"THE RIOTERS WERE COMPOSED OF THE POLICE, FIREMEN, AND THE RABBLE AND NEGRO-HATERS IN GENERAL, WITH A SPRINKLING OF YANKEE-HATERS, ALL LED ON AND ENCOURAGED BY DEMAGOGUES AND OFFICE HUNTERS"

(GRANT, Ulysses S.) (STANTON, Edwin M.) STONEMAN, George. Riot at Memphis. Letter from the Secretary of War, in Answer to a Resolution of the House of the 28th of May, in Relation to the Riot at Memphis. [Washington, 1866]. Slim octavo, unbound; pp.4. $1200.

Scarce first printing of the first official account of the Memphis Massacre of 1866.

This, the first government record of one of the earliest large-scale race riots of the Reconstruction era, was provided by General George Stoneman, later the 15th governor of California. During the three-day Memphis riot, 46 African-Americans (many of whom were Union veterans) were killed, at least 75 others were wounded, and multiple homes, schools and churches burned down. Stoneman's two reports from the city, dated May 13 and May 18, were addressed to Ulysses S. Grant, then lieutenant general; Grant later described the bloody riot as "a scene of murder, arson, rape, and robery [sic] in which the victims were all helpless and unresisting negroes." The subsequent congressional investigation—as well as national outrage over the violence—strongly influenced the passage of the 14th Amendment. Not in Sabin.

Excellent condition.