Later these secret societies numbered scores, perhaps hundreds, varying from small bodies of local police to great federated bodies which covered almost the entire South and even had membership in the North and West.

Other important organizations were the Constitutional Union Guards, the Pale Faces, the White Brotherhood, the Council of Safety, the '76 Association, the Sons of '76, the Order of the White Rose, and the White Boys.

As the fight against reconstruction became bolder, the orders threw off their disguises and appeared openly as armed whites fighting for the control of society.
The White League of Louisiana, the White Line of Mississippi, the White Man's party of Alabama, and the Rifle Clubs of South Carolina, were later manifestations of the general Ku Klux movement.
The two largest secret orders, however, were the Ku Klux Klan, from which the movement took its name, and the Knights of the White Camelia.
The Ku Klux Klan originated at Pulaski, Tennessee, in the autumn of 1865, as a local organization for social purposes.

The founders were young Confederates, united for fun and mischief.

The name was an accidental corruption of the Greek word Kuklos, a circle.