{"id":888,"date":"2021-06-11T17:48:41","date_gmt":"2021-06-11T17:48:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bendingtowardjustice.cah.ucf.edu\/?page_id=888"},"modified":"2022-07-13T19:05:56","modified_gmt":"2022-07-13T19:05:56","slug":"ocoeemassacre","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/bendingtowardjustice.cah.ucf.edu\/index.php\/ocoeemassacre\/","title":{"rendered":"Chapter 5: The Ocoee Massacre, November 2-3, 1920"},"content":{"rendered":"

Introduction<\/h2>\n

No photographs exist of the violence or the destroyed homes, school, churches and Masonic lodge. We must depend on word pictures to know what happened and most of the words have been provided by Whites who were complicit in the racial violence.\u00a0 Blacks fled for their lives on the night of November 2-3, 1920.\u00a0\u00a0When they arrived at a safe place, they feared violent retaliation and remained quiet.\u00a0\u00a0As is true of survivors of other traumatic events, there were those who never found the words to express what they saw and experienced.\u00a0\u00a0For many of Ocoee\u2019s Black survivors a reckoning with the past came only when grandchildren and great-grandchildren asked questions about that night so long ago.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Click to hear the RICHES Podcast Documentaries, Episode 2: The Legacy of the Ocoee Riot<\/p><\/div>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Election Campaign Season: Who Will Vote?<\/h2>\n
\"\"<\/a>

Orange County Voter Registration, Ocoee, District 10, 1914-1922. (Image courtesy of STARS, UCF.)<\/p><\/div>\n

The fall of 1920, like all election\u00a0seasons\u00a0that include a presidential campaign,\u00a0was filled with rallies, marches, speeches, and\u00a0political party efforts to get out the vote.\u00a0\u00a0But the 1920 election\u00a0was more ominous as the NAACP with the support of Black fraternal organizations made it\u00a0clear that\u00a0southern voter disfranchising laws would be challenged by Black voters.\u00a0\u00a0The addition of women to the\u00a0voting rolls in the last months of the campaign added to the\u00a0sense that this\u00a0could be a pivotal election.<\/p>\n

Florida laws required\u00a0registration and the payment of a poll tax to cast a ballot.<\/p>\n\"\"<\/a>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Poll tax receipts from Walton County, Florida. (Images courtesy of Walton County Supervisor of Elections Office.)<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201dEat your bread without butter but pay your poll tax!\u201d\u00a0\u00a0-Mary McLeod Bethune<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

White Pressure to Prevent Black Voting in the 1920 Election<\/strong><\/h2>\n
\"\"<\/a>

Judge John Moses Cheney, Tampa Bay Tribune<\/em>, June 3, 1922.<\/p><\/div>\n

Across the state, Black\u00a0voting activists met White resistance,\u00a0with\u00a0verbal warnings and violence.\u00a0\u00a0Reports from Live Oak in Suwanee County and Quincy in Gadsden County\u00a0detailed the pressure\u00a0exerted against registration of Black voters. In Orlando, John M. Cheney, local\u00a0attorney\u00a0and Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate, met with Black\u00a0leaders and\u00a0urged them to\u00a0promote voter registration\u00a0and payment of the poll tax.\u00a0 His actions\u00a0and those of other White Republicans\u00a0soon came to the attention of the Ku Klux Klan.<\/p>\n

On October 30, Klansmen across the South marched. In some cities the parades included as many as 1000 marchers who carried banners through Black neighborhoods as a way to intimidate Black voters and discourage them from going to the polls on election day.\u00a0\u00a0Five hundred Klansmen marched in Orlando.\u00a0\u00a0In Daytona, the KKK visited Mary McLeod Bethune\u2019s school for girls; on election day, she marched with a contingent of Black voters to the polls in a show of strength. Jacksonville held the largest Klan parade, a reported 1000 participants.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Ku Klux Klan March in Downtown Brooksville, Florida, 1922. (Photo courtesy of Florida Memory.)<\/p><\/div>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Election Day, 1920<\/h2>\n

The following sequence of events have been pieced together from a variety of newspapers,\u00a0investigations, and academic studies.\u00a0 Conflicting reports are noted in parentheses.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\u201c\u201d\"<\/a>

Political cartoon depicting a black woman being distanced from a white suffragist. Both carry signs that read “Votes for women.” Caption reads, “Votes for WHITE women.” (Image courtesy of the Library of Congress.)<\/p><\/div>\n

November 2, 1920 saw Floridians, men and women, heading to the polls.\u00a0\u00a0Many Black Floridians cast their ballots, but there were reports of violence across the state.\u00a0 In Jacksonville, NAACP Field Investigator Walter White reported that more than 4000 Blacks \u201cstood in line most of the day waiting to be voted.\u201d\u00a0 The trouble started in Ocoee when Mose Norman arrived at the polls to cast his ballot.\u00a0 He was turned away because officials claimed he was not registered.\u00a0\u00a0In a tactic that was familiar in the South, the Justice of the Peace, R. C. Bigelow, who would hear voting appeals, had \u201cgone fishing\u201d and was not available to verify Norman\u2019s registration.\u00a0\u00a0(Some sources claimed that Norman voted successfully early in the day and that it was July Perry who was denied the vote.)
Norman (or Perry) left the polling place and went to Orlando to consult with John Cheney.<\/p>\n

Judge Cheney advised him to record the names of Blacks who were denied access to the ballot as well as the names of poll workers.\u00a0 The documentation could be used as evidence in future legal action.<\/p>\n

When Norman\u00a0(or Perry)\u00a0returned to the polling place, accounts differ as to what occurred.\u00a0\u00a0Accounts seem to agree on two things:\u00a0Norman stated, \u201cI (we) will vote, by God!\u201d and he was\u00a0again denied the\u00a0ballot.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Here the accounts vary widely.\u00a0\u00a0Some accounts claim that he brought a loaded gun into the polling place; other accounts state that the White men found a gun in Norman\u2019s car, either clearly visible or under a shawl; a third account says Norman returned home, got his gun, and drove into town where he was confronted by Constable Bernie Cannon, who disarmed him and hit Norman with his revolver.\u00a0 Other accounts put the assault at the polling place.<\/p>\n

Norman fled the scene\u00a0to the home of his friend, July Perry, to relate the events of the day.\u00a0 Both men must have been aware that\u00a0the escalation of violence\u00a0enhanced the danger to themselves and the community.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Accounts also differ as to\u00a0the formation of the first group of White men who confronted July Perry at this home.\u00a0 By one account,\u00a0White men congregating around the local stores decided to confront Perry when they were informed that he\u00a0was arming himself and others.\u00a0 A second story claimed that\u00a0Deputy Sheriff Clyde Pounds (or Sheriff\u00a0Frank\u00a0Gordon) deputized 20 men to bring in Perry and Norman.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The ten men who went to Perry\u2019s house were\u00a0led by WWI veteran and former\u00a0Orlando police chief, Sam Salisbury.\u00a0They\u00a0arrived at the Perry home sometime\u00a0around 9:00 pm.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Vernon E. Parrish,\u201cBloodshed, The Price of History,\u201d Term Paper (Bound), Spring Semester, 1949, P.K. Yonge Library of Florida History, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida.<\/p><\/div>\n

Stories of what occurred at the Perry home are in general agreement.\u00a0Salisbury called Perry to the porch, where they spoke briefly; Perry\u00a0indicated that he needed to get his coat before leaving with Salisbury who grabbed Perry\u2019s arm.\u00a0\u00a0Perry\u2019s daughter,\u00a022-year-old\u00a0Coretha, pointed a rifle\u00a0at Salisbury, who pushed the weapon away and the gun fired;\u00a0Salisbury was shot in the arm.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Gunfire erupted between the Perry family inside the house and the men outside.\u00a0In the course of\u00a0the gunfight, both July and\u00a0Coretha\u00a0Perry were wounded, July Perry quite seriously, and two White men, Elmer\u00a0McDaniels\u00a0and Leo\u00a0Borgard\u00a0were killed as they attempted to enter the house from the rear.\u00a0\u00a0Men at the scene claimed\u00a0that dozens of men were in the\u00a0Perry house, but it seems that only the Perry family was inside.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

When the men retreated, the Perry family used the time to escape.\u00a0\u00a0Perry\u2019s wife helped him flee into the nearby cane fields; the two Perry sons hid in the barn; Coretha Perry stayed in the house to tend to her own serious, but non-life-threatening wound.\u00a0\u00a0A manhunt soon located Perry and he was arrested; his wife and daughter were taken into custody and transferred to Tampa.<\/p>\n

Perry was treated for his wounds, which were viewed as likely fatal and moved to the Orange County jail under the custody of Sheriff Frank Gordon.<\/p>\n

Alerted to the events taking place in Ocoee, some 50 carloads of men from surrounding areas descended on the town.<\/p>\n

In the early morning hours of November 3, a mob arrived at the jail and seized Perry.\u00a0 They took him to a site near Lake Concord and the home of Judge Cheney.\u00a0 There they lynched him and riddled his body with bullets.\u00a0\u00a0No doubt the choice of site was intended as a warning to both Blacks who voted and Whites who encouraged them to cast ballots. Black undertaker, Edward Stone (some accounts say J.B. Stone), later removed the body and facilitated July Perry\u2019s burial in an unmarked grave in the section of Greenwood Cemetery designated for Blacks.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Death certificate for July Perry. His death certificate listed his cause of death as \u201cBy being hung.\u201d And in different handwriting, \u201cnot by violence caused by racial disturbance.\u201d (Image courtesy of the State of Florida.)<\/p><\/div>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Massacre<\/h2>\n

In Ocoee, the mob terrorized the Black citizens living in the Northern Quarters, setting houses aflame and trapping the people inside as they were caught between the flames inside and the gunfire outside. When the gunfire and arson ended, 25 houses, 2 churches, a school, and the Prince Hall Masonic Lodge had been destroyed. Residents of the Southern Quarters were warned that they should leave Ocoee or risk a similar fate. After 1921, only two Blacks remained in Ocoee.<\/p>\n

Within the week, local stories about the violence divided into two separate accounts. What we might term the White accounts discounted what were deemed exaggerated levels of violence and defended the status quo of White supremacy. Black narratives focused on individual tales of violence against them and their escape. They also connected the violence to their legal exercise of the ballot, a connection that Whites increasingly discounted.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Black Interpretations of the Ocoee Massacre<\/h2>\n

Black\u00a0understanding of the violence challenged the White version on every point.\u00a0<\/p>\n

-By November 5, 1920, Blacks and their White allies were placing the number of dead at 30, with most conceding that the total number of dead would remain unknown.\u00a0<\/p>\n

-The violence in Ocoee was perpetrated by Whites who sought to re-assert their control over Black social, economic, and political lives.<\/p>\n

-Blacks saw the \u201chome guard\u201d as members of the KKK.<\/p>\n

-Blacks recognized their determination to exercise their constitutional right to the ballot was a trigger to the subsequent violence. They made that argument to the U.S. Attorney General and before a congressional committee.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Hightower Family<\/h3>\n
\"\"<\/a>

Armstrong Hightower. South Florida Sun Sentinel,\u00a0<\/em> June 1, 2002.<\/p><\/div>\n

The Hightowers, like the other Black families in Ocoee, suffered terror, trauma, and property loss on the night of November 2, 1920 and in the days that followed. The youngest Hightower child, Armstrong, only thirteen at the time, recalled seeing the Perry family\u2019s barn go up in flames as he and his siblings hid in the orange groves behind their house. The Hightowers left Ocoee almost immediately; there is no mention of them in the 1921 Orlando City Directory. They were forced to sell their land, almost forty acres, for much less than its value. The Hightower family reached safety by fleeing south to Fort Lauderdale.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

The John Hickey Family<\/h3>\n