The
Cap
itol
co
uld
feel the
tenseness it show
ed in the air glaring of t
he awful night before the
worst was yet to come—Wash
ington showed the plain dread
of going into something, we knew
not what. We moved about quietly—
grimly & entirely. We had experienced
varied emotions on making the nation,
but none like this. It was almost an imp
ossibility for us to realize as a truth that men
& women mobbed, chased, dragged, beat & killed within the
shadow of the dome of the Capitol, at the very front door of the White House. We had expected to find the people panicky; we found us terrified & afraid. Although some shots had blazed the night, we had reached the determination that we would defend & protect home & that determination rendered us calm. Still there was a tautness wild circulating terrible things—whatever they might be, the people had made up our minds to meet. Darkness had something to do with the things that did happen. The cause of the riots—It was plain that was the plan—call the seeds of a race riot by their action taken upon victims. The Capitol went over—not only local, but national causes of the trouble. Mob violence secure from these years—the promise that would father the same. Washington for perhaps the whole time stood as one struck dumb; a word scared through & through. The whites again took the aggressive. Surprise. Night returned disquieted, but not depressed; worse might have been a riot protected by the law. Run but fight—in defense of our lives. Feel the mark turning the whole nation.††