The Prologue describes the events of November 10th, 1898, in Wilmington, North Carolina when a group of white men in red shirts attacked Brooklyn, a Black neighborhood. The white men had been stockpiling guns for months. They decided to attack to undermine Black peoples’ governmental and economic control in the city of Wilmington.

That day, Black workers from the Sprunt Cotton Compress gathered outside the Brunjes’ Saloon after hearing rumors about an impending attack by a white mob. When the white men arrived, an inexperienced white deputy cop, Aaron Lockamy, at the request of the white mob, asked the Black workers to move. The Black men refused. Lockamy gave up and walked away. Soon after, he heard gunshots.

Nearby, the “private militia of Wilmington’s white supremacists” (xix), the Wilmington Light Infantry and the North Carolina Naval Militia, were mustered. After reports of the gunshots, they marched to join the battle with “new rapid-fire guns” (xx).

Book 1 describes history in Wilmington leading up to the attack on Black residents in 1898. Chapter 1 opens with a description of the chaos in the city in February 1865, toward the end of the Civil War. Confederate troops set fire to supplies while they retreated from the advancing Union Army.