Oral History Interview: Violet Hill Whyte Oral History Interview: Violet Hill Whyte[Transcript Note: CH stands for Christine Hall; VW stands for Violet Whyte.].
CH: Before we turned on the tape, Mrs. Whyte was saying that she was one of ten children and that her father was a clergyman...
VW: I probably would like to talk about my parents a tiny bit. My mother was born in Buffalo, New York. My father
was a clergyman in the Methodist church. My mother was an RN They called them RNs and that's what she was.
Finally, she met my father. My mother was also a lecturer and teacher, a national lecturer.
I'd like to go back a little about my father. He was born in Hagerstown, Maryland. At the age of four or five, he thinks
or thought, he witnessed his father and mother being sold into slavery on the block by their little home. As well as he
could remember it, there must have been at least six or seven siblings in the family. On the day of the auction, the
children screamed and went on. The neighbors took the children as God provided. At that same time there were a few
Quakers visiting in Hagerstown and witnessed the auction. They took him, which made me think that maybe he was the
youngest of the children. They taught him through the years of his childhood, and he became the house-boy and the
valet and everything that people needed in their homes at that time. Finally, he was able to learn enough to leave them,
and go to Lincoln, Pennsylvania to Lincoln University. At Lincoln, he graduated cum laude and after that went back
and got another degree. But all of his life he was unable to find any one of his sisters or brothers. Oddly enough, he lost
contact with the family and I know that's the way they do sometimes. You do a good deed and then move on.
CH: You mean the Quakers who took him in?
VW: Yes. I knew the family name and he knew it and used a lot of time trying to locate them. He did locate some
distant relatives but not the ones that nurtured him....
I married and my husband, George Sumner Whyte, was a principal of a school in Baltimore City. We had four children
of whom [unintelligible] lived. The one pictured there and the other is a teacher in Washington, D.C. Oddly, last night
her husband died suddenly leaving three children. So that upset us a little bit....
So I taught in the Baltimore City Schools. While teaching, I became very interested in social work and law
enforcement. The school I taught in was in South Baltimore. Many of the children were poor and limited. I learned by
experience and study techniques in teaching children of that type. Finally, after teaching a while, I became interested in
travel, national travel. I learned from experience that I needed more money than my family could back me with. Things
happened my way. Without me pursuing it, I was asked to consider Law Enforcement right here in Baltimore City.
CH: Were there any women in Law Enforcement up to that time?
VW: Prior to my going into the Police Department, there were one or two women of the other race, but they were employed as clerks. That's all I could get from information. So I went in as the first law enforcer of my race (1937). I remained in the Police Department for thirty years.
CH: Quite an illustrious career that was too.
VW: Well, I enjoyed it. People were good, even the worst of them.
CH: But you helped so many people. This I know from experience.
VW: Yes, I find some good in everybody I worked with. I found that it was very difficult to make an arrest of a man and go back and talk to his family and find maybe a mother with a whole lot of little children without food and clothing. So I had an opportunity to correlate my social work tendencies with police work and I did for thirty years. But in the meantime, I did everything the men did....everything.
CH: Did you carry a weapon?
VW: Yes, I did -- at night. I never needed one except at night. I had some wonderful experiences though where I would have used one. In making an arrest, the human side to that -- I recall one very easily. I arrested a man on a warrant for rape. I just felt that maybe he would be home one particular morning. I went to the home. His wife let me in. She knew me as a police officer. I told her when she opened the door, I had a warrant for her husband, -- I had it in my hand. and I'd like to talk to him. He would be subject to arrest. [interruption] She said, " Wait, I'll call him. He was expecting an officer in a patrol backing up here and he'll be glad to know that it's you coming." She called him downstairs and he came to the foot of the steps - surprised. I identified myself. I showed him the warrant and he didn't want to read it. I said," Now you have a choice. Do you want to come and go with me without any trouble?" He said, "Yes, I will." So I let him go back up and finish dressing and he kept his word. He came down, kissed his wife good-bye and out the door we went. We started walking up Dolphin Street to Pennsylvania Avenue. Before we got there, the old 21 bus was coming. I didn't have my hand on him. He put his hand on my arm. He said, "The bus is coming." I said, "We're only two or three blocks from the station house. He said, "But I'd rather get on the bus because people will se me walking with you. I'd rather get on the bus." I said, "Okay!" I opened my pocketbook. He said, "Don't take your money out. I never let a woman pay her way when I'm with her." That amused me so. I looked up at him and I smiled. He said, " I know what you're thinking, but I'm still a gentleman." He paid my way on the bus.
CH: You mean he didn't try to run off or anything?
VW: Then when I went to get on the bus, I said "You get on first." He said, "No, you get on first."
CH: That was an awful risk.
VW: Yes it was....He was so much taller than I. When we got to the desk, the lieutenant looked at him and looked at me and he said, "How did you bring this guy in here?" I said, " He's a gentleman and here's a warrant."
CH: Well I know they were truly amazed.
VW: I was able to help that man all through court because I told just what I told you in the private chamber of the judge who heard the case. He said, "That was amazing. I'm going to consider that." He did. I have lots of experiences similar to that, bringing out the good in a person. I never overlooked it.
CH: As I recall in the past and having known you when I worked at the Department of Welfare, I remember a great deal of your work with families - trying to keep families together, trying to make it possible for children to be with their parents wherever this was the case and a reasonable plan. Can you comment on that. When your police work was famous. I know that many Baltimore families know and remember you and your efforts on their behalf.
VW. It took a lot of personal work. I might quickly tell you that I used to work anywhere from twelve to sixteen hours a day. I employed a housekeeper, a lovely woman, and my children loved her. My husband understood, so I had no conflict at home. I did my heavy cooking, like baking a ham, something like that, on Saturday or Sunday. But I always worked on Saturday or Sunday, whenever the need was apparent. By way of summary, I feel I did a pretty good job.
Other episodes: For example, I used to frequently go to the House of Correction and the Maryland Penitentiary especially. I would talk to maybe five or six hundred men, many of whom, I was the instrument that got them in there. And yet, when I'd get through talking, they'd come up and hug me and shake my hand.
CH: It's almost as though you are saying [that] the law enforcer in many ways is tied to the person he has to deal with in the course of his work. You don't just arrest people and forget about them. Their remains a relationship.
VW: You have to remember too, that they have a family…most of them do. The family is in need a whole lot of moral support and sometimes they don't know which way to turn. There is another angle to it too - that it is very seldom that I had to go out for information. People would come in with the information.
CH: I know that we have given a lot of discussion to your local activities, but I am mindful of the fact that you were just as prominent nationally. I know that you did some work for the Women's Christian Temperance Union. Today's youth might not know what that organization is or how it came into being. Could you talk about that organization, what they did, and so forth?
VW: I would like to say that the police department was glad to let me travel and talk. That was good public relations and I took advantage of that. It gave me lots of travel. Between organizations and the police department, I have had thirteen round-trips to the coast.
CH: Isn't that wonderful.
VW: I don't remember one penny I spent out of my pocket for expenses. Because the organizations would send me checks for transportation which had to be cleared through the Department and everywhere I 'd go I would have permission and contact from the local Baltimore Police Department to give an observation in their department. That was helpful to me, even in Canada.
CH: What was the Christian Temperance Union all about? It came into being during prohibition?
VW. They celebrated their 100th birthday of the organization this year, just about two months ago. I was one of the speakers. I conducted workshops in Cleveland. It is a fine group of people, Christian people. It is organized in every state - national and international. Anything else you want to know about that?
CH: I was wondering what your particular job responsibilities were. Did you do lectures? Did you do counseling?
VW: Yes, I have been a lecturer, a national lecturer, a national organizer, and of course, specializing in certain fields. Now, when I work with them or talk with them, it's specializing in the effects of alcohol and drugs. That is an open field, sure enough.
CH: Were people willing to hear what the Temperance Union had to say?
VW: Oh yes. I have never had any adverse criticism. Now I have requests coming in here and there. Last year, I went to Vermont and through the area of northern New York - and places around - beautiful country.
CH: Were you working for the Temperance Union when you had occasion to observe the lynching?
VW: I did not observe it. I was brought in by a group of well-meaning white people who abhorred it. I was pretty well-known nationally. They asked me to come in an befriend the mother of the boy - young man. Just the two of them lived together. My mind goes back. I lived in a little log cabin with her. No two logs came together - cracks between them.
CH: Quite sizable cracks?
VW: At night lizards and snakes would come in between them and other rodents. She kept a pet king snake to catch mice. [That was] the first time I ever observed that.
CH: You would have thought she would have had a cat. It's better than a snake.
VW: I didn't see any cats. That snake knew her and knew every step she'd make. The snake accepted me too. I didn't bother him. Great big fellow. He used to lie on the floor behind her charcoal bucket.
CH: What state was this?
VW: I would rather not specify on that too much. [ Note: Maryland].
CH: All right.
VW: Whenever the snake saw a mouse, (Claps) that quickly. You have a mouse.
CH: No wonder he was fat.
VW: Didn't give me any trouble. (Laughs) She had an improvised bench on the side of the - one side of the cabinet where she slept and I slept when I was living with her. She was a peculiar little person: -- very small, ill-nurtured - and she had the movements - I named her "the squirrel." (Laughs) She was just jumpy. That was reaction though, …because I….
CH: Did you get any details of what the son had been accused of?
VW: Rape. I was able to…no I wasn't…but the local people who were friendly, found the man who had committed the rape, one of our own race.
CH: I believe that lynching took place right in her own yard.
VW: Yes. [It was] a small yard, not much larger than the floor space in here.
CH: She was required to watch her son.
VW: They made her stand and watch it.
CH: Was she allowed to bury him afterwards?
VW: No. Friends of hers, they were not really friends because she was isolated, took care of that. They didn't have any formal burial.
CH: At the point that you left her, how were things then?
VW: I took her to the insane asylum.
CH: Was she completely…
VW: She went off completely while I was there.
CH: Do you think she ever recovered?
VW: I doubt it. No, she was so ill-nourished. I don't think she had any desire to live. She got to the point where she just mumbled.
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[Original transcription by Mary Moore. Part of interview not transcribed.]
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Comments to Joan A. Andersen: joanaa@umd5.umd.edu
Oral History Interview: Violet Hill Whyte © 1974 Oral History Research Center - BJC/BCC;
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