The Battle of Athens (sometimes called the McMinn County War) was a citizen rebellion in Athens and Etowah, Tennessee, United States, against the corrupt local government, which took place on August 1 and 2, 1946. The citizens, including around 50 to 200 World War II veterans, accused the local officials of predatory policing, police brutality, political corruption, and voter intimidation.

Background

In 1936, the E. H. Crump political machine, based in Memphis, controlled much of Tennessee and its influence extended to McMinn County with the introduction of Paul Cantrell, the Democratic candidate for sheriff. Cantrell, who came from a wealthy and influential family in nearby Etowah, tied his campaign closely to the popularity of the Roosevelt administration. Cantrell won over his Republican opponent in what came to be known as the "vote grab of 1936". The sheriff and his deputies were paid under a fee system, whereby they received money for every person they booked, incarcerated, and released. it was common for votes from dead voters to be counted also.

During the war, two servicemen on leave were shot and killed by Cantrell supporters. According to a contemporaneous article by Theodore H. White in Harper's Magazine, one veteran, Ralph Duggan, who had served in the Pacific in the Navy and became a leading lawyer postwar, "thought a lot more about McMinn County than he did about the Japs. If democracy was good enough to put on the Germans and the Japs, it was good enough for McMinn County, too!" When the GIs heard the deputies had taken the ballot boxes to the jail, White exclaimed, "Boy, they doing something. I'm glad they done that. Now all we got to do is whip on the jail." White had at least 60 under his command. White split his group, with Buck Landers taking up position at the bank while White took the rest to the post office.

Lones Selber, then seven years old and observing from a nearby street, wrote later in a 1985 American Heritage article: "Opinion differs on exactly how the challenge was issued." White says he was the one to call it out: "Would you damn bastards bring those damn ballot boxes out here or we are going to set siege against the jail and blow it down!" Automatic weapons fire erupted, punctuated by shotgun blasts. "I fired the first shot," White claimed, "then everybody started shooting from our side." A deputy ran for the jail. "I shot him; he wheeled and fell inside of the jail".

White's group thwarted an attempt by deputies outside the jail to reinforce (or take refuge in) the jail. Some people in the jail managed to escape through the back door.

End of the battle and vote counting

How the fighting ended is also disputed. Byrum reported: "By 3:30 am, the men holding the jail had been dynamited into submission, and by early morning George Woods was calling Ralph Duggan to ask if he could come to Athens and certify the election of the GI slate. White reported that "when the GIs broke into the jail, they found some of the tally sheets marked by the machine had been scored fifteen to one for the Cantrell forces." When the final tally was complete, Knox Henry was declared the winner of the election.

The morning of August 2 found the town quiet. Some minor acts of revenge happened, but the public mood was one of "euphoria that had not been experienced in McMinn County in a long time".

Aftermath

The recovered ballots certified the election of the five GI Non-Partisan League candidates. League member Knox Henry received 2,175 votes against 1,270 for Sheriff Cantrell. The League also won the other races: Frank Carmichael won as trustee 2,194 to 1,270; George Painter won the county clerk race 2,175 to 1,198; the circuit court clerk broke 2,165 to 1,197 for Charles Picket. The McMinn County Veterans of Foreign Wars and American Legion posts had called for Mayor Walker to resign immediately after the gunfight.

The "Battle of Athens" was followed by veteran movements in other Tennessee counties to promote a statewide coalition against corrupt political machines in the upcoming November elections. Governor McCord countered an attempt to form a "Non-Partisan GI Political League" by directing the Young Democrats Clubs of Tennessee to recruit ex-GIs. The "Crump Organization", based in Shelby County, also worked against the nascent GI organization. A convention was held in Alamo, Tennessee, with the intention of establishing a new national party; the convention was discouraged by General Evans Carlson, USMC, who argued that the GIs should work through the existing political parties.

The new GI government of Athens quickly encountered challenges, including the re-emergence of old party loyalties. On January 4, 1947, four of the five leaders of the GI Non-Partisan League declared in an open letter: "We abolished one machine only to replace it with another and more powerful one in the making." The GI government in Athens eventually collapsed, the movement quickly faded, and politics in the state returned to normal. The Non-Partisan GI Political League replied to enquiries by veterans elsewhere in the United States with the advice that political violence was not the appropriate method of resolving political differences.

Eleanor Roosevelt expressed a somewhat popular opinion that GIs should be checked for violent tendencies before they were demobilized; White came to see her point.

References

Further reading

  • Photo: Knox Henry becomes sheriff after battle. Archived Copy.
  • The Battle of Athens, American Heritage Magazine, February/March 1985, Archived Copy
  • Tennessee County History Series: McMinn County