"Kidada Williams's They Left Great Marks on Me is an impressive and important contribution to our understanding of African American life after the Civil War.  Whereas most previous scholars utilized the records of the Freedmen's Bureau and other agencies to document the causes, characteristics, and extent of anti-black violence during the postebellum period, Ms. Williams focuses on the importance of the testimony itself, especially to the African Americans who were brave enough to provide such testimony in the hostile environment of the era.  She convincingly argues that this act of testifying itself was one of the galvanizing forces for the movement that eventually produced a host of civil rights activists at the turn of the twentieth century. While lifting up the transformative power of public testimony, Ms. Williams also helps re-center the discussion of white-on-black violence in the late nineteenth century, which all too often focuses on the most spectacular form of violence during that period, lynching, to the detriment of the more common and arguably more important day-to-day violence suffered by African Americans. This is an important work that should be widely read by all those interested in late nineteenth century America and the origins of the Civil Rights Movement of the 20th century." -William D.

Carrigan,Rowan University, and author ofThe Making of a Lynching Culture.