Jim Crow & Racial Violence
Rosewood Massacre
January 1923 · several days beginning January 1
Rosewood, Levy County, Florida
Over several days in January 1923, a white mob attacked the Black community of Rosewood, Florida, forcing residents to flee and destroying homes.
Credit: State Archives of Florida, Florida Memory, RC12408. · View original archive record
The Rosewood Massacre unfolded over several days in January 1923 in Levy County, Florida. This calendar uses January 1 to mark the beginning of the episode, not to imply that the entire attack happened on a single day.
Following an allegation against a Black man in nearby Sumner, white mobs pursued and attacked Black people in the area. The allegation should not be presented as a verified crime or a justification for collective violence. Attacks spread to Rosewood, a predominantly Black community.
Residents defended themselves, hid in surrounding woods and swamps, and fled as violence intensified. White attackers burned homes and other buildings, destroying the community and displacing survivors. Accounts of particular incidents and the total number killed differ; uncertainty must be retained rather than replaced by an invented precise count.
Florida’s Department of State describes Rosewood’s destruction as a fiery racist attack. Its research guide brings together scholarship, newspapers, government publications, and legislative history for readers seeking a fuller account. Survivor testimony and later historical investigation helped bring this suppressed history back into public view.
The linked Florida Memory record RC12408 documents ruins of a burned African American home near Rosewood and dates its photograph to January 4, 1923. The article remains image-free pending confirmation of the supplied image’s archive match and reproduction terms.