 On November 4, 1898, the "Raleigh News & Observer" noted,

In Wilmington, a biracial coalition of Republicans won the offices of mayor and aldermen in 1898.The mayor and two-thirds of the aldermen were white, elected from a black-majority city.But local white Democrats wanted power and took it six days after the election in the Wilmington Insurrection of 1898, the largest recognized "coup d'état" in United States history.