Between late 1863 and mid-1864, an armed band of Confederate deserters battled Confederate cavalry in the Piney Woods region of Jones County, Mississippi. Calling themselves the Knight Company after their captain, Newton Knight, they set up headquarters in the swamps of the Leaf River, where they declared their loyalty to the U.S. government. The band ultimately grew into an interracial community of poor whites and former slaves, whose descendants continued to fight Jim Crow laws well into the 20th century.
Bynum’s historical chronicle was made into a popular film in 2016. Victoria Bynum has been one of several historians to consistently oppose the New York Times’ 1619 Project, and its racialist falsification of history.
