Page "Tulsa race riot" Paragraph 39

Numerous accounts described airplanes carrying white assailants firing rifles and dropping firebombs on buildings, homes, and fleeing families.

The planes, six biplane two-seater trainers left over from World War I, were dispatched from the nearby Curtiss-Southwest Field ( now defunct ) outside of Tulsa .< REF NAME =" MADIGAN "> Madigan, Tim.

The Burning: Massacre, Destruction, and the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921, New York: St Martin's Press ( 2001 ) at pp. 4, 131-132, 144, 159, 164, 249.

ISBN 0-312-27283-9 </ ref > White law enforcement officials later claimed the planes were to provide reconnaissance and protect whites against what they described as a " Negro uprising.

"< REF NAME =" MADIGAN "/> But, eyewitness accounts and testimony from the survivors confirmed that on the morning of June 1, the planes dropped incendiary bombs and fired rifles at black residents on the ground .< REF NAME =" MADIGAN "/>