Most Black Individuals have by no means heard of the Pink Summer season of 1919…but it surely is a component of Black historical past that we have to take note of. This nation focuses on committing monstrous atrocities after which ignoring the implications of their actions. It occurred with Native Individuals and the Path of Tears. And, in fact, it occurred with Black of us. This fact is greatest captured once we contemplate what occurred within the 12 months 1919.
When Austrian Archduke Franz was assassinated on 28 June 1914, it set off a sequence of occasions that led to what we now name World Warfare 1. Working age white males had been drafted and despatched to struggle, in order that left many job vacancies in northern cities that Black males had been glad to fill. See, Black of us had been feeing the racist South hoping to seek out much less racism in northern cites. The inhabitants of Black Chicagoans elevated by greater than 100% whereas the variety of Black of us in Philadelphia grew by 500%.
Whereas that was occurring, 367,000 Black Individuals both enlisted or had been drafted into service to struggle within the conflict that had simply popped off. Black males had been desirous to show to white America that Black individuals deserved dignity. They hoped they might see that by combating in what white of us had been calling ‘The Nice Warfare.’ However as soon as the conflict ended, Black troopers returned to an ungrateful nation. Eager about these males, W.E.B. Du Bois wrote on Might of 1919 within the NAACP’s Disaster e-newsletter, “We return. We return from combating. We return combating.”
Du Bois had no concept how prophetic his phrases could be. From Might of that 12 months to December, over 25 race massacres occurred on American soil. Greater than 250 Black males, ladies and kids’s lives had been violently reduce quick. Black of us found that the racial violence they thought they escaped after they left locations like Alabama and Mississippi was not a function of Southern residing. As an alternative, it was a part of being Black in America.
These white troopers who got here residence and found that scores of Black individuals had moved to the north. In addition they discovered Black troopers who felt that that they had earned their place in American life by serving their nation. An official put it like this: “one of many precept parts inflicting concern is the returned negro soldier who will not be readily becoming again into his prior standing of pre-war occasions.” Subsequently, white troopers grew to become white terrorists to place these troopers and anybody who seemed like them again of their place. There have been race massacres in Washington D.C., Omaha, Knoxville, and a large race riot in Chicago the place 38 individuals had been killed and 537 injured. Few white individuals had been arrested for these crimes, fewer had been prosecuted. Two years later was the Tulsa race riot the place the Greenwood district, what we now name Black Wallstreet, was burned to the bottom.
As we have fun Black Historical past Month, we have to inform the whole fact of our historical past. Not simply the accomplishments of women and men who embody Black excellence, but additionally the way in which that America has wronged us. The Pink Summer season of 1919 is a type of tales that we want to overlook. But don’t our accomplishments shine much more brightly contemplating the darkness we needed to endure? Little doubt we now have endured days when hope unborn had died. However, in some way, towards all odds, we got here to the place for which our fathers sighed.