A state highway marker recognizing the Danville Riot of 1883, a street fight that inflamed racial and political tensions, will be unveiled during a ceremony in the city at 10 a.m. Thursday.
The Virginia Department of Historic Resources approved the marker application, submitted by local historian Jonathan Hackworth, earlier this year.
The Nov. 3, 1883, riot was a response to the growing Black majority in Danville in the late 1800s.
The Readjuster Party — a biracial political party formed at the state level in Virginia — was established in the late 1870s, during an unstable period of time after Reconstruction.
The party abolished the poll tax and the use of the whipping post, and without the tax as a prerequisite to vote, a majority-Black city council was elected in Danville in the 1880s — almost a century before the civil rights movement.
This led to high racial tensions, as the white population in Danville felt threatened socially, politically and economically, according to an article on the riot in Encyclopedia Virginia.
What is now known as the Danville Riot occurred when “an altercation between a white man and two African American men escalated into violence,” the article says. “After several white men fired guns (testimony is inconsistent about whether any Black men were armed), at least five people, including four African Americans were killed.”
The bloodshed was blamed on Black participants and used to force Black politicians out of power. The Readjuster Party disappeared shortly after.
“That event ended up being a turning point for the state because it wiped the Readjusters from power,” Hackworth said in an interview this spring. “It was a local happening, but the importance of it transcended beyond Danville.”
This made the event good subject matter for a state historic marker, Hackworth said, especially as Virginia is working to bolster the number of markers recognizing the state’s rich Black history.
It was the first marker application that he submitted to DHR, and he later applied for a marker recognizing the Danville canal, which was approved in June.
The Thursday ceremony will be held at the marker’s location, 332 Main St. in Danville.
City Councilman Bryant Hood will speak, alongside the Rev. Michael Pritchett of High Street Baptist Church, local Black historian and genealogist Karice Luck-Brimmer, and Latoya Gray-Sparks with DHR. Soloist Vanessa Adams will sing during the ceremony.
The ceremony will serve as a “day of reflection as we pause to remember Nov. 3, 1883,” according to a city news release.
