Negroes with guns - Robert F. Williams

First published in 1962, Negroes with Guns is the story of a southern black community's struggle to arm itself in self-defense against the Ku Klux Klan and other racist groups.

Submitted by wojtek on May 22, 2013

Frustrated and angered by violence condoned or abetted by the local authorities against blacks, the small community of Monroe, North Carolina, brought the issue of armed self-defense to the forefront of the civil rights movement. Under the leadership of Robert F. Williams (1925-1996), Monroe became the test case of the right of blacks to armed self-defense when law and order broke down.

In 1961 Williams was framed for kidnapping and had to flee the country with his family. From exile in Cuba, Williams told his story of the Monroe case to Marc Schleifer in a three-hour interview, beginning with his return to his home town of Monroe in 1955 as a veteran of the U.S. Marine Corps, when he joined the local chapter of the NAACP. Williams described his involvement, supplemented by material from Williams' articles and editorials featured in the newsletter, The Crusader -- which Williams and his wife Mabel continued to publish in Cuba for a circulation of thousands -- and an interview with John Schultz first published in Studies on the Left. These materials became Negroes with Guns.

The single most important intellectual influence on Huey P. Newton, the founder of the Black Panther Party, Negroes with Guns is a classic story of a man who risked his life for democracy and freedom.

Comments

wojtek

10 years 10 months ago

In reply to by libcom.org

Submitted by wojtek on May 22, 2013

Negroes with guns: Robert F. Williams and black power
53 minutes, 2005.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IVPR7IVio4

Ed

8 years 8 months ago

In reply to by libcom.org

Submitted by Ed on July 19, 2015

The day the Klan messed with the wrong people

a large, heavily armed Klan motorcade roared out to Dr. Perry's place, firing their guns at the house and howling at the top of their lungs. The hooded terrorists met a hail of disciplined gunfire from Robert Williams and his men, who fired their weapons from behind sandbag fortifications and earthen entrenchments. Shooting low, they quickly turned the Klan raid into a complete rout. "[Police Chief] Mauney wouldn't stop them," B. J. Winfield said later, "and he knew they were coming, because he was in the Klan. When we started firing, they run. We run them out and they started just crying and going on."

S. Artesian

8 years 8 months ago

In reply to by libcom.org

Submitted by S. Artesian on July 20, 2015

Worth a read: Deacons For Defense

Chilli Sauce

8 years 8 months ago

In reply to by libcom.org

Submitted by Chilli Sauce on July 20, 2015

Been reading this. It's really good - and quite local to where I am at the moment.

Anyway, he talks about how, in the effort to defend their NAACP chapter, they chartered an NRA branch! What a world, man - chartering a branch of the f*cking NRA so they could engage in an armed defense of a traditionally legalistically inclined civil rights organisation.