Bloody Williamson: A Chapter in American Lawlessness (Paul M. Angle)

In the late nineteenth century and early twentieth, Williamson County, Illinois became a byword for lawlessness. The county first came to nationwide attention in the 1870s, when a bloody feud, comparable to the worst that the mountains of Kentucky and Tennessee had to offer, wracked the area. Then in the 1920s, the town was beset by union and Ku Klux Klan violence to a shocking degree. Indeed, the rest of the country, and even the rest of the world was appalled at the violence, and the townspeople who condoned it.

This is a wonderfully interesting book. The author does an excellent job of bringing bloody Williamson to life, and showing it in all its lack of glory. This tale of union murderers and KKK hoodlums (often the same people) is sure to shock you, and make you very glad that you didn't live then and there!

I highly recommend this book!

If you are a history buff, you will almost certainly enjoy this book immensely as I did. It tells the incredible but little known story of one of the most violent chapters in U.S. history. In fact, some historians believe that the gangs of Williamson County were the most dangerous and violent gangs in U.S. History. Paul Angle does a wonderful job of telling this fascinating story which covers a period of about 50 years. I was particularly interested in it because my father lived through it. He lived in Marion, Illinois at the time and the Sheriff who plays a large part in the book was the father of his best friend. He also personally witnessed some of the things mentioned in the book. My father is 99 years old now and he still remembers it all clearly. But even without that personal connection to the story of Williamson County, I would have been just as fascinated.

I was amazed when reading the review by Alan Mills. How could someone get the most basic facts presented in the book so wrong? He claims that the mine owner hired thugs who killed the miners when, in fact, the mine owner hired guards and non-union miners to work the mines and the union miners killed them! And the "thugs" did not hang around because they were dead! Also, Williamson is a county not a town. Another reviewer guessed that Alan had just read the back cover but he couldn't have even done that based on his "review."

This is a true gem, which depicts the violent history of a rural southern county in Illinois. The author tells of organized labor, bootleggers, gangs and the KKK of the 1920s in Williamson County, Illinois. Angle writes in any easy format for most readers and his book is well indexed. I would highly recommend this book to all readers!

Mike Koch, author of "The Kimes Gang."

While working near Marion, Illinois (Williamson County) in the winter of 2002 and spring of 2003 I was (at first) completely unaware of the history of the area. Finding that I was a history lover, a co-worker, native to the area, told me about "the troubles" and recommended this book. I quickly decided that Bloody Williamson was one of the better books I had ever read concerning this violent era in American history. While reading the book, I rode over many of the roads and visited as many of the old sites as I could find.

Williamsburg County had an unbelievable amount of violence, in both variety and magnitude, in such a short period of time. In less than fifty years this one county had labor wars, Ku Klux Klan wars, gang wars, and one of the worst feuds in American history. Paul Angle is a good writer, but that is only an added benefit. Reading the media accounts of these events would be fascinating enough. Anyone interested in a case study of a dysfunctional community should read this book.