Knights of Liberty (vigilante group)

They are known for the 1917 Tulsa Outrage in Oklahoma, the 1918 lynching of Olli Kinkkonen in Minnesota, and a spree of 1918 tarring and feathering events in Wisconsin and California.

"[17] Criticism of the war effort led to a number of violent incidents, including abductions, beatings, tarring and feathering cases, and lynchings in 1917 and 1918.

These included actions directed at those suspected of pro-German sentiment, as well as labor activists, pacifists, and "slackers" (similar to the later term draft dodgers) around the country.

[19] The organization's membership and aims were described in 1918 by one newspaper:[20] ... its members are almost wholly business and professional men of high standing, men who beyond the draft age and unfitted by years or physical condition to join the military forces of the nation, are determined to do their bit by suppressing disloyalty and seeing to it that the nation shall not be assailed from within.Particularly in the spring of 1918, anti-German sentiment grew significantly as Americans heard of the happenings on the Western Front.

In fact, as a rule, it has the complete backing of public opinion ..."[21] Though Wilson would later denounce mob violence in July 1918,[22] a response described as slow and "muted",[23] actions aimed at the disloyal continued; many believed in an obligation to assist the nation through patriotic vigilance and coercion.

To all Pro-German sympathizers, slackers and knockers against Liberty Bonds and other War Measures: While our brave boys are falling in France and facing a hundred million Huns far over the ocean, we, The Knights of Liberty Of Oklahoma and Texas, feel that we would be cowards, curs and traitors to allow sneering and unpatriotic citizens to live among us without being punished.

While being taken to the county jail along with six others who had been arrested, they were abducted by forty to fifty men – led by KKK member and Tulsa founder W. Tate Brady and police chief Ed Lucas – wearing black robes and masks calling themselves the Knights of Liberty.

"[32] In March 1918, ten cars of masked men belonging to the Knights of Liberty kidnapped two farmers, Henry Huffman and O. F. Westbrook, in Altus, Oklahoma.

A newspaper report stated that the Knights of Liberty in southwest Oklahoma had over 500 members and that "more tarring and feathering activities are expected.

[35] In Tulsa in April 1918, the Knights of Liberty kidnapped, stripped, whipped, and tarred and feathered John Kubecka, a German American.

[36][37] In Durant, the Knights of Liberty abducted "Red" Scott, a man held in the city jail for vagrancy, in May that year.

He was tied to a tree and flogged, with a threat signed by the Knights of Liberty posted above his head, stating, "This is a convict, loafer and thug.

[39][40] In another event in Enid, a laundry wagon driver thought he had seen a portrait of the Kaiser on the wall of an old woman's home, leading him to notify the county clerk.

The clerk in turn informed the Knights of Liberty, who went to her home to discover it was a portrait of Allied commander General Foch.

[41] On September 20, 1918, the Knights of Liberty began to repeatedly threaten Julius Hüssy, the editor of Oklahoma Vorwärts, a German-language weekly newspaper.

On October 17, fifty men, some of whom were well-known community members or in public service, showed up and threatened him in person, causing him to shutter his newspaper after 18 years.

[43] An October 1919 article stated the Tulsa Knights of Liberty were considering re-forming in order to fight car theft.

[20] There, their first victim – Gustaf Landin, a Swedish American photographer – had previously made negative comments about the sale of liberty bonds and "governmental things in general".

[46] Later that year in September, several Duluth men including Finnish American dockworker Olli Kinkkonen renounced their citizenship to avoid fighting in World War I.

[51][52] The Knights of Liberty claimed responsibility for a series of tarring and feathering attacks in the Ashland area between the spring and fall of 1918,[13] stating, "We have no purpose to do injustice to any man, but we do feel that any treasonable and seditious acts, or utterances, demand prompt punishment.

"[53] In March 1918, E. A. Schimler (sometimes spelled Schimmel), a language professor at Northland College from Germany, was suspected by the Knights of Liberty of being a German agent.

[63][64][65] The Knights of Liberty drove a German man, Emil Kunze, out of town in June after he heard them planning to tar and feather him.

[73] Governor Emanuel L. Philipp requested the public's help "to aid me in the suppression of the spirit of lawlessness which has been promoted under the guise of Loyalty";[13] however, local citizens were uncooperative.

George Koetzer was abducted 50 members of the Knights of Liberty and brought to a secluded location in San Jose where the men tied him to a tree and tarred and feathered him.

[81] Several San Jose men requested to stay in the jail for their safety due to the threats against them by the Knights of Liberty; one was later hospitalized "in a state of nervous collapse".

[85] The Knights of Liberty announced further action, sending threats to dozens of San Franciscans, businessmen in Visalia, and people in Northern California.

[89] Major General John F. Morrison spoke harshly against the organization, urging citizens to use legal means of addressing disloyalty: "If any American citizens are so anxious to display their loyalty, let them display it by standing loyally by the constitution of the United States... Tarring or feathering or mob violence is not in the spirit of the American constitution.

[95] The National Civil Liberties Bureau wrote in 1918 that the general response to the Tulsa Outrage was overwhelmingly positive, with a few newspapers such as the Evening Post and St. Louis Post-Dispatch condemning the event.

"[97] The "tardiness" and "spirit" of the governor's response has been described as leading one Minnesota journalist to write in an editorial, "The governor has made the discovery that there is a law against dragging a man out of his home and beating him up and subjecting him to all kinds of indignities.... Mobs have been doing – free and unmolested – so many Hun stunts in this state that we had almost come to believe that the mob was a new form of law and order enforcement.

[102] The Knights of Liberty feature in All Men Fear Me, a historical fiction mystery set in Oklahoma during World War I.