s. They were the members that could use the Klan attire, hood and gown, to hide behind while they committed acts of rape, murder, arson, and lynching. The final group were the poor white population of the South who feared the economic competition of African American workers. They needed to protect their jobs from the highly skilled artisans and former slaves who would be willing to accept less pay to begin their new lives. With these groups at the helm of the organization membership grew at an astronomical rate and the organization was extremely successful during its inception. W.W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina during this period describes the Ku Klux Klan in his state:These combinations were at first purely political in their character, and many good citizens were induced to join them. But gradually under the leadership of ambitious and discontented politicians and under the pretext that society needed to be regulated by some authority outside or above the law, their character was changed, and those secret Klans began to commit murder, to rob, whip, scourge, and mutilate unoffending citizensK They met in secret, in disguise, and arms, in a dress of a certain kind intended to conceal their persons and their horses, and to terrify those whom they menaced or assaulted. They held their camps, and under leaders they decreed judgment against their peaceable fellow-citizens from mere intimidations to scourgings, mutilations, the burning of churches, schoolhouses, mills, and in many cases to murder. This organization, under different names but cemented by a common purpose, is believed to have embraced not less than 40,000 voters in North Carolina. (DuBois, 533-534) By 1871, their membership grew to 550,000 and their heinous and corrupt activities began. It has been documented that they lynched 34 African American women for being sassy during this period but this is just the written evidence. The real evidence of the rise of the...
