the North, men and women, the young and the older, regardless of education level, wrote letters to the Chicago Defender newspaper, the Chicago Urban League, and other organizations. The following letter was written by a 17-year-old girl from Selma, Alabama:
Dear Sir: I am a reader of the Chicago Defender I think it is one of the Most Wonderful Papers of our race printed. Sirs I am writeing to see if You all will please get me a job. And Sir I can wash dishes, wash, iron, nursing, work in groceries and dry good stores. Just any of these I can do. Sir, whosoever you get the job from, please tell them to send me a ticket and I will pay them when I get their, as I have not got enough money to pay my way. I am a girl of 17 years old and in the 8 grade at Knox Academy School. But on account of not having money enough I had to stop school. Sir I will thank you all with all my heart. May God Bless you all. Please answer in return mail.
In this first episode of a three-part series on the Great Migration, we will see what changed–and what didn’t change–for African Americans in the South after the Civil War.
Recommended Reading—
The Warmth of Other Suns: Isabel Wilkerson took 15 years to write this book, and it shows. The book is THOROUGH. Think of it as Everything That You Didn’t Know That You Didn’t Know About the Great Migration.
The Rise and Fall of Jim Crow: Richard Wormser covers a lot of ground in a relative few pages. It opens with Reconstruction and ends at 1954.
I referred to several sources, but used the following most heavily–
Slavery by Another Name, Douglas Blackmon
“Black Workers and the Great Migration North,” Carole Marks
“Blowing the Trumpet: The ‘Chicago Defender’ and Black Migration during World War I,” James R. Grossman
“Land of Hope: Chicago, Black Southerners, and the Great Migration,” James R. Grossman