lives, and who were still technically outlawed, were unwilling to make known their connection with the order and some even considered their oaths still binding. But since the book was printed, the Prescripts or Constitutions of the order have come to light, and the ex-members are now generally willing to tell all they know about the organization. As yet, no other member has written an account of the Klan, though several have been pro'jected, and Lester and Wilson's History seems likely to remain the only one written altogether from inside sources. The authors, Capt. John C. Lester and Rev. D. L. Wilson, were in 1884, when the booklet was written, residents in Pulaski, Tennessee, where the first Den of the Klan was founded. Major Lester was one of the six original members of the Pulaski Den or Circle. He made a fine record as a soldier in the Civil War in the Third Tennessee (Confederate) Infantry, and afterwards became a lawyer and an official in the Methodist Church, and was a member of the Tennessee legislature at the time of writing the book. Rev. D. Ľ. Wilson, who put the account into its present form, was born in 1849, in Augusta County, Virginia. He went to school to Jed Hotchkiss and was graduated as valedictorian of his class from Washington and Lee University, in 1873, and a year later from the Union Theological Seminary, near Hampden-Sidney, Virginia. From 1874 to 1880 he was pastor of a Presbyterian church at Broadway, Virginia, and from 1880 to 1902 he served a church in Pulaski, Tennessee. He died in 1902 after a six months' residence in Bristol, Tennessee, as pastor of the First Presbyterian Church. He was not a member of the Klan, but was acquainted with the founders and with many other former members, and had access to all the records of the order that had not been destroyed. In addition to information received from other members, Wilson was assisted by Captain Lester, who furnished most of the facts used, revised the manuscript and the book was printed with both names on the title page. As a general account of the Ku Klux movement Lester and Wilson's History leaves something to be desired. It is colored too much by conditions in Tennessee. No knowledge is shown of other organizations similar to Ku Klux Klan, when in fact there were several other very important ones, such as the White Brotherhood, the White League, the Pale Faces, the Constitutional Union Guards, and one, the Knights of the White Camelia,1 that was larger than the Klan and covered a wider territory. Then, too, in an attempt to make a moderate statement that would be generally accepted, the authors failed to portray clearly the chaotic social, economic and political conditions that caused the rise of such orders, and in endeavoring to condemn the acts of violence committed under cloak of the order they went too far in the direction of apologetic explanation. Consequently, the causes seem somewhat trivial and the results not very important." It would seem from their account that after a partial success, the movement failed in 1 The Constitution and Ritual of the Knights of the White Camelia have been printed in West Virginia University Documents relating to Reconstruction, No. 1. 2 Tourgee's "Invisible Empire" gives the carpetbagger's view of the Ku Klux movement, and, though filled with worthless testimony from the Ku Klux Report, it shows a very clear conception of the real meaning of the movement and a correct appreciation of its results. The best later interpretation is that of Mr. William Garrott Brown in "The Lower South," Ch. 4. |