Raleigh Jackson “Red” Glover, an employee at the Armstrong Tire Plant in Natchez, was the head of the Silver Dollar Group, a Klan offshoot dedicated to the violent opposition to civil rights and integration during the 1960s and early 1970s.
Glover handpicked every member of the group, which he formed as a “Klan within a Klan.” Entry was gained when he presented a prospect with a silver dollar often minted in the year of the Klansman’s birth. The coin was a sign of unity among members.
SDG Klansmen could commit an act of violence without Glover’s permission. A handful had already been involved in murders before Glover took them into his group.
The SDG was formed during a meeting at the Shamrock Motel in Vidalia in the spring of 1964.
Glover served in the U.S. Navy both during World War II and in Korea. He was a member of the Seabees (U.S. Navy Construction Force), and it was during this service that he learned to handle explosives.
By the 1960s, Glover had a violent reputation. A heavy drinker during periods of his life, Glover was a well-known bully, often walking into bars and picking fights.
FBI Agent John Pfeiffer described Glover as a master manipulator and possible psychopath who would sometimes laugh with glee when torturing his captives.
Glover’s SDG has been linked to eight murders:
1964: Clifton Walker, Henry Hezekiah Dee and Charles Moore, Joseph Edwards and Frank Morris.
1965: Earl Hodges.
1966: Ben Chester White
1967: Wharlest Jackson.
During the 1960s, informants told the FBI that Glover was constantly promoting violence. He was described as moody and aggressive, and routinely tested his members.
He was also involved in multiple burglaries, stealing shotguns from the homes of African-Americans, liquor from a Ferriday bar and even a pasture mower sitting in a farmer’s field in Mississippi. Yet he escaped prosecution for his crimes and told Klansmen that Concordia Parish Sheriff Noah Cross was the Klan’s main protector.
When SDG members learned that Glover had stolen a chainsaw from an SDG member and had made a profit from the sale of automatic weapons to members of his group, Glover was almost ousted. The FBI used informants to inflame members over Glover’s thievery but in the end Glover slowly regained control.
SDG members, when confronted by FBI agents, would ultimately admit that they were Klansmen. But Glover never owned up to being in the KKK. As FBI agents trailed him in the wake of the Wharlest Jackson murder, Glover feared he was about to be caught, although he told his members that the FBI was going to frame him.
He was never arrested for any Klan-related violence and died in 1984 at the age of 62.
