Seven Years Ago Today: Violence Broke Out in Charlottesville’s ‘Unite the Right’ March

Seven years ago – August 12, 2017 – was a Saturday. Many TV news viewers were horrified as they watched violence break out in real time in Charlottesville during an Alt-Right, anti-Semitic, white nationalist “Unite the Right” march in the city.

There are still vivid memories are of the Nazi, Confederate, and Gadsen flags that protesters carried, and the hand-to-hand battling on the street between protesters and counter-protesters.

Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe declared a state of emergency.

There were overtures of impending violence the previous night when hundreds of protesters carrying torches marched to the Grounds of the University of Virginia, chanting, “Jews will not replace us.”

We live-blogged here at Bearing Drift as it unfolded. The violence started around 11am and continued into the afternoon when a speeding vehicle ran into a crowd of counter-protesters and killed Heather Heyer who was standing on a sidewalk.

In late afternoon a Virginia State Police helicopter, on its way to survey the violence, crashed outside the city, killing two officers.

From Wikipedia:

University of Virginia Center for Politics director Larry J. Sabato, who witnessed the torchlit rally on August 11, said that the weekend was among the university’s darkest days and that he hoped that “people will put it into context and understand that we had no control over the individuals organizing it, nor the people who showed up. … What I saw was pure evil.”

August 12 exposed the dirty underbelly of a minority segment of America, and is a reminder that we are in a vulnerable election year and must stay aware to prevent a repeat of the violence of August 12, January 6, and other events in the years since Charlottesville.

Background:

-Bearing Drift: Charlottesville is Representing Our Worst – excellent analysis by Jim Hoeft

–Bearing Drift: Violence Breaks Out In Charlottesville As Alt-Right, White Nationalists Battle Counter-Protesters live blogging by Lynn R. Mitchell