The White Patriot Party Proudly Presents...
...by F.Glenn Miller
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There had not been a Klan rally of any sort in Robeson County in the previous twenty-six years, due to one reason and one reason only: FEAR OF INDIANS.
The last attempted Klan rally in that county had been in the summer of 1958 near Maxton, North Carolina, when about 50 Klansmen were sent fleeing for their lives, by about 2,000 Lumbee, Cherokee and Tuscarora Indians, many of whom came onto the Klan rally field carrying shotguns, clubs, pitchforks, or knives.
The Klansmen had not only run, but several left their wives and children behind in their haste. No one was killed, but several Klansmen were caught and beaten severely, and needless to say, the rally never came off.
This humiliation of the Klan, added to the fear inspired by the Indians, and the subsequent media coverage, so terrorized and demoralized the Whites of Robeson County, that all Klan gatherings ceased in that county completely for the next 26 years.
That story was not only highly publicized by the media throughout the United States, but in foreign countries as well. And, the story has been repeated over and over again by TV, newspapers, news magazines, and radio, as a continuing means to suppress the Ku Klux Klan and all White groups. Of course the 40 to one odds enjoyed by the Indians was never mentioned. By conveniently omitting the numbers involved in the fight, and by subtle half-truths, the media managed to portray a more or less evenly matched fight. Today, not one person in 1,000 who has been made aware of that fight, knows the truth about the odds.
Robeson County was roughly one-third Indian, one-third Black, and one-third White, which means it had the lowest percentage of Whites of any county in North Carolina and therefore, provided another good reason for not holding Klan rallies there.
Frankly, I'd just about as soon hold one in New York Harlem, but by November 1984, the CKKKK had about 75-100 members in Robeson County comprising three separate dens, plus two message machines there going full blast, and there naturally being a lot of Black violence against Whites owing to the small White percentage of the population, our Robeson County members pressured me into scheduling a full CKKKK rally.
So I reluctantly agreed, and set the rally for November 20, to be held on a large farm rented for the purpose, located in the Northern section of that largest of North Carolina 's 100 counties.
We not only passed out over 10,000 White Carolinian newspapers all over the county to advertise the rally and to invite the White public to attend, but I also took out a quarter-page add in the largest newspaper in Robeson County, "The Robesonian," at a cost of $700, in which among other things, I gave the precise directions to the rally site.
To reduce the likelihood of attack by Indians (I never could erase the vision of the 1958 incident from my mind), I included in the Robesonian add, a long message to the Black and Indian citizens of Robeson County. It went something like this, in part:
"The Carolina Knights of the Ku Klux Klan will stage this rally because we want to organize the White people of Robeson County, the same way in which the Black and Indian people are already organized under various organizations which work solely in the interest of their Peoples.
"All honest and decent Blacks and Indians who love their own people cannot fault me for loving mine. Further, those Blacks and Indians who want to have organizations which work to preserve their culture and heritage, cannot in good conscience, try to prevent the CKKKK from doing the same for White people.
We of the CKKKK will hold our rally, and nobody will stop us. We don't want violence, but we don't fear it either. We will fight to defend our constitutional rights of freedom of speech, and freedom of assembly. The CKKKK is in Robeson County to stay, and nothing will prevent us from exercising our rights, etc., etc."
I went on and on with about 500 or 600 words of diplomatic appeal and common reasoning, which I felt would greatly reduce the chance of violence at our rally. And, I felt the article at least would prevent Robeson County Indians from losing face or from feeling honor bound to attack the us. That reasoning effort also extended to the two-minute messages being broadcast over our two Robeson County message units.
Commendably, our Robeson County members did not fear the Blacks or the Indians at least as far as I could tell, and they bravely went about the county passing out newspapers and spreading word of the rally.
One huge young redneck buck confided to me, "Hell, we'll fight the Indians and Niggers, too, if they mess with us."
All of our Robeson County members were good, decent,
hard-working people, and were of the very best in the CKKKK.
They were simply fed up with Black violence, especially against their children, which was a big problem in all Robeson County schools.
All my Miller relatives living just across the state line in South Carolina were of the exact same culture, and spoke the exact same Southern Accent, so those people were especially endeared to me.
Driving to the rally that afternoon, I feared it would end in violence, but I was determined to go on with it.
I felt that if the Indians, or anybody else for that matter, could prevent us from holding rallies, then we might as well quit, because without them, we'd never succeed in attracting the White masses to my cause. So, I had instructed our men to come to the rally heavily armed. I further told them that I didn't care if blood got knee deep on the rally field that we would not run, no matter what.
I arrived early, but Steve and several of his Fayetteville men and a dozen or so Robeson County members were already there and were going about their tasks of constructing a tall cross, and preparing the 150 or so torches. And, Charlie Reck, who was head of CKKKK Security, had organized about 25 heavily armed men in perimeter security, and checking each car before allowing in on the rally field.
Soon, we had around 150 uniformed and armed men, on the field, and part of the crowd of about 250 locals, who eventually would show up.
A friend of Steve's performed a skydiving exhibition as entertainment, and he floated to Earth under his parachute, receiving a round of applause. Country music played over our loud speaker, pending the start of speeches and the cross lighting ceremony, while more and more cars and trucks arrived.
Public law enforcement was also well represented. Several marked cars containing uniformed and civilian-attired officers from the state and local law enforcement offices, were parked nearby, but outside the rally field, some taking pictures or looking at us through binoculars, and others taking down license plate numbers. That surveillance was routine at all Klan rallies, but I was more pleased than usual to see them on that day, because if violence did breakout, it wouldn't be us who started it, and therefore, the cops would be good court witnesses, if it came to that.
I'd always felt that if the cops had been on the scene during the famous Greensboro shootout between the Klan and the Communists, that the Communists would have stood trial, and not us, because the cops would have seen that it was the Communists who started the fight.
I always tried to orchestrate rally speeches to end just at dusk, to be immediately followed by the cross lighting ceremony. That helps to avoid the blind confusion of crowds of people trying to find their way around in the darkness.
So, at the right time, I mounted the long flatbed trailer, with 12 or 15 uniformed Klansmen holding Confederate flags, and the other scheduled speakers. Steve, as always, began with an opening prayer.
As I waited for Steve to finish, I heard a commotion and looked up to see an Indian man in his thirties, in overalls, and obviously intoxicated, approaching me from the edge of the crowd of about 400 people.
I heard him say, "Man, I want to talk to that Glenn Miller. Where's he at?" just before Charlie Reck grabbed him by one arm, and another Klansman grabbed the other. I nodded to Charlie to take him away, and they escorted the Indian off the rally field, and kicked him once in the butt to speed him along.
This one drunk Indian was the only unpleasant incident of the entire day, with the exception of the two shotgun blasts of 5:30 that morning.
The speeches went well. Over a dozen more Robesonians joined the CKKKK afterwards, and a big crowd came up to me, shaking my hand and telling me how grateful they were to the CKKKK for having the guts to come to Robeson County.
One grinning teenage boy of about fifteen yelled out, "we ain't got to be shamed of the Klan nor more," obviously referring to the 1958 incident, and having decided that Whites in Robeson County could once again hold up their heads.
The 30-some foot cross fired up nicely, as around 100 torch-bearing CKKKK members paraded around it, and as the sound of "The Old Rugged Cross" filled the night.
We would stage another rally in Robeson County, at the other end of the county some 30 miles away, in 1985 to be very similar in attendance and publicity. And, that one would be held near the site of the 1958 Klan-Indian confrontation, in what some referred to as "sure 'nuff Indian country."
I canceled that particular rally after the first scheduling, due to a phone call I'd received from Sheriff Hubert Stone, the Sheriff of Robeson County, who incidentally is first cousin to federal Judge Earl Britt who presided over all my federal court cases and who is also from Robeson County. At least the kinship had been told to me by several residents of that county, and I believed it.
In any case, Sheriff Stone, having heard reports that I intended to stage a CKKKK rally in that particular section of Robeson County, called me and begged me not to go through with it because he had received phone calls from several informants saying that the Indians would attack us, if we did, And, he went on to say that he was thoroughly convinced from all his intelligence sources that we'd surely be attacked. He used the term "100 percent sure."
So, realizing the opportunity to make friends with Sheriff Stone, and deciding that I could use his pleading phone call as a face-saving excuse for canceling the rally, I did just that.
Five or six other CKKKK members were in my house and witnessed me talking to Stone over the phone, and one even listened in on the conversation from my phone extension.
But, low and behold, when I informed the Robeson County newspapers that I had canceled the rally because of Sheriff Stone's call, and they had in turn, called him to verify it, he flatly denied he'd made any such statements regarding an Indian attack.
Subsequent news reports in Robeson County then tended to give the impression that I was afraid to hold the rally, and it was believed by our Robeson County members. So, I had no choice but to reschedule it for the following month, which I did. And the rally turned out to be a virtual repeat of the first. There was no violence nor the threat of any, except normal routine telephone death threats I received during the days preceding all rallies.
One of those calls was from an elderly man, identifying himself as a Robeson County Indian, who after announcing his intention of killing me and my whole family, asked me, "Ain't you Catfish?"
Catfish, I concluded from the conversation, was a tough Klansman from the 1950's, who had in some way provoked the hatred of that particular Indian fellow, and he thought that I must be him.
The second Robeson County rally, being just across the line from South Carolina and near where almost all my South Carolina Miller relatives live, gave them all the opportunity to come out to one of my rallies. So, I put the word out through the Miller gossip-vine, and sure enough, two of them actually came, one aunt and one first cousin.
My Aunt Eunice, the oldest of my father's ten brothers and sisters, whom I loved almost as much as my own mother and who shared many of my views, came with a young Indian girl (of all people) chauffeur, and viewed our rally and cross lighting ceremony from the safety and vantage point of her car, never once getting out during the two or three-hour event.
I was so overjoyed to finally have a relative attend one of my rallies that I had one of my members go over to her car and present her with a brand new Confederate battle flag, with the message: "Compliments of Glenn Miller and the Carolina Knights of the Ku Klux Klan," after which I went over and hugged her neck in Miller tradition, and thanked her for coming.
My first cousin, Rock Miller, had come earlier in the afternoon, and after deciding he'd seen all he cared to, he left before the rally started.
Neither my mother nor father ever attended any of my events, nor did any of my other relatives, save that one aunt, and a couple of cousins, and believe me, I've got hundreds throughout both North and South Carolina, though more than a few ceased to admit the kinship when they learned of my political leanings and involvements.
My mother would always say, "I want you to get out of that 'ole White Power." And about all my father would say is, "They're gonna kill you. They're gonna kill you."
Once, my oldest sister Faye, was heard whining to my mother after reading about a CKKKK activity in the newspaper, "Well, I see Glenn made the headlines again, Momma, he's humiliating us."
I did, however, have one cousin who was an ardent supporter, though all of his support came from quite some distance, and was in no way tangible. What he did for years, was to confide confidentially to all his drinking buddies that he was not only Glenn Miller's cousin, but a member of the Klan, and the right arm of Glenn Miller, and the CKKKK, as well.
That cousin of mine was so good at keeping his support a secret, I didn't know it myself until after my arrest in 1987, when another relative told me.
Of course, I wasn't mad or even displeased. In fact, I got a kick out of it. At least he was proud of being related to me, which is more than I can say for the vast majority of my kinfolks.
While I'm on the subject of relatives, let me say a little about one of my favorites, my uncle Joe Miller, from Dillon County, South Carolina.
Uncle Joe died before I got involved in White racist groups, but he and I shared the same racial and political views, and spoke together for hours on end during my weekend visits to South Carolina when I was in the Army, and of course, I came to know him well while I was growing up.
Uncle Joe fancied himself as being one of the world's foremost authorities on history, politics, race, law, and any other topic one cared to bring up, and he'd explain his truth-of-the-matter in the slow-drawling Southern accent of the area, not even closely matched anywhere else on the face of the earth. I like to think of it as "correct English," because I love to hear it spoken. I could listen to him for hours, and relished every word that came out of his mouth.
Uncle Joe was like all five of my Miller uncles, a tobacco farmer, and he, like them had light hair, and about the clearest blue eyes I've ever seen, reflecting the German ancestry of the Miller Klan.
He could tell amusing stories for hours, and anyone listening who didn't know him, had some difficulty in deciding whether or not to believe the stories.
For example, Joe told of one local fellow who was bragging about being related to the Miller's which Joe found repulsive because that fellow's reputation didn't meet Joe's standards, so he decided to use a little Miller psychology to make him quit claiming kinship.
And so, as the story goes, Joe caught the fellow sitting around with four or five others one day outside a local country store, and he sat down with them, after opening his bottle of Coca-Cola, and announced that he was going to tell the story of how the Miller's came to settle in South Carolina.
Joe said that the fellow's ears perked up, and he was all smiles as he waited to hear the story.
"The Miller's didn't always live in South Carolina," drawled Joe. "They originally settled in Georgia, but they got run out of Georgia for being goat thieves. And, they all swam the Savannah River, with a goat under each arm, and never went back. That's how the Millers came to settle here in South Carolina."
Joe said that after that, the fellow not only didn't claim kinship anymore, but went around to all those he had and informed them he'd made a big mistake, that it wasn't the local Miller's he was kin to, after all. It was a different set of Miller's from the next county.
I always got as big a kick out of Joe's personality, as I did in his tales.
Once, after I'd informed him that I was getting married, he told me in his most serious voice, "Glenn, keep her barefoot and pregnant, and that way you won't have to worry about her running around on you. Not many men want a big fat pregnant woman."
Joe had eight children, so he could tell that type story from experience. Trying to equal his serious humor, I said, "But Joe, I'm going to get my wife a good job, so she can support me," to which he said, "Then in that case, get her a pair of tennis shoes. It's a sorry woman that can't support one man."
Joe really enjoyed playing the male chauvinist, but I don't think he'd have known the definition of that word, if anyone had asked him. It was just good humor to him, and all female Millers would consider the source, and be just as amused as the men.
Once back in the 1940's, Joe was convicted of some misdemeanor, and found himself bush-hogging weeds along the highway in Lake View, after being sentenced to 30 days "on the road" by the local judge. An elderly farmer came by and, thinking he recognized Joe, he asked, "Which one of them Miller boys are you," to which Joe replied with a perfectly honest face, "Frazier."
Of course, the Frazier he was referring to is my father, and Joe's brother. Joe, really didn't care who knew his predicament on the highway, never being overly concerned about his reputation in the community. He just wanted to brighten his own day by playing a little trick on his brother.
But, my daddy was not only highly concerned about his reputation, he has been a downright fanatic about it all his entire life.
When I asked my daddy about the incident, he said it was not only true, but for about twenty years afterwards, people would ask if he really did pull time on the road.
And, of course, when anybody asks Joe about it, he'd say, "It was Frazier all right, he just don't like to admit it."
Uncle Joe was the typical South Carolinian from the old school. He'd never admit to a lie. He was never wrong. And, he never apologized. This too, is the code of all the old, fiercely independent, tough, hard working, Southern White men, and when they're gone, the country will be the worse, with their passing.
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