# What was the first mass shooting? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 18, 2016, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662 "2016-06-18T03:37:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2016, 6:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/21 "2016-06-19T06:21:46Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > I would say the whole of Napoleon’s career was testament to how ineffective sidearms in that era. His military philosophy was based on the ability of massed infantry to over run ranks of musketeers in a frontal attack. I’d say his philosophy was more “fuck infantry, mobile cannon is where it’s at”. Which is par for the course, since he got his military training at an artillery school 😛 ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2016, 6:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/22 "2016-06-19T06:41:20Z")
> [@Kobal2](#): > > I’d say his philosophy was more “fuck infantry, mobile cannon is where it’s at”. Which is par for the course, since he got his military training at an artillery school 😛 He had more respect for cannon than for muskets (rightly so, given the technology of the time). But he won battles by ensuring than at one point in the line he had massed more troops than his opponents (even though he was often out numbered on the battlefield as a whole), his well drilled troops could then overwhelm the muskets facing them and outflank the enemies on either side. ---
**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2016, 7:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/23 "2016-06-19T07:28:45Z")
An article at Counterpunch discussed this [Purging History: Was Orlando Really the Worst Massacre in US History?](http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/06/17/purging-history-was-orlando-really-the-worst-massacre-in-us-history/) while not restricting themselves to weapons capable of mass shootings on their own, they mentioned massacres at: Bad Axe, 1832 the mass murder of at least 300 Sauk (also known as Sac) men, women and children, and 20 whites. The Gunther Island Massacre, 1860 a small group of white men murdered between 60 to 200 Wiyot men, women and children. Fort Pillow, 1864, Confederate troops under General Nathan Forrest massacred 227 black and white Union troops. New Orleans, 1866, the white Mayor of New Orleans organized and led a mob who opened fire on a meeting in session. The killing rampage spilled out into the streets, and by its conclusion 238 people were killed and 45 wounded, including 200 black Union war veterans. Colfax, 1873, Louisiana, 280 blacks were victims of a group of armed white men that included members of the White League and the Ku Klux Klan. Ludlow Massacre, 1913, over 66 people were killed, including eleven children and two women who were burned alive. Mostly foreign born Serb, Greek and Italian coal miners. East St Louis, May and July, 1917, between 40 and 200 people were killed and 6000 blacks homes and businesses were burned to the ground. The National Guard was called in after whites rode through town shooting indiscriminately at blacks in their homes, where many were burned alive or shot at as they tried to escape burning buildings. Tulsa, 1921, the African American Greenwood business district of Tulsa, Oklahoma, was the site of shooting deaths of at least 40 people, most of whom were black, although the actual–but undocumented–death toll is said to be closer to 300. Whites took possession of most of the land, and the site has become part of Oklahoma State University’s Tulsa campus. > [@](#): > > The media does a disservice to all Americans when it in effect purges our history of the long litany of mass murders we would do well to remember and try to understand. I guess I mistakenly assumed that all American students had at least learned the haunting story of Wounded Knee, when in 1890, between 150 to 300 Lakota Sioux practitioners of the Ghost Dance were shot dead by a detachment of the U.S. 7th Cavalry Regiment. Can it be that ignorance of American history is not only a problem effecting American high school students, but also handicaps even those who graduate from elite graduate journalism programs? ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2016, 7:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/24 "2016-06-19T07:39:56Z")
> [@don\_t\_ask](#): > > An article at Counterpunch discussed this [Purging History: Was Orlando Really the Worst Massacre in US History?](http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/06/17/purging-history-was-orlando-really-the-worst-massacre-in-us-history/) while not restricting themselves to weapons capable of mass shootings on their own, they mentioned massacres at: No one who knew anything about history would claim any recent shooting was the worst massacre in US history (let alone world history, as the OP was asking). ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2016, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662/25 "2016-06-19T12:51:39Z")
But I thought the topic was “massacres committed by a single person in a short time-frame”, not “massacres”. I skimmed that list, and most seem to have been committed by groups or gangs or even armies. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-mass-shooting/757662.md?page=1)