The Assault on Elisha Green: Race and Religion in a Kentucky Community
Randolph Paul Runyon
University Press of Kentucky
Runyon recounts one man's pursuit of justice over violence and racism in the nineteenth century. He tells the story of Elisha Green's life and follows the network of relationships that led to the assault on Green on a crowded train. In response, Green took legal action, winning his case against his assailants in March 1884. The significance of this case lies not only in the prevailing justice of the 1800s, but also in the fact that a black man won a lawsuit against two white men. In this engagingly written tale, Runyon masterfully interweaves background information with the immediacy of the harrowing attack and its aftermath, revealing the true character of the primary actors and the racial tensions unique to a border state.