Negro Migration during the War

oduc

s of the blacks from remote regions of the South, depopulated entire communities, drew upon the negro inhabitants of practically every city of the South, and spread from Florida to the western limits of Texas. In character it was not without

nchisement in the South to States where their votes might swell the Republican majority. Just here may be found a striking analogy to one of the current charges brought against the movement nearly f

g over a period of fifteen years; the convict system by which the courts are permitted to inflict heavy fines for trivial offenses and the sheriff to hire the convicts to planters on the basis of peonage; denial of political rights; long continued persecution for political reasons; a system of cheating by landlords and storekeepers which rendered it impossible for tenants to make a living, and the inadequacy of school faciliti

number of other negroes he first formed a committee which in his own words was intended to "look into affairs and see the true condition of our race, to see whether it was possible we could stay under a people who held us in bondage or not." This committee grew to the enormous size of five hundred members. One hundred and fifty of these members were scattered throughout the South to live and work among the negroes and report their observat

longer remain in the South, and decided to leave even if they "had to run away and go into the woods." Membership in the council was solicited with the resul

rk of inducing negroes to move to the State of Kansas about 1869, founded two colonies and carried a total of 7,432 blacks from Tennessee. During this time he paid fro

the United States government and railroad lands which could be cheaply obtained. This brief excitement subsided, but was revived again by reports of thousands of negroes

zed the movement. One desc

toil rewarded by honest compensation. The newspapers were filled with accounts of their destitution, and the very air was burdened with the cry of distress from a class of American citizens flying from persecution which they could no longer endure. Their piteous tales of outrage,

five miles, crossing States on foot. Churches were opened all along the route to receive them. Songs were composed, some of which still linger in the memo

zed by the same frenzy and excitement. Unlike the Kansas movement, it had no conspicuous leaders of the type of the renowned "Pap" Singleton and Henry Adams. Apparently they were not needed. The great horde of restless m

ng standards of selected groups of negroes in large cities antedating the migration of 1916-1917 have revealed from year to year an increasing number of persons of southern birth whose length of residence has been surprisingly short. The rapid increase in the negro population of the cities of the North bears eloquent testimony to this tendency. The total increase in the negro population between 1900 and 1910 was 11.2 per cent. In the past fifty years the northern movement h

n the basis of the numbers leaving the cities. The cities are merely concentration points and they are continually recruiting from the surrounding rural districts. It might be stated that 2,000 negroes left a certain city. As a matter of fact, scarcely half that number were residents of the city. The others had moved in because it was easier to leave for the North from a large city, and there was a greater likelihood of se

043 native negroes reported by the census of 1930, 963,153 or 9.9 per cent were living outside the division of birth.12 Previous to the present migration,

(1,527,107). The North, however, has contributed more than five times as many to the population of the West as the South has. The number of negroes born in the South and living in the North in 1910 was 415,533, or a little over two-thirds of the total number living in the North. Of the 9,109,153 negroes born in the South, 440,534, or 4.

these conditions and gave to the negroes of the United States the same opportunities for occupations in practically every section of the country, which had heretofore been enjoyed only by the whites. In 1900, 27,000 negroes born in the North lived in the South. In 1910, 41,000 negroes born in the North lived in the South. This indicated that there was beginning to be a considerable movement of negroes from the No

klahoma, being contiguously situated in one section of the South and Florida in another sec

y of negroes to move within the South, although, as, he points out, t

s, Louisiana, Oklahoma and Texas) which showed a gain from this source of 194,658. The middle Atlantic division came second with a gain of 186,384, and the east north central third with a gain of 119,649. On the other hand, the south Atlantic States showe

the intersectional migrati

NAL MIGRATI

ed by Cens

Divisions and Living In

on Number Living: Per Cent Living

ision With

,746,043 8,782,

37,799 30,81

c 212,145 189,

ral 173,226 145

ral 198,116 162

4,487,313 4,039

l 2,844,598 2,491

al 1,777,242 1,7

,342 4,122

262 6,082

NAL MIGRATI

ed by Cens

g in Specifi

g in the Division Number Living in the Division and Born in ot

,746,043 8,782,

58,109 30,81

c 398,529 189,

ral 292,875 145

ral 238,613 162

4,094,486 4,039

al 2,643,722 2,4

l 1,971,900 1,713

,571 4,122

,238 6,082

South, South to Nor

ive Population Born in: State of Birth

The Sout

Ra

380 46,179,002 29,010

1 42,526,162 1,527,

19 1,449,229 27,07

0 2,203,611 403,8

h

412 45,488,942 19,814

3 41,891,353 1,110,

49 1,407,262 18,32

0 2,190,327 378,3

e

7,424 621,286 9,10

51 570,298 415,

858 39,077 8,668

5 11,911 25,00

d and Westward and No

ation

al White Ne

rentage Of Foreign

ississippi River 5,276,879 4,941,5

e Mississippi River 684,773 616

Mississippi River 4,592,106 4,32

h 1,449,229 1,407,262 1,15

th 1,527,107 1,110,245 94

thward 297,017 21

n northward

essional Record, 46th Cong

ic Monthly, LXIV, p. 222; N

lliams, History of the

rn) Atlantic Mont

lliams, History of the

ton, the Moses of the Colored Exodus," America

nal Record, Senate Reports, 693

erican Journal of Socia

(return) I

rn) The Censuses o

11: (retu

ensus of 1910, Population, Gene

(return) Ib

(return) Ib

1910 census, Population, Gener

Migration of Negro Population," Journal of