The Wilmington Ten: Violence, Injustice, and the Rise of Black Politics in the 1970s

by Kenneth Robert Janken

Overview

In February 1971, racial tension surrounding school desegregation in Wilmington, North Carolina, culminated in four days of violence and skirmishes between white vigilantes and black residents. The turmoil resulted in two deaths, six injuries, more than $500,000 in damage, and the firebombing of a white-owned store, before the National Guard restored uneasy peace. Despite glaring irregularities in the subsequent trial, ten young persons were convicted of arson and conspiracy and then sentenced to a total of 282 years in prison. They became known internationally as the Wilmington Ten. A powerful movement arose within North Carolina and beyond to demand their freedom, and after several witnesses admitted to perjury, a federal appeals court, also citing prosecutorial misconduct, overturned the convictions in 1980.

Kenneth Janken narrates the dramatic story of the Ten, connecting their story to a larger arc of Black Power and the transformation of post-Civil Rights era political organizing. Grounded in extensive interviews, newly declassified government documents, and archival research, this book thoroughly examines the 1971 events and the subsequent movement for justice that strongly influenced the wider African American freedom struggle.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781469666235
Publisher:	The University of North Carolina Press
Publication date:	08/01/2021
Pages:	256
Sales rank:	1,061,648
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Kenneth Janken is professor of African American and Diaspora studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

Kenneth Janken's Wilmington Ten is a fast-paced, deeply researched investigation of an atrocity whose ordinary black and white victims might otherwise have remained all but forgotten and whose large civil rights significance holds lessons to be taught ever and again.—David Levering Lewis, Julius Silver University Professor, Emeritus, New York University, and author of books on Martin Luther King Jr., and W. E. B. Du Bois

The story of the Wilmington Ten, despite its tragic aspects, demonstrates the power of an inclusive, eclectic, and morally grounded movement to triumph over repression and wrong. Kenneth Janken has written an utterly fascinating account of a tumultuous and transformative episode in the struggle for democracy in America.—Timothy B. Tyson, Duke University

Kenneth Janken provides us unique insights into one of the many violent battles in America's misrepresented racial war of the 1960s and 1970s—a war that has quieted but not ended.—John Sayles, director of Matewan and author of A Moment in the Sun

Kenneth Janken provides the reader with a riveting, important account of a sorely understudied episode in the black freedom movement of the early-to-mid 1970s. The Wilmington Ten is likely to become a transformative work in the area of Black Freedom Studies.—Clarence Lang, author of Black America in the Shadow of the Sixties

Kenneth Janken's unraveling of the tangled skein of one legal miscarriage of justice after another gives this work a cumulative and damning force. A riveting and important study of injustice in the modern South, Janken's work is especially important because he situates an engaging legal history against a fascinating backdrop of local, national, and even international politics. This is an unflinching work of history that makes a tremendously important contribution.—David Carter, Auburn University

Editorial Reviews

09/28/2015
Janken (White: The Biography of Walter White, Mr. NAACP) recreates in meticulous detail a trial that became a cause celebre in the 1970s. Setting the scene, he describes how the desegregation of the Wilmington, N.C., school system in 1970 led to rioting, arson, and finally the arrival of the National Guard in early 1971. In the wake of this violence, 10 people—nine African-American men and one white woman—were arrested, tried, and convicted of arson and conspiracy. Janken’s account of their experiences takes readers through their trial, which involved prosecutorial misconduct and flagrantly biased jury selection; the attempts of a coalition of activists to free them; and the overturning of their convictions in 1979. The bittersweet conclusion concerns the difficulty with which the Wilmington 10 resumed their lives, or attempted to. Younger readers may be most surprised by the blatant racism expressed by some of the court officials—for example, the prosecutor making pleased note of the KKK affiliation of potential jurors. The story’s minutiae can become overwhelming, but the subject matter is fascinating, and it’s illustrative of how far Americans still have to go in bridging our society’s divisions. 12 illus. (Jan.)

Publishers Weekly

The subject matter is fascinating. . . [and] illustrative of how far Americans still have to go in bridging our society's divisions."—Publishers Weekly

Janken's highly recommended history of student racial protest provides a historical perspective on the current struggle for diversity within academia and the black lives matter movement.—Library Journal

A passionate, intensely engaging portrait of the group's initial mission, as well as the terrible personal lifelong toll the struggle took.—Kirkus Reviews

This first book-length scholarly treatment of the event is meticulously researched and compelling in its analysis. . . . Highly recommended.—Choice

Simultaneously thorough and concise, deeply researched, and insightful, The Wilmington Ten deserves a wide readership.—Journal of Southern History

Provides fresh insight into hard truths about procedures used by the state to suppress and repress black challenges to the racial status quo. . . . A sincere exploration of black politics in the 1970s, one that takes seriously black power activists and ideologies.—American Historical Review

Explodes what little is left of [the] cut-and-paste version of the [civil rights] movement, reminding readers that many different movements were operating over a period of decades. . . . An important, approachable study.—North Carolina Historical Review

No one explains this complicated story better than Kenneth Robert Janken. . . . Shows the complicated ways the 1970s black revolt took up the unfinished civil rights agenda, especially its attempt to resist white terror.—Journal of American History

From the Publisher

01/01/2016
In 1971, high school students in Wilmington, NC, staged a boycott to protest the systematic mistreatment of African American students by school administrators, police, and the larger community. The boycott led to four days of violence that resulted in two deaths, six injuries, and several ruined businesses, some of which were destroyed by owners to take advantage of the civil unrest before the National Guard restored order. The riots would eventually result in the conviction of ten young protestors sentenced to a total of 282 years in prison. Using recently declassified government documents, personal interviews, and archival research, Janken (White: The Biography of Walter White, Mr. NAACP) provides the first examination of a pivotal moment in the black freedom movement of the 1970s and spends the first third of the book constructing a time line of how a town fell apart over school integration. The rest of the volume documents the corrupted trial of the protestors and how their conviction resulted in mass protest of the injustice. VERDICT Janken's highly recommended history of student racial protest provides a historical perspective on the current struggle for diversity within academia and the black lives matter movement.—John Rodzvilla, Emerson Coll., Boston

Library Journal

Janken's account of racial injustice in North Carolina proves even more enlightening through Ron Butler's powerful narration. In 1971, in Wilmington, 10 Civil Rights activists—nine African-American young men and one white woman—were wrongly convicted of arson and conspiracy and served four to six years in prison before their convictions were overturned. Janken explores the decades-long racial tension in the city, confrontations around school education, prosecutorial deceit, and the aftermath of the overturned sentences. With a deep voice and deliberate tone, Butler guides listeners through the events and differing points of view. His steady cadence at times seems too calm for the explosive situations being described. However, his emotional distance allows listeners to focus on the substance of the firsthand accounts. L.E. © AudioFile 2016, Portland, Maine

JANUARY 2016 - AudioFile

2015-09-08
A new look at the injustice visited on a group of African-American high school students engaged in the battle for desegregation in the public schools. Janken (African-American and Diaspora Studies/Univ. of North Carolina; Walter White: Mr. NAACP, 2003, etc.) revisits this painful episode in the civil rights struggle of early 1971, when the boycott by black high school students of two newly desegregated Wilmington, North Carolina, high schools turned violent and provoked a white-supremacy response and precipitous police roundup. The initial protests were led by a student "boycott committee" radicalized by the ongoing culture and politics of Black Power and frustrated by the discrimination they endured continually in their formerly all-white schools: racist taunts by other students, sidelining of black students for government and sports teams, uneven disciplinary action meted out by administration, and the need for black educators and counselors, among other grievances. The students sought help from black church leaders in town, especially the white minister of Gregory Congregational Church and the assistant he recruited for help, Ben Chavis, a young civil rights organizer, who would become the lightning rod for focusing and leading the student group's demands. After the conflict spread from the schoolyard to the town, resulting in the burning of several white establishments and violent clashes with the homegrown vigilante Rights of White People, the boycott leaders, including Chavis, were charged in a frame-up and jailed. The story of the Wilmington Ten really begins here, as Janken follows systematically the problematic witness who perjured himself at the trial, coached by the prosecution, and the faulty jury selection process. Moreover, the alliances the group garnered from supportive civil rights groups helped ignite a national outrage about the cause and helped join the larger discussion of racial equality smoldering across the country. A passionate, intensely engaging portrait of the group's initial mission, as well as the terrible personal lifelong toll the struggle took.

Kirkus Reviews