Doctoral Dissertations

Date of Award

5-2002

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy

Major

History

Major Professor

Stephen V. Ash

Abstract

The topic of this dissertation is the Tennessee State Guard and its activities from 1867 to 1869. The Radical (Republican) Governor William G. Brownlow used this militia organization to uphold his fledgling Reconstruction administration and provide some protection to the recently enfranchised freedmen. In the process, the State Guard policed elections, in accordance with the state's controversial Franchise Acts, and operated against the ex-Confederate opposition, including the emergent Ku Klux Klan. Drawing principally on the rich, but little used, papers of the Tennessee Adjutant General's Office, my thesis is that the State Guard was remarkably successful at enforcing the Recqnstruction policies of the Radical government. Although it was a partisan law enforcement body-a Radical Army in effect-the State Guard usually conducted itself with a high degree of professionalism and restraint; it was not an instrument of tyranny. When it was deployed-during the political campaigns of 1867 and under the martial law decrees of early 1869-it effectively thwarted ex-Confederate vigilantism. When it was not employed-as in 1868 when the Klan terrorized large sections of the state-the Radical party and the freedmen suffered. By not maintaining a consistent and active militia presence, the Radicals may have forfeited their best means for completing the Reconstruction of their state.

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