Internment at McNulty baseball park.
Courtesy of the McFarlin Library University of Tulsa
White Tulsans roamed the streets while blacks were imprisoned.
Courtesy of the McFarlin Library, University of Tulsa
Greenwood Avenue, looking north from Archer.
Courtesy of Western History Collections, University of Oklahoma Library
The Red Cross estimated that at least 715 black families left Tulsa but returned later for “various reasons.” On June 2, the New York Times reported a statement by members of a railroad crew that they passed some three thousand blacks heading north from Tulsa to Bar-tlesville—undoubtedly an exaggerated report. Some two hundred Tulsans left the city by rail, perhaps permanently, during the first two weeks after the riot. One hundred and fifty of these had their tickets purchased by the Red Cross. The others, who could purchase their own tickets, were charged only half fare. But not all black Tulsans who wanted to leave, even temporarily, were able to do so. Police, guardsmen, and “relief” workers combed areas north and east of town and took many of the people whom they found there to the internment centers.6
II
Tulsa’s first experience under martial law was brief. Business hours in the city were initially set from 8 A.M. to 6 P.M., except for groceries, meat markets, and other agencies contributing to the “comfort of the people.” No automobiles, except for those of physicians, the Red Cross, or the police, were allowed on the street during the night. The National Guard authorities further deemed that any persons who were found on the streets with arms without “written permission from military authority or by virtue of proper commission under civil law, will be considered as public enemies and treated accordingly.” The troops stood guard at various points throughout the city.7
Life under martial law was modified on June 2 and 3, and then terminated on the latter date. The modifications were enacted through a number of “field orders” issued by Adjutant General Barrett. Field Order No. 1 altered military rule so as to allow the civil authorities to begin prosecution of alleged rioters. The second did a number of things. It allowed most normal business and social activities to resume (at least for whites), and it removed all guardsmen from the “business area,” which presumably referred to the “white” business area, namely downtown. However, the field order also decreed that people would be allowed neither “to congregate on the streets nor engage in heated controversy.” It forbade any white people from going into the burned black district without a pass from the military. Blacks were to be allowed in the “burnt district or negro quarters” if they presented their “police protection” cards. This field order further declared that “all negroes living outside of the city and now detained in the various refugee and detention places will be held under detention and brought before the authorities at the city hall for investigation.”8
Field Order No. 3 prohibited funerals in the city. The fourth order dealt particularly with the city’s interned black population. In essence, it enacted forced labor:
All the able-bodied negro men remaining in detention camp at the Fair Grounds and other places in the city of Tulsa will be required to render such service and perform such labor as is required by the military commission and the Red Cross in making the sanitary provisions for the care of the refugees.
Able-bodied women not having the care of children, will also be required to perform such service as may be required in the feeding and care of refugees.
This order covers any labor necessary in the care of the health or welfare of those people, by reason of their misfortune, must be looked after by different agencies of relief.9
Adjutant General Barrett also directed the county registrar to stop registering deeds from the destroyed area.10
The termination of martial law did not, however, produce an immediate end of the military’s presence in the city. The Tulsa units of the National Guard remained on active duty until the morning of June 4, at which time some of them were to leave for their annual summer encampment. Battery “B” of the Tulsa-based 2nd Field Artillery was to remain in the city, “held in readiness” to cooperate with city and county authorities if needed, but was not to act as an organization unless ordered to do so by the governor.11
When it was announced on June 2 that martial law was to be ended in Tulsa the next day, some people were disturbed. During a directors’ meeting of the Chamber of Commerce on June 3, “a motion prevailed appointing a committee ... to confer with the general executive welfare committee and ask that martial law and the troops be maintained in Tulsa for at least one more week.” One member of this newly appointed committee was the Reverend Harold G. Cooke, the white pastor of the Centenary Methodist Church, who stated three days later that blacks were the most at blame for the riot. He further claimed that there had been “no spirit of mob violence” amongst the crowd of whites in front of the courthouse, which included him, “but when criminal and liquor-frenzied niggers appeared on the streets and outraged the white people of this community, the thing was off.”12
It is also possible that some black Tulsans may have desired that the National Guard troops, at least those sent in from the state capital, remain in the city for a longer period. After the riot, Mary E. Jones Parrish performed interviews for the Inter-Racial Commission, and of them she stated, “everyone with whom I met was loud in praise of the State troops who so gallantly came to the rescue of stricken Tulsa.” But in reference to the “Home Guards”—by which she probably was referring to the numerous “special deputies”—she found denunciation of them “on every lip.” This attitude was echoed by E. A. Loupe, a black plumber, who claimed that the “Home Guards” had offered no protection to blacks during the riot, but “joined in with the hoodlums in shooting in good citizens’ homes.” Seeing this, Loupe took his family and a few friends in his automobile and drove four miles outside the city, “where we were gathered up by the State troops who were perfect gentlemen and treated us like citizens of real America.”13
This white couple apparently thought that the destruction in “Deep Greenwood” might make a good backdrop for a snapshot. They were not alone in a desire to commemorate the riot, for later one group of white entrepreneurs sold postcards of photographs of the riot and its aftermath, including photos of corpses.
Courtesy of Western History Collections, University of Oklahoma Library
The brick shells of the black business district loom behind the remains of black homes in the foreground.
Courtesy of Western History Collections, University of Oklahoma Library
To replace the departed guardsmen, American Legion members were sworn in as police officers and “a force of 100 emergency minute men” was organized by Colonel P. J. Hurley in conjunction with the sheriff’s office and the Chamber of Commerce. This group of “minute men” was better known as the Business Men’s Protective League, and it played an active role in the “policing” of the city. Its members guarded the roads leading into Tulsa under instructions to halt any suspicious looking persons or automobiles, using force if necessary. In at least one instance, these guards did shoot, severely wounding a man and slightly injuring his sister when they refused a command to stop their car.14
This guarding of the highways leading into the city was a response to the lingering fear that many white Tulsans had of a black “counterattack” from outlying areas. Captain Blaine of the Tulsa police made a “scouting trip” by airplane to several centers of the black population in eastern Oklahoma to investigate rumors that blacks were preparing for some form of retaliatory violence. He found no such evidence. Perhaps the first rumor of this kind occurred on June 1, when Colonel Rooney of the National Guard heard that some five hundred black Muskogeeans were en route to Tulsa by train. He enacted precautionary measures to meet the train, but the report proved false. These rumors, and the actions which they generated, also tended to increase the isolation from the outside world which black Tulsa found itself in after the riot. F
or the first few days after the violence, all blacks who came to Tulsa from other communities were turned away at the city limits by white guards unless they agreed to take a black person home with them. One further example of the fear that there was more violence to come, or that violence in Tulsa could easily be provoked, was the fact that for several days after the riot the Pullman Company would not allow black porters to work on trains passing through Tulsa.15
III
The restoration of law and order was the first priority in post-riot Tulsa, and the military authorities played the key role in this undertaking. Other needs, however, such as relief for the victims of the riot, were nearly as urgent. But here, as in most other post-riot activities, the primary players were civilians.
Any grass-roots actions of charity by Tulsa’s white citizenry were generally limited to the first few days after the riot. On the morning of June 1, white citizens and church groups, in addition to the Salvation Army, “brought in coffee and sandwiches for the men on duty and prisoners and refugees.” The Chamber of Commerce reported that on June 7 “dozens” of automobiles had been consigned to the Red Cross, and that “thousands of articles of wearing apparel and household utensils were assembled and distributed to the needy.” Much of this activity was probably organized by the white churches and service groups, but one student of the riot has written that by June 3 “there was little activity at any of the churches except that they were used as collection points for bedding and clothing.” Perhaps of questionable altruism, and an example which helps to illuminate the dubious nature of much of the local white “relief” activities, was the donation of fifty pieces of luggage by a Tulsa trunk company for use by homeless black Tulsans.16
Yet, regardless of the general lack of sympathy in white Tulsa for the conditions faced by their black brethren, and the extremely minimal and brief charitable activities which the local whites performed, “honest” relief work did continue in Tulsa, primarily through the Red Cross and the “Colored Citizens Relief Committee and East End Welfare Board.” Of these two groups, the Red Cross probably wielded the most power, primarily owing to the funds which they had available. Unfortunately, little is known about the East End Welfare Board, but in all likelihood it was primarily an agency of organization and coordination of post-riot activities and strategy in black Tulsa. “These men worked faithfully and have fought many battles for their fellowman,” Mary E. Jones Parrish wrote of this group. “They looked after the needs of the people both physically and legally to the best of their ability, with the assistance of the outside world.”17
Red Cross activities began in Tulsa on June 1, but it was not until a couple of days later that they received official sanction from the civilian authorities. Initially, its operations were headquartered in the downtown area, but on June 3, an officer from the divisional headquarters in St. Louis arrived in Tulsa and moved the operational offices to the Booker T. Washington School. An emergency hospital, a central first aid station, and a dispensary were also established at the school, and the medical work performed there was a collaboration of efforts between the Red Cross, local physicians, the County Superintendent of Health, and the State of Oklahoma.18
Looking toward “Deep Greenwood.”
Courtesy of Western History Collections, University of Oklahoma Library
Part of the black business district.
Courtesy of the Metropolitan Tulsa Chamber of Commerce
By June 3, relief supplies were being given on a family basis, and on June 7, the Red Cross announced that “it would assist only those financially unable to bear the burden.” Efforts were made by the organization and other groups to secure employment for black Tulsans rendered jobless by the riot. The Red Cross made the homeless who were employed pay for meals, but for some time fed the unemployed and the ill for free. This latter group, along with women with infants, were given relief supplies, but the mode of distribution soon changed from actual handouts to “clothing and grocery permits.” Black women and some black children were given cloth and provided with sewing machines with which to make clothing and bedding. The Red Cross was also instrumental in securing tents for black Tulsans whose homes had been destroyed. Governor Robertson, who had refused the offer of fifty Black Cross nurses by the president of the Chicago chapter of the Universal Negro Improvement Association, also refused to consign some one hundred National Guard tents for use in Tulsa. Although, by the first week in July the Red Cross was feeding only those blacks who were ill, their relief work in Tulsa did not end until December of 1921. It should not be assumed that all black Tulsans accepted aid from the Red Cross, nor that the organization was not viewed without suspicion. Mary E. Jones Parrish, who was later loud in praise for the “Mother of the World,” at first avoided Red Cross workers.19
The remains of the “Negro Wall Street” looking north on Greenwood Avenue from Archer.
Courtesy of the Metropolitan Tulsa Chamber of Commerce
Some money and other donations also came into Tulsa from out of town. Civic organizations from various other Oklahoma towns and cities sent clothing and other articles. The NAACP initiated a nationwide campaign to raise money for the victims of the riot. It collected at least $1,900 for its “Tulsa Relief and Defense Fund,” and its contributions ranged from one dollar from a New Jersey woman, to nearly $350 from the Los Angeles Branch of the NAACP. In addition to sending money, the Colored Women’s Branch of the New York City YMCA also sent two barrels of clothing, which the express company shipped free of charge.20
As important as these actions by non-Tulsans were, there was a much more powerful and ominous force working within Tulsa which shaped its post-riot history: the city’s official “relief” activities as carried out by the Executive Welfare Committee and its successor, the Reconstruction Committee. The former was organized, at the request of Adjutant General Barrett, on June 2 at a special meeting of the board of directors of the Tulsa Chamber of Commerce. It was authorized to “appoint such sub-committees as might be necessary in the rehabilitation work and in bringing Tulsa back to normalcy.”21 Before this meeting adjourned, Alva J. Niles, president of the Chamber of Commerce, read a statement concerning the riot which he had given to the press. In it, Niles stated:
Leading business men are in hourly conference and a movement is now being organized, not only for the succor, protection and alleviation of the sufferings of the negroes, but to formulate a plan of reparation in order that homes may be re-built and families as nearly as possible rehabilitated. The sympathy of the citizenship of Tulsa in a great way has gone out to the unfortunate law abiding negroes who have become the victims of the action, and bad advice of some of the lawless leaders, and as quickly as possible rehabilitation will take place and reparation made....
Tulsa feels intensely humiliated and standing in the shadow of this great tragedy pledges its every effort to wiping out the stain at the earliest possible moment and punishing those guilty of bringing the disgrace and disaster to this city.
Niles ended his statement by citing Tulsa’s war effort accomplishments, such as the Liberty Loan drive, as evidence that the “city can be depended upon to make a proper restitution and to bring order out of chaos at the earliest possible moment.”22
A similar attitude was expressed by L. J. Martin, chairman of the Executive Welfare Committee. Martin was quoted in the Independent as stating: “Tulsa can only redeem herself from the countrywide shame and humiliation in which she is today plunged by complete restitution of the destroyed black belt. The rest of the United States must know that the real citizenship of Tulsa weeps at this unspeakable crime and will make good the damage, so far as can be done, to the last penny.”23
This was not, however, the course of action which the Executive Welfare Committee took, and in light of what this committee actually did do, few statements about the riot are as hideously ludicrous as these made by Niles and Martin. On June 4, there was a meeting between the Executive Welfare Committee—which, like the Chamber
of Commerce, had no black members—and other white “relief” groups. They decided not to solicit any funds for aid, “but that any offers in the form of cash would be accepted by the Red Cross and used for relief work.” Furthermore, and most importantly, “it was decided not to accept any other kind of donation nor would any help, financial or otherwise, be accepted to reconstruct the Negro district.”24
Thus, while the officials of the Tulsa Chamber of Commerce were telling the nation’s press that reparation and restitution would be made, they charted a directly opposite course, even to the point of refusing offers of aid for people whom they hardly represented. One Chamber of Commerce member stated that “numerous telegrams were received by the executive committee from various cities in the Union offering aid, but the policy was quickly adopted that this was strictly a Tulsa affair and that the work of restoration and charity would be taken care of by Tulsa people.” This supports a statement made by Walter White that outsiders made offers of money to be used in relief work in Tulsa—including a $1,000 offer of aid from the Chicago Tribune—but that the parties were told “in theatric fashion that the citizens of Tulsa ‘were to blame for the riot and that they themselves would bear the costs of restoration.’”25
Death in a Promised Land Page 8
