Transcriber's Note:
The original publication does not include aa table of contents.
CONTENTS
Personal
My Initiation
Making a New Company
The K. K. K.
Mode of Recognition
The Work Done
The Grand Signal
THE OATHS,
SIGNS, CEREMONIES AND OBJECTS
OF THE
KU-KLUX-KLAN.
A FULL EXPOSÉ.
BY A LATE MEMBER.
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS.
CLEVELAND,
1868.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1868,
in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for
the Northern District of Ohio.
[5]PERSONAL.
It does not matter who is the writer of the following pages. If it did,no inducement likely to be offered, would tempt him to publish his name.He has no desire to be tracked out by the Brothers of the SouthernCross, and he knows too much of their deathless hatred and hound-likepertinacity, their numbers, and the ramifications of their organization,already encroaching on southern Ohio, Indiana and Illinois, tocarelessly take the slightest risk of anything of the kind.
It is due to the public, however, that one who pretends to make anexposure like this, in which the whole nation is interested, shouldoffer some plausible explanation of the means by which he becamepossessed of the information. For this explanation the reader isreferred to the narrative following.
As to the truthfulness of the exposure, the writer is content to leaveits vindication to[6] the events of the future, confident that so far asthe workings of the K. K. K. are ever discovered, they will confirm themain facts as given here. Of course there are many minor points on whichit is not likely there will ever be more positive testimony than thathere given. This must be so from the nature of the case, as will plainlyappear in the following pages.
[7]MY INITIATION.
After the war, which had not benefited my purse extravagantly, Iwandered off into the interior of Georgia, and finally engaged inbusiness in one of the interior counties. I knew the southern peoplepretty well before the war, had been much among them, and was familiarwith their habits, prejudices, etc. For my own convenience and safety,when I went into business I passed as a Kentuckian, and thereby avoidedmany personal and business annoyances. At first this was notparticularly disagreeable, as no very decided opinions were expectedwhile the country was still thoroughly under the national armies.Gradually, however, it became worse and worse, until at length, to keepup my pretensions, and save my business, I was