The Silent Parade (or Silent protest) was a march of between 8,000 and 10,000 African Americans on July 28, 1917, in New York City. The purpose of the parade was to protest lynching and anti-black violence. The parade was precipitated by the East St. Louis Riots in May and July 1917, when between 40 and 250 blacks were killed by white mobs. It was the first parade of its kind in New York, and the second instance of blacks publicly demonstrating for civil rights.