Predecessors of the KKK: 1828
"I hear a good deal about the association called the Knights of the Golden Circle, a Protestant association for securing the Gulf provinces and states. including which has been largely developed by recent times . . . in the Southern confederacy. and creating them into an independent government. "
The above is taken from William Howard Russell's book My Diary North and South, written in 1866 by the London Times war correspondent. Russell had gotten this assignment at a meeting on May 5, 1861 with Confederate leader General Pierre Beauregard, a leader of the KGC. Russell himself was serving his Queen as a top British Secret Intelligence Service agent. profiling the 1861 crisis situation in the United States and reporting back to the Rothschild owner of the London Times.
The above is taken from William Howard Russell's book My Diary North and South, written in 1866 by the London Times war correspondent. Russell had gotten this assignment at a meeting on May 5, 1861 with Confederate leader General Pierre Beauregard, a leader of the KGC. Russell himself was serving his Queen as a top British Secret Intelligence Service agent. profiling the 1861 crisis situation in the United States and reporting back to the Rothschild owner of the London Times.
(1)Originating out of the 1828-32 Nullification Crisis, the KG C was not officially established until 1854 under the direction of Dr. George William Lamb Bickley. Bickley had been trained in Botany at the University of London in the 1840s, then redeployed back into the U. S.
Prior to the official surfacing of the KGC. however, the Southern Rights Clubs were established during the height of Andrew Jackson's presidency. Their structure was identical with that of the southern branch of the Scottish Rite of Freemasonry with its prime political focus centered on a three-point program. As stated in the KGC's manual, the three points were:
(1) Reestablish the slave trade;
(2) Acquire new slave territory;
(3) Destroy the U. S. Constitution as a "tyrannical document. "
Two of the leaders of the SRC were Robert Toombs and William Landes Yancey. Each was to play a significant role in the Confederate government. Toombs. a so-called Southern Whig, was personally responsible for financing several attempts to kidnap Africans and bring them to the South. Significantly. the SRCs served British intelligence by providing a functioning political infrastructure for the secessionist movement and for the creation of other secret societies.
Two of the main centers of the SRC. and later the Knights of the Golden Circle. were New Orleans and Charleston. S. C. Secret orders such as the Order of the Lone Star were also set uP. then later merged directly into the KGC. Key in organizing the New Orleans operations was Judah P. Benjamin. later to be the Secretary of State of the Confederacy. of whom more below.
In 1854. Bickley surfaced with the organization known as the Knights of the Golden Circle. Under the banner of creating a "Democratic Monarchy in North America. " its first operation was to organize paramilitary terrorism in Central America. Mexico. and Cuba. the purpose of which was to instigate a war between the U. S. and Spain. One of its most successful early ventures was under the direction of William Walker. who organized a military coup in Nicaragua in 1855.
The next phase of the KG C's activity was to organize a military coup in the U. S. before Lincoln could be inaugurated. The KGC was used primarily as the main terror force to ensure that the key Southern states voted for secession. Its stated organizational purpose indicates the extent of its intentions at the time of the 1860 election of Lincoln:
(1) Secure all U. S. arsenals;
(2) Sabotage reconciliation between North and South;
(3) Concentrate on the border states:
(a) coerce state legislatures or governors into
voting for secession;
(b) elect legislators to vote for secession; (c) bring armed men from the cotton states:
(4) Set up Knights of the Safety Guards. watch over men who are doubtful about secession;
(5) Organize guerrilla bands to harass union troops. under the direction of the Knights Gallant. the elite corps within the Knights;
(6) Northern members were instructed to play "hypocrite roles " by loudly supporting Union efforts in order to act as spies;
(7) Raise militias in the North. turn arms over to the South. and send Confederate ladies to spy in the
North;
(8) Assassination and terror.
"In short. the intention of the secessionist is to have a more powerful monarchy than England." according to KGC member Jim Pumfrey.
The belief structure of the KGC was the following. Its symbols were the glowing sun and 15 stars emblazened on a crescent. with a triangle with the numbers 3.7 and 5 placed in each anglE' with R-61 in the
middle of the triangle. The R meant 'revolution,' and the 61 meant 1861. in other words. Revolution in 1861. Meetings took place in "castles" or lodges. which were organized on the local. state. and national level. On the state level they were referred to as "Grand State Castles," with a delegate body .sent to the "Grand United States Castle" or "American Legion."
In its organizational hierarchy. as reported by the Daily Louisville Democrat in 1861. the KGC was divided into three degrees or levels. The first degree was the Foreign and Home Guards. the second degree was Commercial and Financial. and the third or highest degree was the political governing body. the American Legion. Each degree was divided into divisions which were in turn divided into departments. The 10 departments comprising a division were Agriculture. Education. Manufacturing. Finance. Religion. Police. War. Navigation. Law. and a Foreign Office.
Thus. when the Confederate government was established. the KGC was its ready-made leadership body. With 65.000 KGC members in the South. and several members of President Buchanan's cabinet also members of the KGC. the plot to pull off a military coup nearly succeeded.
Central in the plot was the assassination of President-elect Abraham Lincoln. In February 1861 a plot to kill Lincoln was in place in Baltimore. Md. There. under a subunit known as the Palmetto Guards. the KGC planned the murder of Lincoln. It was only due to the efforts of General Winfield Scott. that the plan did not succeed - until four years later.
During the Civil War the KGC was used to run subversion through the Democratic Party faction known as the Copperheads. or antiwar Democrats. With a plan for provoked outbreaks of violence and terror combined with Confederate military operations. i n Missouri. Illinois. Indiana. Ohio. Kentucky. Tennesee. and the cities of Chicago and New York. the Confederacy aimed to destroy the North's ability to fight. Draft riots aided by Jesuit priests. with the cooperation of the Mayors of New
York and Chicago. Fernando Wood and Edward Walsh. as key conspirators. were designed to stop the war by forcing a negotiated settlement.
All espionage and terror operations deployed into the North were under the direction of the Confederate Secretary of State. Judah P. Benjamin. Benjamin. a former U.S. Senator from Louisiana. was born in the British West Indies in 1811 and remained a British
subject throughout his career in the U.S. Under the Confederacy Benjamin became first Attorney General. then Secretary of War. and last and most important, Secretary of State.
The plot to destroy the Union remained the foremost theme of Benjamin's activity. Central to the insurrections to be run in the North and in the border states was the Confederate espionage operation functioning in Canada, with its headquarters in Montreal. Not coincidentally. the hotel in Montreal. St. Lawrence Hall. that headquartered the Confederate Secret Service also was the headquarters of the British military mission.
The head of Confederate espionage was Jacob Thompson. a former Secretary of the Interior under Buchanan and a member of the KGC. Through Thompson and another top British operative operating in Canada named George Sanders. the plan to assassinate Lincoln was finalized.
The assassination was carried out by John Wilkes Booth. a member of the KGC, along with John Harrison Surratt who had been trained by Jesuits at Jesuit Georgetown College (now known as
Georgetown University) . The two were
The symbols of the Knights of the Golden Circle
under the immediate direction of Benjamin and Thompson.
Most of the intelligence garnered and reported by Union counterespionage operations was suppressed at the Lincoln assassination trial by Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. Stanton had known Benjamin quite intimately since 1850, when both were deployed by the U. S. government as members of the California Land Commission: Stanton headed up the commission and had Benjamin as his able assistant.
It is now known that not only did John Harrison
Surrat escape capture through the efforts of two Jesuit priests and wound up in the Papal Zouaves, but that Booth also escaped. The coverup "killing " of Booth at Garrett's farm was carried out by Union officers who were highest-degree members of the Scottish Rite of Freemasonry. Even the head of the National Detective Bureau, Lafayette C. Baker, who was later poisoned to death, revealed in documents only recently published that he knew that the individual found in the burned-out barn was not Booth.
The KGC underwent several facelifts to prevent detection, and rechristened itself. The Order of the American Knights and The Sons of Liberty were two new names it took before it became the Ku Klux Klan.
The back door of the James O. Eastland US Courthouse, Jackson, Mississippi.
Prior to the official surfacing of the KGC. however, the Southern Rights Clubs were established during the height of Andrew Jackson's presidency. Their structure was identical with that of the southern branch of the Scottish Rite of Freemasonry with its prime political focus centered on a three-point program. As stated in the KGC's manual, the three points were:
(1) Reestablish the slave trade;
(2) Acquire new slave territory;
(3) Destroy the U. S. Constitution as a "tyrannical document. "
Two of the leaders of the SRC were Robert Toombs and William Landes Yancey. Each was to play a significant role in the Confederate government. Toombs. a so-called Southern Whig, was personally responsible for financing several attempts to kidnap Africans and bring them to the South. Significantly. the SRCs served British intelligence by providing a functioning political infrastructure for the secessionist movement and for the creation of other secret societies.
Two of the main centers of the SRC. and later the Knights of the Golden Circle. were New Orleans and Charleston. S. C. Secret orders such as the Order of the Lone Star were also set uP. then later merged directly into the KGC. Key in organizing the New Orleans operations was Judah P. Benjamin. later to be the Secretary of State of the Confederacy. of whom more below.
In 1854. Bickley surfaced with the organization known as the Knights of the Golden Circle. Under the banner of creating a "Democratic Monarchy in North America. " its first operation was to organize paramilitary terrorism in Central America. Mexico. and Cuba. the purpose of which was to instigate a war between the U. S. and Spain. One of its most successful early ventures was under the direction of William Walker. who organized a military coup in Nicaragua in 1855.
The next phase of the KG C's activity was to organize a military coup in the U. S. before Lincoln could be inaugurated. The KGC was used primarily as the main terror force to ensure that the key Southern states voted for secession. Its stated organizational purpose indicates the extent of its intentions at the time of the 1860 election of Lincoln:
(1) Secure all U. S. arsenals;
(2) Sabotage reconciliation between North and South;
(3) Concentrate on the border states:
(a) coerce state legislatures or governors into
voting for secession;
(b) elect legislators to vote for secession; (c) bring armed men from the cotton states:
(4) Set up Knights of the Safety Guards. watch over men who are doubtful about secession;
(5) Organize guerrilla bands to harass union troops. under the direction of the Knights Gallant. the elite corps within the Knights;
(6) Northern members were instructed to play "hypocrite roles " by loudly supporting Union efforts in order to act as spies;
(7) Raise militias in the North. turn arms over to the South. and send Confederate ladies to spy in the
North;
(8) Assassination and terror.
"In short. the intention of the secessionist is to have a more powerful monarchy than England." according to KGC member Jim Pumfrey.
The belief structure of the KGC was the following. Its symbols were the glowing sun and 15 stars emblazened on a crescent. with a triangle with the numbers 3.7 and 5 placed in each anglE' with R-61 in the
middle of the triangle. The R meant 'revolution,' and the 61 meant 1861. in other words. Revolution in 1861. Meetings took place in "castles" or lodges. which were organized on the local. state. and national level. On the state level they were referred to as "Grand State Castles," with a delegate body .sent to the "Grand United States Castle" or "American Legion."
In its organizational hierarchy. as reported by the Daily Louisville Democrat in 1861. the KGC was divided into three degrees or levels. The first degree was the Foreign and Home Guards. the second degree was Commercial and Financial. and the third or highest degree was the political governing body. the American Legion. Each degree was divided into divisions which were in turn divided into departments. The 10 departments comprising a division were Agriculture. Education. Manufacturing. Finance. Religion. Police. War. Navigation. Law. and a Foreign Office.
Thus. when the Confederate government was established. the KGC was its ready-made leadership body. With 65.000 KGC members in the South. and several members of President Buchanan's cabinet also members of the KGC. the plot to pull off a military coup nearly succeeded.
Central in the plot was the assassination of President-elect Abraham Lincoln. In February 1861 a plot to kill Lincoln was in place in Baltimore. Md. There. under a subunit known as the Palmetto Guards. the KGC planned the murder of Lincoln. It was only due to the efforts of General Winfield Scott. that the plan did not succeed - until four years later.
During the Civil War the KGC was used to run subversion through the Democratic Party faction known as the Copperheads. or antiwar Democrats. With a plan for provoked outbreaks of violence and terror combined with Confederate military operations. i n Missouri. Illinois. Indiana. Ohio. Kentucky. Tennesee. and the cities of Chicago and New York. the Confederacy aimed to destroy the North's ability to fight. Draft riots aided by Jesuit priests. with the cooperation of the Mayors of New
York and Chicago. Fernando Wood and Edward Walsh. as key conspirators. were designed to stop the war by forcing a negotiated settlement.
All espionage and terror operations deployed into the North were under the direction of the Confederate Secretary of State. Judah P. Benjamin. Benjamin. a former U.S. Senator from Louisiana. was born in the British West Indies in 1811 and remained a British
subject throughout his career in the U.S. Under the Confederacy Benjamin became first Attorney General. then Secretary of War. and last and most important, Secretary of State.
The plot to destroy the Union remained the foremost theme of Benjamin's activity. Central to the insurrections to be run in the North and in the border states was the Confederate espionage operation functioning in Canada, with its headquarters in Montreal. Not coincidentally. the hotel in Montreal. St. Lawrence Hall. that headquartered the Confederate Secret Service also was the headquarters of the British military mission.
The head of Confederate espionage was Jacob Thompson. a former Secretary of the Interior under Buchanan and a member of the KGC. Through Thompson and another top British operative operating in Canada named George Sanders. the plan to assassinate Lincoln was finalized.
The assassination was carried out by John Wilkes Booth. a member of the KGC, along with John Harrison Surratt who had been trained by Jesuits at Jesuit Georgetown College (now known as
Georgetown University) . The two were
The symbols of the Knights of the Golden Circle
under the immediate direction of Benjamin and Thompson.
Most of the intelligence garnered and reported by Union counterespionage operations was suppressed at the Lincoln assassination trial by Secretary of War Edwin Stanton. Stanton had known Benjamin quite intimately since 1850, when both were deployed by the U. S. government as members of the California Land Commission: Stanton headed up the commission and had Benjamin as his able assistant.
It is now known that not only did John Harrison
Surrat escape capture through the efforts of two Jesuit priests and wound up in the Papal Zouaves, but that Booth also escaped. The coverup "killing " of Booth at Garrett's farm was carried out by Union officers who were highest-degree members of the Scottish Rite of Freemasonry. Even the head of the National Detective Bureau, Lafayette C. Baker, who was later poisoned to death, revealed in documents only recently published that he knew that the individual found in the burned-out barn was not Booth.
The KGC underwent several facelifts to prevent detection, and rechristened itself. The Order of the American Knights and The Sons of Liberty were two new names it took before it became the Ku Klux Klan.
The back door of the James O. Eastland US Courthouse, Jackson, Mississippi.
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