George W. Albright
George W. Albright (born 1846) was an African-American farmer, educator, and politician who was born enslaved in the U.S. state of Mississippi. A Republican, Albright represented Marshall County in the Mississippi State Senate from 1874 to 1879 during the end of the Reconstruction Era. In 1873, Albright won his Senate seat by defeating the Democrat E. H. Crump, a leader in the Ku Klux Klan. [1]
After he was emancipated from slavery, Albright worked as a field hand. His father, who was sold to an owner in Texas shortly before the American Civil War, joined the Union Army, and was killed at the Battle of Vicksburg in Mississippi. During the War, Albright was a member of the Union League, which promoted loyalty to the Republican Party and spread news of the Emancipation Proclamation among still enslaved people. After the war, he attended a school run by Sheriff Nelson Gill, who was later killed by the Ku Klux Klan.[citation needed]
Albright married a white teacher and became a teacher himself. When he narrowly escaped with his life in a confrontation with Klansmen, Albright moved to Chicago, Kansas, and later Colorado. In 1937, in an interview with the communist Daily Worker newspaper, he hailed Communist Party USA for nominating a Black man, James W. Ford, for the vice-presidency in the 1936 presidential election.[2][3]
See also[]
- List of African-American officeholders during Reconstruction
References[]
- ^ Society, Mississippi Historical (1912). Publications of the Mississippi Historical Society. pp. 193–. Retrieved March 5, 2016.
- ^ Boritt, Gabor S.; Hancock, Scott (May 30, 2007). Slavery, Resistance, Freedom. Oxford University Press. pp. 117–. ISBN 9780190282875. Retrieved March 5, 2016.
- ^ Foner, Eric (1996). Freedom's Lawmakers: A Directory of Black Officeholders During Reconstruction. Louisiana State University Press. pp. 2–3. ISBN 9780807120828. Retrieved March 5, 2016.
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- 1846 births
- 20th-century deaths
- African-American politicians during the Reconstruction Era
- African-American state legislators in Mississippi
- Mississippi Republicans
- Schoolteachers from Mississippi
- People from Marshall County, Mississippi
- Mississippi state senators
- Ku Klux Klan crimes
- 19th-century American slaves
- Mississippi politician stubs