Rosewood 1923 - Smoke and Sorrow

Rosewood Florida was originally settled in 1845 by both Black and white people. Black codes and Jim Crow laws in the years after the Civil War fostered segregation in Rosewood. A white woman, 22-year-old Fannie Taylor, claimed a black man had entered her house and assaulted her. This was never proved and her white lover was suspected to be the real culprit. However, word spread and the resulting "Rosewood Massacre" was an attack on the predominantly African American town on January 1, 1923 by large groups of white aggressors, including the Ku Klux Klan. The town was entirely burned and destroyed by the end of the violence, which saw two white men and many blacks killed, and the residents driven out permanently. This book "Rosewood 1923 - Smoke and Sorrow" outlines the events of that sad time in Florida's history.