How the Lumbee Indians Put Out the Klan's Light in 1958

Last year, I was surprised to learn that I have many Lumbee cousins. As with most North Carolinians who have lived in this state for long time, I was always aware of the Lumbee Indians and their struggle not only to survive, but also against the effects of racial prejudice and poverty. They fought year after year for tribal recognition. These are strong and stubborn people. Many of us who lived here four decades ago remember their desperate ten-hour takeover in 1988 of the office of The Robesonian, the local newspaper in Lumberton. That was to demand that the state investigate local corruption, drug trafficking, and unsolved murders of their people. We also remembered hearing about the Klan rally event that happened before my family and I had moved to North Carolina. Periodically, we would see articles about their struggle for federal tribal recognition. Recognition finally came after 137 years of seeking on December 18, 2025.

A few examples of common Lumbee names

     My life touched the Lumbee’s in another way.  I had many Lumbee patients when I was in pediatric practice at Duke University Medical Center, years ago now. I learned their frequent surnames well, never imagining that I would see them connected to me. It remains to be seen how many of my Lumbee DNA matches are blood cousins. I shouldn’t have been too surprised about matches, though, since my European ancestors coexisted for generations in areas where the Lumbee people lived such as Robeson County and surrounds or the old Cheraw District in South Carolina. An illustrative example is a set of my Euro-American grandparents from Darlington County back in the mid-1700s who had a granddaughter who had a third great- granddaughter who married a Lumbee from the area. After two centuries of her people staying put, this third great-granddaughter, who is about my age, left the area, and moved to Texas with her husband. Her daughter, the one with the Ancestry account, is about 13% African. Her grandfather is listed as Indian in the 1940 census and her grandmother as Black. In the 1950 census they are both listed as white.

     After moving to NC in the mid-sixties I soon heard the story of the famous Robeson County Klan rally in 1958 and how the Lumbees routed them, whooping in on horseback and brandishing rifles. At least that is the version I heard. Not being a fan of the KKK, I loved that memory.

Recently, after finding out that I have Lumbee relatives, I read a history on the Lumbee Indians by a Lumbee historian, Melinda M. Lowery. There, in the pages of this

fascinating book, I learned my Klan rally memory was not quite correct. I also learned about the Euro-American woman, Mary Hoyland Livermore, a long-serving English and religion professor at Pembroke, whom the Lumbees honored by naming the library on the UNC Pembroke campus after her. I have a connection with her descendants. That explanation comes later.

In 1954, after the Supreme Court decision Brown v. Board of Education, the Ku Klux Klan in Robeson County had turned their efforts to harassing and terrorizing the Lumbees, wanting to, in the words of Catfish Cole, their leader, "to put the Indians in their place, to end race mixing." Crosses were burned in a few yards and a rally planned for the night of January 18, 1958, in a widely announced field near the tiny town of Maxton.  Word spread quickly among the local Lumbee people. Reports vary but on the night of the 18^th, there were possibly about one-hundred Klan members with a large banner emblazoned with "KKK,” a portable generator to power a public address system and a single bare light bulb, It provided a small circle of light in the expanse of darkness and cold. The Klan couldn’t see that they were soon surrounded by many hundreds of Lumbee Indians. A few younger Indians tried to take down the light. Some were armed. A fight started and soon a shotgun blast shattered the light bulb. Suddenly, completely dark, the rest of the Lumbees swarmed onto the field yelling and firing guns into the air. Police came, the Klan scattered, some accompanied by the police. Catfish Cole took to the woods. Cole was found and later sentenced to some prison time for inciting violence. Much to my disappointment no horses were reported in any of the news accounts.

The news, featured in Life magazine and The New York Times, went worldwide which I hadn’t known until now. Recently, while researching another topic, I happened to come across a January 20, 1958 headline from a Mayfield, Kentucky newspaper which boldly announced “Hooting, Shooting Indians Break Up Klan Rally in Carolina.” Though still no horses, that is more like my memory. For certain, many of us North Carolina citizens chuckle to this day about this event. The Klan never had another public meeting in Robeson County. They tried again in March 1966, applying this time for a permit. The District Solicitor strongly advised the then Grand Dragon of the Klan to not hold a rally. The Solicitor implied that the KKK could be found, once again, to be inciting violence. I think everyone knew that the Lumbees would not put up with their shenanigans. This was the end of any KKK rally attempts in the area.

    As for the Livermore name, I was astonished to see several Livermore relatives of Mary, the beloved Pembroke professor, mentioned in Maynor's book. Some were not so liked by the Lumbee tribal people.  My long acquaintance with several of them had to do with business. I give no further details in order to keep a modicum of confidentiality.    

    Today there are over 55,000 Lumbees, many in North Carolina and some in historic

diaspora communities such as Baltimore and Detroit. The tribe's core ancestry links to Siouan-speaking groups like the Cheraw (Saura), alongside other regional Native peoples. Just like the cousin I discussed above, they have been mixtures of white, Black, and Native American for at least two centuries now. They are survivors and proud of their heritage. They do not keep the color lines like the rest of us who are used to living with the falseness of the one-drop rule. Their history is long and complicated and admirable.

Lowery, Malinda Maynor. Lumbee Indians in the Jim Crow South: Race, Identity, and the Making of a Nation. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2010.

Bad Medicine for the Klan: North Carolina Indians Break Up Ku Kluxers' Anti-Indian Meeting." Life, 27 Jan. 1958, pp. 26–28.

www.ncpedia.org/history/20th-century/lumbee-face-klan

by Marcia E. Herman-Giddens, July 2026