Eye for an Eye: The Role of Armed Resistance ... - Freedom Archives

logically . There were always Black people who defied the customs of segregation
or were allowed space to coexist without being subject to the humiliation imposed
on the majority of Black Mississippians . This is true particularly from those
Blacks who could muster enough resources within the framework of segregation
to live a more autonomous existence than their brothers and sisters sharecropping
on the plantations . These defiant Blacks were often called "Bad Negroes ." While
"Bad Negroes" were in the minority in this period, their social significance was
greater. The majority of the Black community identified with the openly defiant
Blacks who generally became folk heroes .' This is true of rebellious Blacks who
engaged in gun battles with whites like Eddie Noel and Robert Charles .
In rural areas "Bad Negroes" could probably be found among those
Blacks who owned enough land to survive and support their families without
being involved in agrarian peonage . In 1964, there were over one million acres of
land owned by Blacks in Mississippi . Particularly when living in Black majority
counties or contiguous Black communities, these Blacks landowners and their
offspring proved to be more defiant of segregationist standards of behavior. Often
weapons were needed to back up their defiant stands . In the hills ofAttala County
after emancipation, Blacks began to occupy land . Since the Civil War, Black
people have occupied at least one third of Attala land in contiguous communities
in the hills . The Black land owners and their families would receive different
treatment from whites, as opposed to the treatment of their brother and sisters who
sharecropped on Attala plantations . Living in a contiguous community, blacks
could offer mutual support from nightriders . In fact Attala Blacks often developed
traps for nightriders . ° In the Black majority county of Jefferson, Ed Cole remem-