0%
Read
Recent Conversations
View allSouthern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases
Wells
1892
The pamphlet that turned reporting into an indictment.
Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases
Ida B. Wells-Barnett · 1892
In 1892, Wells used court records, her own reporting, and the Southern press's own words to dismantle the alibi that lynching was about protecting white women from rape. It is a founding document of American investigative journalism — data-driven, case-by-case, and still legible as a template for how a pretext gets built and then dismantled.
This pamphlet documents lynching and other racial violence using the period's own reporting and language, presented unaltered as Wells wrote it.
ReaderAI MentorGlossaryQuizModernizationContext cards
Start reading8 chapters · 9,587 words · ~44 min read
Contents
Preface & Endorsement
Wells's own account of why she wrote this pamphlet, and Frederick Douglass's letter backing it.
The Pamphlet
Wells's six-essay case against lynch law — the offense, the evidence, the press, the South's defense, and her call to self-help.