Security· Civil Aid and Humanitarian Operations
Washington DC Race Riots response
A Marine deployment during one of the deadliest episodes of the "Red Summer" of 1919, when racial violence erupted in cities across the country.
In Washington, inflamed by sensational press reports, white mobs, many of them servicemen, attacked Black neighborhoods over several days of street fighting in which the Black community organized to defend itself. As the violence overwhelmed the city's police, federal forces were called in: two companies of Marines from Quantico were brought to the capital to assist the civil authorities, the police, and Army units in restoring order. The combined show of force brought the rioting under control. No Marine casualties resulted, though the wider violence in the city left scores killed and wounded. The deployment was a characteristic use of the nearby Marine force to put down major disorder in the capital, this time a racial pogrom rather than an ordinary riot.
Record no. 556