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©CIL 'Adapted from Thomas Dixon's novel, "The Clansman,"

^ Produoed by D. W. Griffith

Story arrangement by D. W. Griffith

and Prank K. Woods# v

Photography by William Bitzer#

Copyright 1915 - David W. Griffith Corporation#

DESCRIPTION OP THE STORY

The first seed of disunion is planted by the African

being brought to America in Hew England ships and sold by the traders
to the South, pious Puritans blessing the traffic# Having profited
by the trade and having no use for slaves themselves, the traders
of the seventeenth century became the abolitionists of the nineteenth#
In 1860 a great parliamentary leader, whom we oall Austin
Stoneraan, is rising to pwwer in the House of nepresentatives# We
find him with his young daughter, Elsie, in her apartments in Washing-
ton# Her brothers are planning a visit to Piedmont, S# C#, where
live the Camerons, old friends - the family consisting Of Bennie, his
two sisters, mother, father and two brothers. True to their
promise the Stoneman boys visit Piedmont, where the elder brother
falls in love with the elder Cameron girl, while Bennie Cameron falle
in love with a picture of Elsie Stoneman, whom he has never met*
They are all interested in the possibility of §ecession
in case the Worth carries the election# Soon the Stoneman boys re-
turn North#

The President signs the proclamation and his first oall

for volunteers comes# In Stoneman's home his mulatto housekeeper
dreams ambitiously of her future and the future power of her master -
Stoneman, over whom she is gaining ascendancy.

The Stoneman bovs leave for the front, as do the Cameron

boys# On the battlefield, the chums - the younger Cameron and
.3toneman sons - meet once again and die in each other's arras#

In piedmont, war has scarrea the village# The Cameron's

sell their last and dearest possessions to aid the-failing cause of
the South#

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 In the north, Elsie Storeman goes as a nurse to the
military hospital at Washington. Later, Atlanta is bombarded and
the lust days before Petersburg are come* The north is finally
victorious and Bennie Cameron lies near death in the military
hospital at Wasnington, and is nursed by Elsie* .Cameron is to be
hanged upon his recovery, as a guerilla, but Elsie and his mother
secure his pardon by Lincoln* Cameron returns home and the South
goes to wofk to rebuild its failed fortunes, under xiincoln's
fostering hand* Then comes Lincoln's assassination and Btoneman
xinas himself In supreme power and starts to make hi3 dreams of negro
equality cone true. His protege, Silas xiynch, a mulatto, he chooses
v*s ti e leuder of the blacks, and sends Him South to organize and
wield tiie _ o./er of the black vote. Lynch m .ken .. iedmont his h cud-
quarters, whore iuuce3 the lo pi.it ’..or.: and where he soon
ox-shes with, the Aryan race, represented by Bennie Cameron and his
friends*

Stouexu-i., ill, co.iiGe to xiedmont with Elsie* Her brother

seeks reunion with the Cumeron girl, but the poor bruised heart of
the -outh cannot forget war's trials, and he is disnissed* Elsie's
love battles with her pride for Bennie Cameron, but she will not
answer him definitely.
The whites -re disfranchised and the Camerons confer with
their fellow victims w.s to what shall be done* Lynch is
elected nieut* Governor and now hie love looks high and he aspires
to the hand of ^Isie Stoneman in marriage*

• In agony of soul over the degradation of his people by the

blacks, now supreme in power, Bctn Cameron goes to the mountain
top to be alone and there sees a couple of white children scare
some pickaninnies by hiding beneath a white sheet* Cameron thus
gets an inspiration for a plan whereby he can use the negro
superstitions as a club to defeat their insolent power* Th$ result
is the forming of the Hu XI ux Alan* «.hen Elsie Stoneman learns of
Cameron*s connection with the Xu Xlux Xian, in loyalty to her father
she breaks off her engagement with Bennie*

Bennie's little sister, against her brother's warning

against venturing out alone on -ccount of the *.egro lawlessness,
ventures out alone to the sr»ri ng and is pursued by Gus, a renegade
negro soldier* To escape with honor intact, she leaps to her death
from a high cliff* The* townsmen, led by Ben Cc-aeron, capture Gus,
kill him after e. trial by the Xian, and throw his body on the steps
of the Lieut* Governor's* mynch fills the streets with negro
militia during Stor.emtn's temporary departure from Biedraonti . »The
Xl-n meets to disarm the negroes, while nynch arrests the elder
Cameron for harboring the Xlansman* Elsie goes to Lynch, in the
absence of her father, to seek Cameron*s release* In the mean-
while Cameron and Elsie's brother, who has aided the Camerons, have
escaped to seek refuge in a hut near the woods outside of town*
 Lynch proposes marriage to Elsie and proposes that she
shall be his queen of the black empire he is to found in the South*
Upon her fefusal, he plans arrangements for a forced marriage, and in
the meanwhile the Klan, being assembled in full strength, ride off
on their missions* They rescue the Cameron party and are told of
Elsie^ danger* In the meantime, Stoneman returns and Lynoh tells
him he is to marry Elsie* Stoneman now realizes the Frankenstein
he has himself created, but is helpless until the Klan arrives,
disarms all the negroes and Rescues Elsie*

At the next election, the negroes dare not vote and the
threat of a black empire is dissoluted.

Bennie Cameron and Elsie and martied, and the Stoneman

boy marries Jennie's sister*

In the end is seen the Prince of peace in struggle with

bestial war, represented by a nude man beast astride a horse,
trampling across a sea of dead bodies, while on either side are
tiiose bereft by cruel war* . The Princ£ o^£eace causes the
banishment of the war figiwe from earoh fl^^all is brotherly love
in the City of Peace*

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 This document is from the Library of Congress
“Motion Picture Copyright Descriptions Collection,
1912-1977”

Collections Summary:
The Motion Picture Copyright Descriptions Collection, Class L and Class M, consists of forms, abstracts,
plot summaries, dialogue and continuity scripts, press kits, publicity and other material, submitted for the
purpose of enabling descriptive cataloging for motion picture photoplays registered with the United States
Copyright Office under Class L and Class M from 1912-1977.

Class L Finding Aid:

https://hdl.loc.gov/loc.mbrsmi/eadmbrsmi.mi020004

Class M Finding Aid:

https://hdl.loc.gov/loc.mbrsmi/eadmbrsmi.mi021002

National Audio-Visual Conservation Center

The Library of Congress