Blood at the Root: A Racial Cleansing in America

Phillips, Patrick

ISBN 10: 0393293017 / ISBN 13: 9780393293012

Published by W. W. Norton & Company, 2016

About this Item

2016. 1st Edition. Hardcover. As New Fine. Cloth, D-j. 2016. Originally published at $26.95. In publisher's shrinkwrap. New.

Seller Inventory # W106292b

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Blood at the Root: A Racial Cleansing in America
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
• Publication Date: 2016
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0393293017
• ISBN 13: 9780393293012
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Condition: New
• Dust Jacket Condition: Dust Jacket Included

About this title

Synopsis

In 1912, a young girl's murder rocked the rural community of Forsyth County, Georgia, and led a mob of whites to lynch a black man on the town square. A month later, thousands cheered the hanging, on spurious evidence, of two black teenagers, then set fire to the homes and churches of farmers, field hands, and servants. Bands of night-riders declared Forsyth "whites-only" and sent 1,100 citizens running for their lives. Whites took over their livestock, harvested their crops, and laid claim to "abandoned" black land, slowly erasing all evidence of their communal crime. Blood at the Root is a sweeping American tale, spanning the Cherokee removals of the 1830s, the hope and promise of Reconstruction, and the crushing injustice of Forsyth's racial cleansing. The story continues to the verge of our own era, including a violent attack on civil rights activists in 1987, as residents fought to "Keep Forsyth White" well into the 1990s. Patrick Phillips breaks the century-long silence of his hometown and uncovers a history of racial terrorism that continues to shape America in the twenty-first century.

About the Author

Patrick Phillips is an award-winning poet, translator, and professor. A Guggenheim and National Endowment for the Arts Fellow, his most recent book, Elegy for a Broken Machine, was a finalist for the National Book Award in poetry. Phillips lives in Brooklyn and teaches at Drew University.