Victoria Matthews, Maritcha Lyons and the healing journey of Ida B. Wells Part Six

During the summer of 1892, Marticha Lyons devoted herself to teaching Ida B. Wells the skills needed to speak clearly and passionately, without notes.?But more importantly, Maritcha needed to help Ida heal from the trauma of escaping lynching and mob rule and the horrible homesickness that came from leaving her family and friends behind in Memphis Tennessee. As a child, Maritcha spent hours alone at home stuck in an uncomfortable back brace. Her parents helped her heal by giving Maritcha a piano and lessons that made playing classical music a lifelong source of comfort. Ida loved classical music, especially when it was performed by Black artists, but she was not a musician herself. Maritcha's parents also showed their deep love for her by filling her life with interesting people of all ages. After speaking to Ida, it seemed that besides missing her family, what Ida missed most about being away from Memphis were her friends: the Black businessmen, church leaders, and journalists who filled her days with fascinating discussions and activities. Maritcha did her best to help Ida fill that void.

In July Maritcha took Ida to a day picnic along the Hudson River.? She introduced Ida to her fellow writers, Black women who loved reading and were passionate about creating literature by Black women about Black culture. ?Slowly Maritcha built a family of writers for Ida, supportive women who listened to Ida and encouraged her the way Maritcha’s parents and family friends had done years before.

Meanwhile, Maritcha began meeting with wealthy Black women in Manhattan and Brooklyn to plan events that would allow Ida the chance to build back her public speaking confidence.? Maritcha reminded these Black women that young women like Ida were under particular attack all across the United States.? Books, magazines, and newspapers were filled with criticisms of Black women. These writers stated that a Black girl was born genetically hard-wired to be a thief, a liar, and worse.?

The many articles targeting Ida were just one example of the constant barrage of hate toward Black women. White newspaper writers reprinted portions of Ida's articles where Ida accused white men and women of falsely accusing Black men of crimes against white women and then using riots and lynching to destroy the lives of Black people. White newspaper editors then stated that her words revealed her to be a prime example of a horrible, lying Black woman, someone who deserved to be tortured and killed once she was captured.?

Maritcha told influential Black women that something needed to be done to show white Americans that these stereotypes were false. Maritcha told influential Black women that Ida’s traumatic story would draw large audiences of Black and white people. ?She believed that when white people attended a speech given by Ida they would be overwhelmed by her intellect, determination, and radiant personality.?Ida would begin the process of killing negative stereotypes about Black women in the minds of white Americans. Maritcha also hoped that white leaders would find Ida’s story of white mob rule repulsive and would work to protect Black people. The question remained, could Ida speak about her past without bursting into tears?? Would Ida’s powerful words and personality shine through or would an audience only see her tears?

Maritcha’s wealthy Black friends, and her circle of women writers, agreed to attend every meeting that Ida spoke at that summer. Ida could count on speaking to friendly sympathetic audiences at first before encountering a skeptical white audience.? Meanwhile, over the summer Ida slowly rediscovered her public speaking voice, one she first used long ago at Rust College in Mississippi. Maritcha admired Ida’s grit and determination to rebuild her confidence and re-learn all she could about public speaking. Reporters described Ida as having a “musical voice” and “carefully constructed sentences” which she spoke with “great energy.”

Maritcha also taught Ida all she knew about how to speak to an audience without prepared notes.? Ida long remembered what Maritcha taught her: ?“there were two main rules for public speaking: 1 – Be so familiar with your subject that you are literally saturated with it; think, meditate and reflect to develop all the points in logical sequence. 2 – Learn how to manage the voice; if thought is prolific, expression of ideas will become automatic.”

Towards the end of the summer, Maritcha arranged for Ida to put some of these skills into practice. Ida was not yet ready to speak to an audience without notes, but she was ready to read a paper about something she and her audience were interested in.? Ida and Maritcha chose “The Afro-American in Literature” as the topic. Ida enthusiastically dove into researching and writing her lecture on the subject.? Her research and writing was likely done on the train, because Ida squeezed in a trip to Minneapolis and Chicago that August.? Preparing a speech she would read in front of an audience was not a new skill for Ida. She had read many papers before an audience at educators and journalist conventions, but this would be her first chance to get before an audience after the horrible events back in Memphis.

At the end of August 1892, while Maritcha was preparing to return to teaching at PS 67, she began to speak to reporters at Brooklyn’s newspapers. Maritcha announced in Brooklyn's papers that she wanted to meet with Black women interested in supporting Ida B. Wells.? Soon Maritcha was holding meetings with wealthy and influential Black women at Brooklyn’s African American churches.? Well-known Black writer Victoria Matthews attended the planning meetings with Dr. Susan McKinney and her sister, school principal Mrs. Sarah Garnet, along with Black school teachers Mary Eato and Susan Frazier.? Next Maritcha spoke with Joseph H.E. Scotland the President of Brooklyn’s Concord Literary Union.? Joseph Scotland agreed to hold host Ida as lecturer at their first meeting in September.? The Brooklyn Standard Union promoted the upcoming event: “Prominent men and women of Brooklyn expect to be present and they will no doubt be repaid for coming, as Miss Wells is a scholarly and eloquent speaker.”

Sitting on the stage next to Ida were Maritcha and the other women whom Ida had met and socialized with all summer long.? Even though the event was held on a Thursday, Maritcha succeeded in attracting a crowd that filled the church and overflowed outside. Newspaper reporters from all of Brooklyn’s papers attended and printed Ida’s speech the next day. After a kind introduction by Joseph Scotland, Ida stood at a podium and likely read her speech to the audience.? She made sure her talk was a detailed and interesting review of how Black people are portrayed in literature. Ida pointed out that even sympatric white writers were blinded by prejudice: “It is not in their power to understand that the Afro-American is a man with all the attributes of manhood.” Then, Ida called on Black people to start writing their own realistic portrayals of Black life in America.? She said readers “have viewed us with a white man’s glasses so long, seeing only the ignorant and humble side, there seems no other perspective for them.? Thus it is that to the world at large the [belief] is widespread that we are a menial, servile, happy-go-lucky race given to petty thievery or humble forgiving, and submissive as was Uncle Tom… Nowhere do we find spread of the world’s gaze a work that portrays Afro-American life in its true likeness.”? ?And so Ida spoke about one of the root causes of lynching, the dehumanizing of Black people, without having to talk about the still very raw details her own experience.

After she was finished reporters noted that she received a standing ovation, the intensity of the clapping was “of which any woman might well be proud.” The Washington Bee reported: “She completely captivated the large and cultivated audience.” Ida sat down and Maritcha led the audience in a discussion about Ida’s talk. ?Maritcha and Ida had done well. Ida regained her confidence that she could stand before an audience once again. The public speaking lessons she learned from Maritcha resulted in a very clear delivery and a standing ovation, a first for Ida.

Next Maritcha asked Ida to build on her good experience at the Concord Literary Union by reading a speech to an audience specifically about the lynching deaths of her friends and the destruction of her newspaper by a mob in Memphis. Maritcha felt Ida was ready and she believed that speaking her story aloud would help Ida heal.? Bravely Ida agreed. A newspaper article appeared soon after in the Brooklyn Citizen under the headline “She is an Exile.”?? The article came with an illustration of Ida, the story of how she tried to use her newspaper Free Speech to end mob rule.? The article stated; “As a result of her condemnation of the mobobratic spirit of the South, she is now an exile from her home.? Her property has been destroyed… The publication of Free Speech has been suspended, and she came to this city to visit her friends and tell them the sad story of her banishment. The women of her race were very much in sympathy with her and threw their doors open to receive the martyr of free speech.? Some of the ladies conceived the idea of tendering to her a reception…[Ida] is much elated over the interest which the ladies are taking in the reception, and has lots of pleasant things to say of them.? Miss. M.R. Lyons, the well-known Brooklyn? educator, is one of the foremost ladies in the movement, and is devising ways and means to assist in making the affair attractive.”

Maritcha and her friend Victoria Matthews had big goals for Ida’s next speech.? Not only would it be a chance for Ida to heal by telling her story aloud, but the reception would also be an opportunity for Black women leaders from other cities to come and hear Ida. Maritcha and Victoria hoped that Ida would then be invited to give her talk in other cities. By meeting these women at a reception, Maritcha hoped that Ida would feel comfortable staying in the homes of these Black leaders as she traveled.?

Maritcha and Victoria chose to hold the meeting in Lyric Hall in New York City rather than in Brooklyn where most of that state’s wealthy Black families lived. Since the draft riots of 1863, when so many Black neighborhoods were destroyed, there was tension between the Black families who left Manhattan for Brooklyn and those who stayed in the war-torn city and rebuilt their lives.? Maritcha and Victoria hoped that women from both cities joining together to support Ida, would begin to create unity.? Most of all, Maritcha and Victoria hoped the event would bring donations, money Ida could use to restart her newspaper, or travel to other cities to give speeches. With growing public support, Maritcha hoped that white leaders would forcefully put an end to mob rule.

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On October 5, 1892 Ida once again took the stage, this time at Manhattan’s Lyric Hall.? Up above the speaker’s platform, Maritcha had hung electric light bulbs that spelled “Iola,” the name Ida used to sign all of her articles speaking against mob violence.? The programs for the event were designed to look like small versions of Ida’s Free Speech newspaper. Two hundred Black women leaders from New York, Philadelphia and Boston filled the seats.? These women knew “Iola” from reading Ida’s articles which were printed in the newspapers across the United States, but what would they think of young Ida B. Wells?? Would the hours spent re-learning public speaking with Maritcha, would her new found confidence after her Black literature talk help her this evening?? As Maritcha stood to introduce the audience to “Iola” in real life, Ida felt “a panic seize me.”?? As Ida stood and began reading her speech, she told herself not to cry. “I was afraid that I was going to make a scene and spoil all those dear good women had done for me. I kept saying to myself that whatever happened I must not break down, and so I kept on reading.”? But as she read about the horrible deaths of her friends in Memphis just a few months before “my mind went back to the scenes of the struggle, to the thoughts of my friends who were scattered throughout the country,” Wells later wrote. She felt shaken by “a feeling of loneliness and homesickness for the days and the friends that were gone.” And then, she said, “I felt the tears coming. I kept saying to myself that whatever happened I must not break down, and so I kept on reading.”? Ida reached for her handkerchief but she realized she had left it on her chair behind her.? As she read, with tears streaming down her face and she had a runny nose, she put her hand behind her back and signaled to Marticha and Victoria for help.? Victoria jumped up and handed Ida a handkerchief. “I wiped my nose and streaming face,” Ida remembered, “but I kept on reading the story which they had come to hear.”

Through her sobs, Ida spared herself and the audience none of the trauma and grief she and her friends went through at the hands of the white mob. “On the morning of March 9, the bodies of three of our best young men were found in an old field, horribly shot to pieces [this illegal practice of mob violence was called Lynch Law]…The baby daughter of Tom Moss [Ida’s Black postman friend] too young to express how she missed her father, toddles to the wardrobe, seizes the legs of the trousers of his letter-carrier uniform, hugs and kisses them with evident delight, and stretches up her little hands to be taken up into the arms which will nevermore clasp his daughter’s form…And his wife holds Thomas Moss Jr. in her arms, upon whose unconscious baby face the tears fall thick and fast when she is thinking of the sad fate of the father he will never see, and of the two helpless children who cling to her for support she cannot give.”? Ida’s listeners began to cry as she concluded her speech: “Do you ask a remedy?... The Way to Right Wrongs is to turn the light of Truth upon them...A public sentiment strong against lawlessness must be aroused. Every individual can contribute to this awakening. When a sentiment against lynch law strong, deep and mighty as that roused against slavery prevails, I have no fear of the result...The voice of the people is the voice of God.”

Ida, still crying, took her seat.? She felt horribly embarrassed for crying through her speech. It seemed everything she learned from Maritcha was wiped out by feelings of trauma and grief.? This must have been an emotional experience for Maritcha as well.? In Manhattan, during the draft riots of 1863, Maritcha witnessed the senseless destruction of all her possessions. She experienced the horrible injuries suffered by the boarders staying at her family home, and the cruel deaths of family friends. Maritcha endured terror while fleeing home barefoot, knowing that her neighbors had decided to become her killers.

Would the audience help them both heal? For a moment the audience filled with crying people, seemed caught up in Ida’s grief.? Then the sound of loud cheering and clapping broke the silence.?? Maritcha and Victoria rose to award Ida with a golden pin. The pin read “Mizpah” which meant “lookout” in Hebrew.? Maritcha and Victoria were signaling that Ida was officially their speaker for warning America about the evils of mob rule and for equal rights for Black people. ?From then on Ida wore this pin during all of her public speeches.?

For Maritcha Lyons, the whole experience must have been healing.? Through Ida, Maritcha was able to help another hurting person the same way her parents had cared for her after the trauma of the 1863 draft riots. Maritcha was living out her life goal of "becoming her best self, so she could help others."

That night, the audience contributed more than four hundred dollars, over $13,000 in today’s money.? After her speech, Black women community leaders from Boston, and Washington DC invited Ida to come and stay with them and give her speech in their cities.? They assured Ida that her tears helped and did not in any way hurt her message. For Ida, the experience seemed to help her heal.? She would go on to give her heartfelt speech in many cities in the United States and in Great Britain, but without the outpouring of tears. Ida began to build groups of men and women in cities across the country who opposed mob rule and supported equal rights for Black people.? Sadly Lynch Law, and mob rule continued to kill innocent Black people for decades to come after 1892, but the work of Ida and her followers certainly reduced the numbers of cities that experienced violence against Black people.

The whole experience of helping Ida heal from grief and trauma was very motivating for Maritcha Lyons and Victoria Matthews. They stayed in contact with the women who attended the event and Lyric Hall. Meetings with the women continued and they decided to create a formal club that would support Ida as she spoke around the country, speaking out against the many books and magazine articles that described Black women as being naturally immoral liars and thieves. She used the court of public opinion to promote equal rights for Black people. Ida demanded that laws be passed to punish anyone involved in the killing of a Black person.? The women called themselves the “Woman’s Loyal Union” and soon clubs with the same goals began to form in other cities.?

For many decades before this time, Black women had formed local clubs to help their community and push for equal rights.? This was the first time a nationwide organization of Black women began to coordinate their work together in large numbers.

One of the women who attended Ida’s Lyric Hall meeting was a wealthy Black woman, Josephine St. Pierre Ruffin of Boston. She was so inspired by Ida’s speech that Josephine started the Women’s Era club as a sister club of the Loyal Union. More importantly, Josephine started a national newspaper for Black women club members.? Victoria Matthews was a regular contributor to Josephine’s newspaper. Each month the Women’s Era newspaper reported on what each local club across the country was doing to achieve goals set out by Maritcha and Victoria: defending and supporting Ida Wells and other Black women, pushing for equal rights for Black people, and ending Lynch law and mob violence against Black communities. When newspaper editors continued to attack Ida and denounce her as being immoral, Josephine and Victoria called for a meeting in Boston of Black women to protest Ida’s mistreatment. The meeting in 1896 brought hundreds of Black women activists from across the country. The meeting resulted in the creation of the National Association of Colored Women and later the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.? Victoria Matthews served as the first leader of the committee that established the NACW.? The Lyric Hall meeting had a huge impact on Black activism across America.? Part Seven: Ida learns to speak without notes but arguments and division threaten the civil rights movement of the 1890's.