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The 1891 New Orleans lynchings were the murders of 11 Italian Americans, immigrants in New Orleans, by a mob for their alleged role in the murder of police chief David Hennessy after some of them had been acquitted at trial. It was the largest single mass lynching in American history.
Italians have had a presence in the New Orleans area since the explorations of the Europeans. [2] Many Sicilians immigrated to New Orleans in the 19th century, traveling on the Palermo-New Orleans route by ship. [3] [4] The number of Italians who immigrated in the late 19th century greatly exceeded those who had come before the American Civil ...
Most Confederate Italian Americans had settled in Louisiana. The militia of Louisiana had an Italian Guards Battalion that became part of its 6th Regiment. [59] Following the protests of many soldiers, who did not feel like Italian citizens since they fought against the unification of Italy, it was renamed 6th Regiment, European Brigade in 1862.
The Italians were still citizens (nationals) of Italy, and their government protested strongly to the United States government about each lynching murder. The US government said that the states had to prosecute such killings. [7] As was typical in this period of frequent lynchings of black US citizens, none of the white lynch mob was prosecuted ...
Sociologist Arthur F. Raper investigated one hundred lynchings during the 1930s and estimated that approximately one-third of the victims were falsely accused. [4] [5] On a per capita basis, lynchings were also common in California and the Old West, especially of Latinos, although they represented less than 10% of the national total.
The largest mass-lynching in American history was the mass-lynching of eleven Italians in New Orleans, Louisiana, in 1891. The city had been the destination for numerous Italian immigrants. [11] [12] Nineteen Italians who were thought to have assassinated police chief David Hennessy were arrested and held in the Parish Prison. Nine were tried ...
David C. Hennessy (1858 – October 16, 1890) was an American policeman and detective who served as a police chief of New Orleans from 1888 until his death in 1890. As a young detective, he made headlines in 1881 when he captured a notorious Italian criminal, Giuseppe Esposito.
Most of the lynchings occurred in the American South, as the majority of African Americans lived there, but racially motivated lynchings also occurred in the Midwest and border states. In 1891, the largest single mass lynching in American history was perpetrated in New Orleans against Italian immigrants.