In the late summer of 1889, the Indianapolis Freeman used the figure of Uncle Sam to protest a Gouldsboro, Louisiana, massacre of African American families on an excursion, and the burning of a church, as a symbol of federal protection. In this image, members of the Ku Klux Klan cower behind a tree, from which one lynch victim hangs, as a second man flees to safety. The caption emphasizes the persistence of violence in the South, its “daily or rather nightly occurrence.” Uncle Sam and a Union soldier advance with rifles and bayonet in hand, a reference to the government’s power, during military Reconstruction at least, to suppress mob violence.