A decent, orderly lynching :
the Montana vigilantes /
Frederick Allen.
| Main Creator: | |
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| Summary: | "The deadliest campaign of vigilante justice in American history erupted in the gold camps of the Rocky Mountains during the Civil War, when a private army hanged twenty-one troublemakers, including a rogue sheriff. Hailed as great heroes at the time, the Montana vigilantes are still revered as founding fathers who brought order to a lawless land." "Combing through original sources, including eyewitness accounts never before published, journalist and historian Frederick Allen concludes that the vigilantes were justified in their early actions, as they fought violent crime in a remote corner hundreds of miles beyond the reach of government." "But Allen has uncovered evidence that the vigilantes refused to disband after territorial courts were in place. Remaining active for six years, they lynched more than fifty men without trials. Reliance on mob rule in Montana became so ingrained that in 1883, a Helena newspaper editor advocated a return to "decent, orderly lynching" as a legitimate tool for social control. As Allen shows in this definitive account of Montana's "formative morality play," many of the vigilantes' targets were not guilty of any crimes at all."--Jacket. |
| In collection: | Stephen Griffin Collection |
| Format: | Book |
| Language: | English |
| Published / Created: |
Norman :
University of Oklahoma Press,
©2004.
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| Subjects: | |
| Notes: | Includes bibliographical references (pages 401-406) and index. Physical description: xxiv, 421 pages : illustrations ; 25 cm more |
| ISBN: | 0806136375 9780806136370 0806135921 9780806135922 |