When black protesters took over a wildlife refuge in 1979, they were removed in 3 days

Since an armed militia overtook an Oregon nature preserve in the start of January, the only real consequence has been strangers mailing them bags of glitter and dildos.

A recent piece from The Oregonian tells the story of when 40 members of the People Organized for Equal Rights set up camp on a federal nature preserve south of Savannah, Georgia. They were unarmed, and their ancestors had lived there for generations.

A white plantation owner had deeded the land to a former slave following the civil war and many freed slaves came to live in the area, which was called Harris Neck. They lived, fished, farmed, built, and worked there until 1942 when the military took over the land through eminent domain. They gave the residents 3 weeks to leave, burned down their homes and farms, and built an airbase on top of it, which they abandoned after World War II.

The land was then converted into the Harris Neck National Wildlife Refuge.

Decades later, 26 families who were direct descendants of the original inhabitants organized to take the land back. On April 30, 1979, they staged an unarmed sit-in to force the government to recognize their cause, and asked for $50 million in reparations to rebuild the town the government had burned down 40 years earlier.

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While the armed white militants in Oregon, who are demanding the release of federal land to a county government they made up and the release of two ranchers convicted of arson, have given news conferences, issued demands, threatened violence, and been left alone, the unarmed protestors in Savannah were forcibly removed on May 2, just two days after they took it over.

Federal authorities secured a court order to remove the “squatters.” Four unarmed protestors who refused to leave were forcibly removed and sentenced to a month in jail each.

The 1979 incident has been largely forgotten, and is not even included on Harris Neck’s Wikipedia page, but the descendants of Harris Neck are still trying to rebuild that community.

Featured image courtesy of Emory University/Lewis H. Beck Center