On July 24, 1919, in the quiet town of Newberry, South Carolina, Elisha Harper, a 25-year-old African American world war I veteran found himself at the center of a mob’s rage. A simple accusation, that he had insulted a 14-year-old white girl, nearly cost him his life. His story is a perfect example of the volatile racial climate of the early 20th century, and a reminder of how fragile Black life was during what became known as the “Red Summer.”
Elisha Harper was not a drifter or a criminal. He was the son of Reverend T.F. Harper, a respected preacher in Helena, South Carolina. More than that, Harper was a veteran who had just returned from fighting overseas in World War I. Like many African American soldiers, he had gone abroad to defend a country that denied him basic rights at home, hoping that his service might lead to fairer treatment upon his return.
Instead, Harper stepped into a racial powder keg. While walking the streets of Newberry, he was accused of insulting a white girl. The details of what was said or what actually occurred are lost to history, but the consequences came swiftly. He was arrested and jailed. News of the incident spread quickly, and a white mob soon assembled outside the jail, demanding his blood.
It was only through the quick actions of the Sheriff of the town, who secretly moved Harper out of the jail to a safer location, that a lynching was avoided. But Harper’s close call was not unusual. It was part of a much broader pattern of white violence against Black Americans that had swept the nation.
The Red Summer of 1919
The summer of 1919 was one of the bloodiest and most racially charged periods in American history. It came to be known as the “Red Summer,” because of the rivers of blood that flowed in city streets and rural backroads across the United States.
More than three dozen cities and counties experienced white-led riots, lynchings, and armed assaults on Black communities. These attacks were often sparked by the most trivial of accusations, alleged insults, perceived disrespect, or rumours of sexual advances. What they had in common was a widespread belief among white Americans that Black people, emboldened by military service, were forgetting their “place” in a society built on white supremacy.
In Chicago, a Black teenager named Eugene Williams was stoned to death by white beachgoers after mistakenly drifting into a whites-only area. His death, and the failure of police to arrest his killers, sparked a riot that left 38 people dead and over 500 injured.
In Washington, D.C., white mobs, many including off-duty soldiers, launched attacks on Black residents after false reports that a Black man had assaulted a white woman. In response, Black Washingtonians organized to defend their neighborhoods, leading to days of gun battles in the nation’s capital. The death toll in the D.C. riot reached 39.
The most devastating violence was the “Elaine massacre” which occurred in Elaine, Arkansas, where Black sharecroppers trying to organize a union were met with overwhelming force. White mobs and federal troops launched a massacre that left an estimated 100 to 240 Black people dead.
The Red Summer was not just about race riots, it was about the violent suppression of Black independence and self-respect. It was a warning to African Americans who refused to bow their head: no matter what you did for this country, no matter how bravely you fought, you could still be hanged from a tree for the slightest offence.
Today, Elisha Harper’s name is not widely known. His brush with death is a footnote in the long, ruthless ledger of America’s racial violence. But his story matters. It is a reminder that the struggle for dignity and safety in the United States did not begin with the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s, it was fought in the trenches of World War I, on the streets of Newberry, and in the lives of men like Harper, who returned home not as heroes, but as targets.
