An interruption of the survival guide so I can finally write something I've been meaning to do for ages.
Lift Up Rifle, Pike, and Saber: The 1937 Charlotte Immigrant Quarter Riots, and the Rise of the Rooftop Coreans
Several of the Rooftop Coreans pose for a photo after the riots (1939)
Charlotte has always been a surprisingly diverse city, one of the most diverse ones in the Free World outside of the major Yankee cities. Jews, Yankees, Germans, French Protestant refugees, Englishmen, Welshmen, Scotchmen, Ulster Scotchmen, Kangas, Scandinavians, Nipponese, and Coreans all live within her confines side by side with the native born majority. In fact, the majority of the northern half of the city is given over to the Immigrant Quarter, which is further subdivided into ethnic enclaves. The southernmost part of the Quarter is Little Edinburgh, and is home to about 30,000 Scots and 15,000 Ulster Scots. Directly north of Little Edinburgh is Coreatown, home to over 12,000 Coreans. Northwest of Coreatown, one finds Scanditown, home to about 6,670 immigrants from the various Scandinavian nations. Northeast of Coreatown is Little Britain, home to some 35,000 English and Welsh immigrants. North of these two enclaves, one finds Little Melbourne, home to some 18,000 Kangas. Northwest of this enclave, there are two communities, Little Israel and Nippontown. Little Israel is home to about 4,500 Jews, while Nippontown has around 10,000 Nipponese. Northeast of Little Melbourne, there is Huguenottown, home to 4,000 French Protestants. Directly north of these enclaves are the last two communities in the Quarter; Krautburg and Yankburg. Krautburg is home to about 37,000 Germans from the various Germanies, while Yankburg is home to some 90,000 Yankees. The geography of the Immigrant Quarter is important to note because of the way status played into it. Simply put, the further North a community was, the less respected it was by the native born, and the more impoverished and oppressed it was as a result.
This resulted in a complicated, tiered hierarchy within the various ethnic groups themselves. At the absolute top were your Scottish and Ulster Scots. They collectively owned 1/3rd of the Quarter, and held control of the Common Sense Party in the Quarter. Almost every alderman the Quarter elected was Scotch or Ulster Scotch. Directly beneath them, although arguably close to their equals, were the Coreans. They too owned 1/3rd of the quarter as a group, and often played landlord to the Yankees and Nipponese. They were less powerful politically, but had a bizarrely high level of influence over the Presbyterian churches in the Quarter, making up a majority of pastors. The Scandinavians and other Brits were beneath the Coreans, having a decent level of control over their own neighborhoods and livelihoods, but no real power beyond the boundaries of their enclave. One could argue that the English were slightly below the Scandinavians and Welsh because they were occasionally harassed by Scotchmen, but this was incredibly rare and didn't make too much of a difference in the grand scheme. Beneath them are the Kangas. While they still control a decent portion of their neighborhood and are treated well enough, they are looked down upon as being both foreign and somewhat hickish, and economically they're much more dependent on Scottish and Ulster Scotch businesses for employment, goods, and shelter. Beneath the Kangas are the Jews, Nipponese, and French. The Jews are viewed as a financial threat by the Scotch-Corean elite of the Quarter due to the success the community has been known to have, and whenever they're getting too close to financial independence as a community, it isn't uncommon for anti-Semitic theft and violence to flare up. The Nipponese are
hated by the Coreans, who essentially owned the neighborhood by the late 1930's. They are subjected to racism, rent gouging, and are thrust into demeaning jobs for low wages. The French aren't as badly exploited financially, but are frequently bullied for their origins and urged to convert to Presbyterianism and Anglicize their names. Finally, at the very bottom of this complicated caste system, you have the Germans and Yankees. The Germans were widely despised because of their connections to imperial competition with Carolina in Africa and the hated Loomies. The Yankees were despised because the large mass of unassimilated Americans secretly kept everyone up at night, terrified that they might be a fifth column. Of note is that those at the bottom of this hierarchy did have a path to fully enjoying the benefits of citizenship... by converting to Presbyterianism, learning Cokie English, oftentimes changing their last name, and totally abandoning any semblance of their old identity.
This was the way the Immigrant Quarter was run. No one complained too much, and the Scotch-Corean ruling class of this little world didn't go out of their way to extract wealth or oppress, but did just enough to keep the cash coming in and stay in charge. Nonetheless, resentment had built from the Kangas on down. Then came Operation: Manifest Climax. Carolina, as a full-fledged member of the League of Nations and an obedient client state, immediately jumped into the fray. This meat grinder of a war needed soldiers, and conscription was the obvious solution. However, in the Immigrant Quarter, the Corean and Scotch leadership schemed with the local OPV to thrust most of the burden down on the bottom groups of ethnicities when their draft time came up on December 1st, 1937. The result; out of 2,000 draftees, only 40 were Corean or Scotch, with another 50 coming from Little Britain and Scanditown. The remaining 1,910 were drafted from the Australians, Jews, Nipponese, French, Germans, and Americans. The result was instant. As if with one mind, these groups banded together and stormed towards Coreatown and Little Edinburgh. Once word got out about what was happening, the people of Little Edinburgh put together honest to God roadblocks and trenches. The Coreans, being shorter on time, grabbed their firearms and headed for the rooftops. Not everyone made it. Some 300 Coreans were murdered down below. The Coreans began to open fire on the looters, who were busy destroying property or trying to clamber up onto rooftops. Two businesses fell to the rioters, Mr Lee's Grocery, and the office of Yun Property Management. The results were horrific. Men were beaten or killed, while most of the women were raped in full view of the community. Mercifully for the Coreans, no more businesses fell, and some good shooting got some of those who managed to take the rooftops. The rioting went on for three days, dying down in Coreatown as some mobs went after the now heavily fortified Little Edinburgh. On December 4th, the Army rolled in to support the beleaguered residents and OPV, and pushed the rioters back. The Coreans had held their ground for three days, oftentimes while hungry. They became national heroes, lauded as "
Honest, god-fearing Presbyterian Patriots who defended life, liberty, and property with great vigor and sturdiness." The Presbyterian Church and thousands of ordinary citizens donated time and money to help rebuild Coreatown, and to a lesser extent, Little Edinburgh. However, the story doesn't end there.
On December 6th, a new draft, this time for 6,000 soldiers and nurses, was instituted in the Quarter. Every single one of them was from the lower castes. When one German woman protested all 4 of her sons being drafted, she was shot dead by Virtuemen in front of the whole community. It was a show of force by the Confederate government, and it worked. However, the Scotch, and especially the Coreans were not even close to getting their revenge. On December 11th, several Corean men lynched an Australian for not saying excuse me. On December 25th, a mob of Coreans burned down the First Fundamentalist Church of Charlotte during the Patriot-Saints Day services. Of the 1,100 congregants inside, only 84 made it out alive. The Yankee government, distracted by bad news in South America, didn't even issue a statement. The Americans in Yankburg began taking down their flags and hiding their copies of the Four Books. Even worse was the chillingly methodical vengeance exacted for the rape of Corean women. The victimized women and girls were asked to describe their attackers, who were then cross-referenced with other eyewitnesses, those who had been drafted, as well as employment and government records. When matches for appearance and believed ethnicity were found, groups of adult male family and friends of the victimized women would track down the assumed perpetrators adult female relatives, and "
make those animals reap what they sowed." Making matters worse, they made sure to tell the women they victimized why they were doing so, and shattered hundreds of families as a result. As if this wasn't horrifying enough, this method was predictably not 100% accurate, and although a shockingly high majority of families targeted did have a rapist among their number (modern estimates put it at 70%) a large minority did not, and were completely innocent. What truly frightened everyone involved was the painstakingly methodical way in which these families were hunted down and victimized. Adding insult to injury, most of the men blamed, innocent or guilty, would later be hunted down and lynched anyway by separate mobs, provided they hadn't already been drafted or committed suicide.
In the aftermath of the Riot and the reprisals, life in the Immigrant Quarter changed. Coreans, Scotchmen, Englishmen, Welshmen, and Scandinavians were told by alderman Enoch Ferguson to begin wearing flag pins featuring the Cokie flag and the flag of their origin country as an easy way to identify one another. These ethnic groups were informally classed as "Budding Citizens." All others were dubbed "Resident Aliens." Signs began appearing in businesses in Coreatown and Little Edinburgh that said; "
No Dogs, No Papists, No Aliens." Ironically, many of these businesses were staffed by said Aliens. These new rules were enforced brutally and with impunity from legal punishment. If curious American tourists asked about the meaning of the word Aliens, they were told it was meant as a warning to foolish Hispanics who had been trying to sneak in on freighters from South America. This satisfied most, and many of them had little interest in seeing much beyond Scanditown, as most of the oppressed ethnicities were fairly common and free back home, giving them little tourist appeal. Aliens were eventually forbidden from entering Coreatown at all except to work. Wages were lowered and rents and prices were raised across the board, pressures made worse by the total consolidation of ownership in Alien communities by Coreans and the Scotch. When the Coreans and Scottish visited Alien communities, the residents were eventually made to clear off all sidewalks for them, and were forbidden from making eye contact. And finally, racist violence against these communities by Coreans, Scotch, and some native born became ubiquitous. The Riot of '37, almost a rebellion really, had turned the masters of the Immigrant Quarter into unforgiving tyrants who were backed up by the law.
German businesses destroyed by Corean and Scottish reprisals.
A mob of Coreans, Scotchmen, and native Cokies burn Australian flags and religious texts during a reprisal.
Authorities desperately try to save the First Fundamentalist Church of Charlotte.