ParaBack to Table of ContentsParaI joined with Harold Covington and the National Socialist Party of America (NSPA), a Nazi group around February 1976, in Raleigh.
ParaLooking much older than his twenty-six years and with a full beard black as coal, and weighing about 225 pounds on a 5,10” frame, Harold greatly impressed me with his intelligence and knowledge, in spite of his never having been to college.
ParaHarold would run for the state Attorney General’s office in the Republican Primary election in 1978, and receive a whopping 54,000 votes, and though he didn’t win, this unprecedented large vote gained by a self-proclaimed Nazi really shook up the state Republican Party, and the media buzzed for months after the election.
ParaActually, it was a fluke. At least 98% of those 54,000 votes came from voters who did not realize Harold Covington was a Nazi. In fact, one small Black Republican group voted overwhelmingly for Harold, and when asked why after the election, their spokesman said they thought Harold’s opponent was the Nazi because his name was Snyder, and Snyder sounds more German than Covington.
ParaAnyhow, I joined the NSPA the same day I met Harold, and started attending weekly meetings held at Harold’s residence, a rented frame house, three blocks off Glenwood Avenue in Northwest Raleigh.
ParaThe meetings varied, but usually consisted of Harold presenting an update on the group’s activities, and of the American White Movement, in general, and the passing out of Nazi literature
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for members to distribute to the general public. Often, we’d all sit around and roll Nazi newspapers in rubber bands, and then drive around Raleigh throwing them on lawns and in driveways.
ParaHarold also operated a telephone message unit from his house. This message unit contained a prerecorded two minute message by Harold, changed weekly, educating callers about the NSPA, and ending with Harold’s phone number for those wanting more information, or to join. This message machine was quite popular, and judging from the fact it was busy most of the time, I estimate that it received around 5,000 calls per month, though it resulted in pitiful few members or supporters.
ParaI never attended an NSPA meeting containing more than 40 members and the average was only around 10 to 15.
ParaAfter four years with the NSPA, most of that time spent as a unit leader, and with my own message unit to attract members, I succeeded in signing up a grand total of three, two drunks and a man who was afraid to even wear a swastika armband. And, I worked harder for the party than anyone else, save Covington himself.
ParaThough I was in the Army at the time, I lived on an eighteen-acre farm I had purchased near Fuquay-Varina, driving back and forth to Fort Bragg each day.
ParaTo help the NSPA financially, I grew two acres of watermelons and cucumbers, doing virtually all the work myself, and I donated the proceeds from these, and from the sale of pecans from two huge trees on my farm. This amounted to a couple thousand dollars, and I also continued to send money to the National States Rights Party, ordering thousands of copies of their newspaper, “The Thunderbolt,” which I continued to distribute all over the state.
ParaIn addition to NSPA meetings, Harold, myself and other members also attended rallies and meetings sponsored by North Carolina Klan groups and by the National States Rights Party. We often traveled in convoy to NSRP meetings in Rocky Mount and Louisburg.
ParaI recall one such meeting in Rocky Mount in 1978. Prior to
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that night’s meeting, and while passing out Thunderbolt newspapers around Raleigh, I handed one copy personally to a huge young Blonde red-neck fellow at a tavern near Dorthy Dix Hospital. He was so impressed with the paper, he agreed to attend the Rocky Mount meeting with me. On his request, we stopped at a Raleigh ABC store and he bought a fifth of vodka, and in no time he became high as a Georgia Pine, and I wasn’t feeling much pain myself.
ParaTen miles or so from the meeting site, we stopped at an old country store, which contained six or eight Black males and the White store operator, to get chasers. I had on my Nazi uniform, including a swastika arm band, and on seeing this, the operator informed me he did not serve Nazis in his store. On hearing this, the Blonde fellow ran back to my car, and came back with a huge .357 Magnum pistol I didn’t even know he had, and started yelling at the operator and the Blacks, calling them all Niggers or Nigger-lover, while waving the pistol at the Blacks and pointing it in the face of the store operator.
ParaWith much pleading and consoling, I managed to get this fellow calmed down and back to my car without any blood shed.
Para“I’ll kill all them sons-of-bitches,” he yelled.
ParaDown the road about two miles, as the impact of what had happened penetrated my senses, my right foot started trembling so bad I had to pull off the road, at which time I took a long swig from the vodka bottle, to steady my nerves, before proceeding on.
ParaAfter pretending I couldn’t find the meeting place, I turned around and headed back to Raleigh, and in thirty minutes I said farewell to that red-neck and never saw him or tried to again.
ParaThough I never heard anything from the police about the incident, a Rocky Mount NSRP member told me later that he had not only heard about it, but that the store operator had been so shook up, he had closed his store down for good, saying he didn’t know what in hell this country was coming to when Nazis could run around loose with guns.
ParaIt was also in 1978 (as I recall), that I got arrested for trying to start a riot in a bar on Hillsboro Street across from North
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Carolina State University in Raleigh.
ParaI was sitting at the bar talking to two young uniformed soldiers who were on weekend pass from Fort Bragg, and the place was packed with about 150 college students.
ParaI noticed a table over in one corner with what I thought (and I was correct) was seven or eight Jewish males, sitting around drinking beer and eating pizza, and I informed my two soldier conversationalists of the fact, while continuing on with my racist and anti-Semitic ramblings.
ParaAnd, then I got loud and proclaimed to the whole bar, “Hey y’all, sitting right over there (pointing my finger), are a whole bunch of God’s chosen people. Yes sir, aren’t we all honored to be in the presence of these Jews and chosen people of God Himself. Look how beautiful they are. Anybody can plainly see why God chose them, with their banana looking noses, their beady eyes, and their dark skin.”
ParaThe crowd was amused, strangely enough, proven by the large grins around the bar room. And, I heard a few giggles, too, all of which spurred me on.
ParaI yelled again, holding my bourbon and coke in my left hand and orating with my right, “On second thought folks, these Jews are a ugly bunch. Next to the Eskimos and the Niggers, the Jews are the ugliest people on Earth. How odd of God to choose the rats.”
ParaThere were even more giggles now from the college student audience, and those Jewish fellows were angry enough now to do something to shut me up.
ParaThree of them came toward me with balled up fists, and I turned around and grabbed a beer bottle off the bar, waved it in the air, and told them to come on, that I’d whip them all.
ParaNot wanting a fight, or just choosing to ignore me, they sat back down, at about which time the manager came over and informed me to shut up or get out, so I chose the former and while keeping an eye peeled on the Jewish students, I sat back down to resume sipping on my bourbon and coke and talking with my two soldier acquaintances.
ParaAnd then, it was closing time, and I was wondering how I Para
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was going to get safely away from those Jews, since I was without a car, and having to walk seven or eight blocks to my mother’s house where I was spending that night.
ParaThe two soldiers had left earlier and I didn’t know a soul in the place.
ParaWhen I looked over at those Jews, they were grinning and seemed to be thinking, “Now we’ve got you. We’re going to kick your butt when you leave the bar.” Obviously from their looks, they had forgotten nothing.
ParaI resigned myself to a fight, but I didn’t think they’d beat me up too badly in front of all those people leaving the bar together. I thought about running, but they were young and athletic looking, so that was out.
ParaI walked out the front door as they were getting up from their table.
ParaOutside, miraculously, sat four Raleigh police officers in two police cars, and they all got out on seeing me, arrested me for “attempting to start a riot,” and hauled me off to the county jail.
Someone, probably the bar manager, had called them, and they had just waited, not wanting to arrest me inside the bar. ParaAs we drove off, I grinned and waved at the Jewish students who were standing in front of the bar, looking somewhat rejected, but shaking their fists at me.
ParaAt the police magistrate’s office, I signed my own release promising to appear in court on the designated date, and left on my own, after calling a taxi.
ParaI was convicted, of course, and as I recall, I was fined about $100 for this misdemeanor, in Raleigh District Court, which I felt was better from my point of view, than a butt whipping by those Jewish students, as would surely have been the case.
ParaIn 1981, a conspiracy was hatched by about twenty American White racists, including two members of the NSPA (Bob Pritchard and Larry Jacklin), to overthrow the government of the Commonwealth of Dominica, to set up a puppet government there, cooperative with the White Movement, and to establish a big vacation and gambling resort for Western tourists. The money derived from this endeavor would go
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toward financing those White groups worldwide, which were in agreement with the conspirators.
ParaThis conspiracy received international news coverage following the arrests of the perpetrators, which was carried out by undercover FBI agents who had infiltrated the group, and who arrested the men as they raced their boat, Nazi flag a-waving, headed for Dominica off the coast of Louisiana, loaded down with firearms of all sorts.
ParaAmong those arrested, in addition to Bob and Larry, was nationally known Klan leader Don Black of Alabama, also an acquaintance of mine, who wound up serving two years in a federal prison for his efforts. Bob and Larry served about a year each. Several years later, Don Black and I would appear on the TV show, “The Sally Jesse Raphael Show.”
ParaThree days before their arrests, Bob Pritchard was at my house near Angier, telling all about the plan to overthrow the Dominica, and trying to recruit me and others to go with him to Louisiana that same day. I declined his offer.
ParaThe Commonwealth of Dominica is a small island in the Caribbean Sea off the coast of South America, with 290 square miles of banana trees and 74,000 in population, the vast majority of whom are Black. However, as Bob explained it, this small country was communist-leaning, had only a small police force with no military at all, and not only would he and the others be doing America and Democracy a favor, but it would be easy pickings, to boot. But, he didn’t convince me of all that, especially the easy pickings part, so I didn’t go. However, I did remind Bob to remember me and my group when they started passing out that casino money, and he vowed he would.
ParaAt the height of the NSPA, Covington proclaimed a national membership of over 500, and I don’t doubt his word, though I never met more than 40 or 50.
ParaHe mailed around 500 copies of his monthly newsletter to addresses all over the country and to several foreign countries.
ParaThese four years being a Nazi were both depressing and happy for me. I was depressed because the Party attracted so few supporters or even sympathizers for that matter and I suffered
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the blame along with the others who worked so hard to make it successful. But, I was happy in my family life, as evidenced by the birth of three sons in three years, whom I named Glenn III after myself, Jesse after my grandfather on my father’s side, and Gunjer, after a Miller uncle who lived about 200 years ago. These three babies kept Marge and I (and mostly Marge) busy as one armed paper hangers in a wind storm, but they were the joy and glory of my life. Marge quit her job as a supervisor at Amoco Oil Corporation in Raleigh, a job she had held for over ten years, after the birth of our second son, the income from which we could ill afford to lose. But my boys were well worth it to me, and I’d have had a dozen more if I could have gotten the required cooperation from Marge.
ParaWe were not only blessed with three sons, but also a daughter, born in 1982, whom we named Anna after my Miller grandmother and Marge’s mother Ann. All four weighed over eight pounds, and healthy and lively as puppies. Their baby pictures taken right after birth all looked like carbon copies of the same.
ParaI lost my driver’s license in 1976 for DUI and therefore, Marge had to drive me the 40 miles to Fort Bragg each morning and then return in the afternoon to pick me up. Getting up early, making breakfast, getting the babies ready, and then the drive, put a big strain on Marge, but she never complained.
ParaMarge has never ceased to amaze me at how many tasks she can perform and at the same time, and she’s the hardest working woman I ever met, bar none. She’s the type of woman who has to be doing something all the time. I used to get tired just watching her. And, she can work and chat at the same time. But, she’s a dangerous driver. I’ve seen her driving 65 mph on a country road, smoking a cigarette (Her only bad habit), nursing a cup of coffee, feeding a baby on her lap, and laughing and chatting up a storm, all while I sat terrified, both hands glued to the dash, my butt biting the seat.
ParaMarge took an instant dislike to Harold Covington, mainly because I was in his Nazi organization, and she despised it, begging me on many occasions (to no avail) to get out of it. I invited Harold down for supper several times, and while she did
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her cooking duties, she didn’t try to hide the fact of her dislike. And, she would usually just leave the room after supper until he was gone.
ParaAfter the shootout with the Communist Worker’s Party, the arrest of several Nazi Party members and the accompanying daily barrage of media condemnation against both the Klan and the Nazis, everybody, including myself, expected Harold Covington to close up shop and leave town. But, I’ve got to give him credit, he not only didn’t quit, he spent $5,000 of his own money to get one of the defendants out of jail on bond, and he launched a nationwide fund drive to help others get out, and to support their families.
ParaHarold had inherited $90,000 upon the death of his grandfather (according to Harold), and he announced he was spending it on the Party.
ParaNot only did he help the defendants financially, he rented a large two-story brick building in West Raleigh at a rental cost alone of $900 per month, for use as the Party headquarters, and as living quarters for several members.
ParaWhatever is said about Harold Covington, one cannot say he was not a devoted and hard worker for the cause he believed in.
ParaWhat he refused to believe, and this goes for me, too, at the time, was that no matter how much the average White American might agree with us, they just plain would not associate themselves with the swastika or with the word Nazi. It was this undeniable fact which caused me to quit the NSPA in December of 1980, and begin my own group, The Carolina Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. Coincidently, and not because I had resigned, Harold disbanded the NSPA at about the same time and left Raleigh and moved to South Carolina for a few months before traveling to Ireland and settling down on the Isle of Man where he married an Irish girl with two children.
ParaOn June 1,1979, having completed 20 years in the U.S. Army, I retired with half pay, and immediately enrolled as a student at Johnston Technical College in Smithfield, under the G.I. Bill. Studying Agriculture for the next three and a half years, I
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was paid $450 per month by the government for attending classes two nights per week. This, added to my Army retirement pay, enabled me to devote my full time working for the White Movement, and support my family financially, at the same time.
ParaI moved my family from Fuquay-Varina to Johnston County (near Angier) in 1979, having purchased a 25-acre farm and having built a new home there.
ParaOne year later in early 1980, due to my involvement in the Nazi Party, the Greensboro shootout, and after dozens of telephoned death threats against myself and the family, Marge left me, taking the children, and returned to her family in Chicago, Illinois.
ParaShe would remain there for the next two years, obtaining a final divorce in 1981.
ParaI was living alone when I decided to quit the Nazi party and launch my own organization, The Carolina Knights of the Ku Klux Klan.
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