To my friend, It has been brought to my attention that you have some questions about my race and my ethnic background. I am going to start this letter to you with the beginning of the story. My people had a very rocky start. In the mid 1500’s European mariners started to bring African Americans to America as slaves. They were forced to migrate. African Americans were captured and brought to be sold. Two out of five of the African Americans died on the move from the Atlantic seacoast to where they were sold to Europeans as slaves. When they were on board the vessels they were chained below decks in racks the size of coffins. They were sold to people who wanted them primarily for plantation workers. Slave owners had no rules as to what they were allowed to do to them. They could use very harsh punishments if they saw fit. A lot of times families were broke apart family members would be sold to different families. Even through this really hard time for these poor people slaves still managed to develop a strong cultural identity. When children were separated from their parents adult slaves at the plantations would take care of all of the children not just their own. Even though they faced separation daily slaves would quite often get married. The north had less slavery then the south. So a lot of times slaves who escaped would go to the north. The civil war brought an end to it being legal to own slaves but there were many other problems that came about after the Civil War. African Americans were able to vote, start their own schools and churches, and they even were able to purchase land. Many of the people in the south were angry about this and this created the Ku Klux Klan also known as the KKK. The KKK was ruthless they would plan raids and lynching’s against African Americans in these raids they would burn down schools, homes, and churches. In 1877 white power