The Ku Klux Klan to the best of my knowledge went into action about
the time shortly after the war when the amendments to the Constitution
gave the Negroes the right to vote. I have seen them at night dressed
up in their uniform. They would visit every Negro's house in the
comunity [TR: community]. Some they would take out and whip, some they
would scare to death. They would ask for a drink of water and they had
some way of drinking a whole bucketful to impress the Negroes that
they were supernatural. Negroes were very superstitious then. Colonel
Patterson who was a Republican and a colonel or general of the
militia, white and colored, under the governorship of Powell Clayton,
stopped the operation of the Klan in this state. After his work, they
ceased terrorizing the people.