Nelson Gill

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Nelson Green Gill was a state legislator and school organizer in Mississippi.[1] He organized a school for African American students in Holly Springs, Mississippi. Mrs. Gill was also involved with the school.[2] He represented Marshall County, Mississippi in the Mississippi House of Representatives in 1874 and 1875.[3][4] He was white. He was a Republican.[5]

From Illinois, Gill served in the Union Army during the American Civil War.[6] He lived in Mississippi after the war and was appointed sheriff and to the board of supervisors. He represented Marshall County, Mississippi in the Mississippi House of Representatives in 1874 and 1875 and as sergeant at arms.[7][8]

He served as a Freedmen's Bureau agent in Holly Springs, Mississippi after the American Civil War.[9] A Democratic Party spokesman passed a death threat to him from the Ku Klux Klan.[10] but assassination attempt against him by the Klan failed.[10] He worked to organize African Americans in Oxford, Mississippi into a Loyal League.[11][8][12]

Gill was critical of abuses of apprenticeship laws including the binding of a teenager to her former slaveowner instead of letting her live with her mother.[13]

Gill was targeted for his political activities and because he fraternized with African Americans.[14]

He served as president of the board of supervisors from 1869 to 1871.[15]

References[edit]

  1. ^ Society, Mississippi Historical (1913). Publications of the Mississippi Historical Society. The Society. pp. 39, 235.
  2. ^ "Publications of the Mississippi Historical Society". 1912.
  3. ^ Senate, United States. Congress (1872). "Miscellaneous Documents: 30th Congress, 1st Session - 48th Congress, 2d Session and Special Session".
  4. ^ Lowry, Robert; McCardle, William H. A History of Mississippi: From the Discovery of the Great River by Hernando DeSoto, Including the Earliest Settlement Made by the French Under Iberville, to the Death of Jefferson Davis. AMS Press. ISBN 9780404046101.
  5. ^ "Reports of Committees: 30th Congress, 1st Session - 48th Congress, 2nd Session".
  6. ^ The Lewis Publishing Company. An Illustrated History of Southern California embracing the counties of San Diego San Bernardino Los Angeles and Orange and the peninsula of lower California. The Lewis Publishing Company, Chicago, Illinois. 1890.
  7. ^ Society, Mississippi Historical (October 1, 1912). "Publications of the Mississippi Historical Society" – via Google Books.
  8. ^ a b Buckley, G. T. (1961). "Is Oxford the Original of Jefferson in William Faulkner's Novels?". PMLA. 76 (4): 443–454. doi:10.2307/460629. ISSN 0030-8129. JSTOR 460629. S2CID 163479021.
  9. ^ Franke, Katherine (November 6, 2015). Wedlocked: The Perils of Marriage Equality. NYU Press. ISBN 9781479815999 – via Google Books.
  10. ^ a b Newton, Michael (December 21, 2009). The Ku Klux Klan in Mississippi: A History. McFarland. ISBN 9780786457045 – via Google Books.
  11. ^ Society, Mississippi Historical (October 1, 1913). "Publications of the Mississippi Historical Society ... V. 1-14". The Society – via Google Books.
  12. ^ Black, William R. (2018). "How Watermelons Became Black: Emancipation and the Origins of a Racist Trope". Journal of the Civil War Era. 8 (1): 70–71. ISSN 2154-4727. JSTOR 26381503.
  13. ^ Wood, Betsy (September 14, 2020). Upon the Altar of Work: Child Labor and the Rise of a New American Sectionalism. University of Illinois Press. ISBN 9780252052323 – via Google Books.
  14. ^ McKee, Kathryn B. (January 8, 2019). Reading Reconstruction: Sherwood Bonner and the Literature of the Post-Civil War South. LSU Press. ISBN 9780807170526 – via Google Books.
  15. ^ Society, Mississippi Historical (October 1, 1912). "Publications of the Mississippi Historical Society". The Society – via Google Books.