A RED RECORD
Revealing lynching sites in North Carolina and South Carolina

A Red Record documents lynchings in the American South, starting with North Carolina. The title, A Red Record, is drawn from Ida B. Wells-Barnett’s work by the same name and is intended, in a small way, to recognize Wells-Barnett’s remarkable courage and commitment to justice. Our research also corroborates Wells-Barnett’s core argument–that lynching was much more than just a response to crime. It was part of a narrative of white supremacy that wrote out Black success, Black families, and Black personhood.

New Documentary On Wealthy SC Black Cotton Farm Owner Who Was Lynched For Success

By Kalyn Oyer /Post And Courier Nov 17, 2020 Updated Nov 23, 2020

In 1916, just over half a century after slavery was abolished, a wealthy Black farmer who drew the ire of his jealous and bigoted White business peers in Abbeville was murdered by a lynch mob.

The Lynching of Bob Brackett

EJI-Community Remembrance Project - Asheville in Buncombe County, North Carolina

Marker inscription:
On August 11, 1897, Bob Brackett, a Black man, was lynched by a mob of at least 1.000 white people in Reems Creek Township. Mr. Brackett was a traveling laborer working in the Asheville, North Carolina area.

On August 8, 1897, a white woman from Weaverville reported an assault. Race-based suspicion was immediately directed towards Black men in the area. On August 10, despite a lack of evidence and no investigation, a mob of white men seized Mr. Brackett at the home of a local reverend in nearby Barnardsville, and Mr. Brackett was detained in the Buncombe County Jail in Asheville.

In 1900, the sole Black member of Congress, Rep. George Henry White, a North Carolina Republican, introduced the nation’s first anti-lynching bill, but it died shortly after in committee.
On January 20, 1900, White introduced the first bill in Congress to make lynching a federal crime to be prosecuted by federal courts; it died in committee, opposed by southern white Democrats, who were making up the Solid South block.

Image shows Sharin Wilson of New York holds hands with Kimberly McDowell-Lois of New Jersey as a marker to their ancestor George Taylor’s lynching is unveiled in Rolesville, North Carolina.

Photo credit: Josh Shaffer-News & Observer

George Taylor, lynched in 1918, honored with historic marker near spot in Rolesville

Lynchings in Rowan County, North Carolina

Historical Marker Dedicated in Rowan County, North Carolina
09.10.21

Lynching in Rowan County
The narrative marker memorializes six documented victims in Rowan County: James Gillespie, Harrison Gillespie, Jack Dillingham, John Gillespie, Nease Gillespie, and Laura Wood.
‌
In‌ ‌the‌ ‌early‌ ‌morning‌ ‌hours‌ ‌of‌ June‌ ‌11,‌ ‌1902,‌ ‌a‌ ‌mob‌ ‌of‌ ‌approximately‌ 75 masked white‌ ‌men‌ ‌lynched‌ ‌two‌ ‌Black‌ ‌children‌ ‌named‌ ‌Harrison‌ ‌and‌ ‌James‌ ‌Gillespie.‌ ‌

The Lynching of Hezekiah Rankin

Asheville in Buncombe County, North Carolina.
Equal Justice Initiative, Buncombe Community Remembrance Project.

Marker inscription:
On September 24, 1891, a mob of at least 20 unmasked white men lynched a Black man named Hezekiah Rankin. Earlier that evening, a white co-worker at the Western North Carolina Railroad wanted Mr. Rankin to perform duties unrelated to his job.

Ida B. Wells Awarded Posthumous Pulitzer Prize For Lynching Investigations
The pioneering Black journalist is revered for her reporting that exposed lynching as a white tool of political terror against Black people.

The Lynching of John Humphries

EJI-Community Remembrance Project - Asheville in Buncombe County, North Carolina

Marker inscription: On July 15, 1888, a mob of 25 to 40 white men lynched John Humphries, a Black teenager. On July 14, the daughter of a white planter reported being assaulted in the woods. Race-based suspicion was immediately directed towards Black men and boys. Later that evening, without any evidence connecting him to the assault, police nonetheless arrested John Humphries.

hotograph of the lynching of John Richards, January 12, 1916. Goldsboro, North Carolina.
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We posted this image to accompany this org's site. This is an organization that researched the lynchings that happened in NC.

We also will post a book written about the lynching of Black people history in NC in the Gallery for Books-Resources, so please check there also.

NORTH CAROLINA 1916

Joseph Black was hanged at Kingston, N.C. , because his son was accused of attacking a white child.

Learning Their Names.
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From the Red Record website:

"This is a (likely incomplete) list of the names of persons who were killed in lynchings that took place in North Carolina between the end of the Civil War and the beginning of World War II.

This list is a work in progress and will be updated as more information comes to light. Those persons identified as “Unidentified” were of course not unknown–they were fathers and sons, wives, and daughters, they had friends and enemies, communities and stories.

Photo: Hundreds of jars of soil from documented lynching sites are displayed at the Legacy Museum, part of the National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Ala.
Photo Credit" Audra Melton-NYT
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Carolina Panthers Stadium Sits On Top Of Charlotte’s First Documented Lynching Site.

Asheville in Buncombe County, North Carolina EJI Marker
Photograph By Dave W, August 27, 2022

Marker Inscription:

Lynching in America

Between 1865 and 1950, thousands of African Americans were victims of mob violence and racial terror lynching across the United States. Following the Civil War, white Southerners fiercely resisted equal rights for African Americans and sought to uphold an ideology of white supremacy through intimidation and fatal violence.

Lynching in America: Confronting the Legacy of Racial Terror
By EJI

Lynching in America: Confronting the Legacy of Racial Terror documents EJI’s multi-year investigation into lynching in twelve Southern states during the period between Reconstruction and World War II. EJI researchers documented 4075 racial terror lynchings of African Americans in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia between 1877 and 1950 – at least 800 more lynchings of black people in these states than previously reported in the most comprehensive work done on lynching to date.

Biden Signs Bill to Make Lynching a Federal Crime

President Biden’s signature ended more than 100 years of failed efforts by the federal government to specifically outlaw lynching..

By Michael D. Shear / March 29, 2022, 6:12 p.m. ET

WASHINGTON — President Biden on Tuesday signed a bill making lynching a federal crime, for the first time explicitly criminalizing an act that had come to symbolize the grim history of racism in the United States.

Dr. Patton has been gathering research for a new book she's writing about violence against Black children, and lynching being one of the violent ways Black children have been murdered by slavers and white supremacists in America.

This post is one of several that she has written and shared with her followers on her fb page.

We felt it deserved to be placed in our gallery titled, "Lynchings".

Photos credit: Dr. Stacey Patton
Collage credit: The G.C. and Frances Hawley Museum®
I Remember Our History®

No one is sure how many African-Americans were lynched in North Carolina, some researchers said the number could be 100 or as many as 300+.
Researchers said in the 1940s the lynchings began to be more secretive but they did not go away.
Professor Lentz-Smith is a 20th century history scholar. She has focused much of her writing and research on the period around World War I -- a time when lynching was resurgent.

NORTH CAROLINA, 1918
Mob Leaders Go To Prison

Realizing that if a lyncher is permitted to remain unpunished the decency of the community is greatly endangered, Judge B. F. Long of the Superior Court sentenced fifteen white men, indicted for the participation in a riot in Winston-Salem, Nov. 17, to serve from fourteen months to six years in prison. The men were found guilty of attempting to lynch Russell High, a prisoner in the city jail.

White Mob Lynches Black Veteran Powell Green in North Carolina

On the night of December 27, 1919, a 23-year-old African American veteran named Powell Green was lynched by a mob of masked white men near Franklinton, North Carolina.

After a “prominent” white movie theater owner was shot and killed, Powell Green was arrested for allegedly committing the crime. During the era of racial terror, white allegations against black people were rarely subject to scrutiny and often sparked violent reprisal even when there was no evidence tying the accused to any offense.

The Freedom Struggle Committee

"We are a group of high school students who are committed to developing a memorial to serve as a permanent public acknowledgement to the victims of lynching in North Carolina. Since establishing the Freedom Struggle Committee in 2016, we have been working with community leaders and local government officials to make our vision a reality. What began as a class project has turned into a commitment to recognizing the truths about our state's history.

Thirty Years of Lynching in the United States 1889-1918 Illustrated Edition
by NAACP (Author), Paul Finkelman (Introduction)

Book Summary:
COMPREHENSIVE STUDY OF LYNCHING Published by the NAACP in 1919 to promote awareness of lynching in the United States, this seminal study provides information on the lynchings of 3,224 African-Americans between 1889 and 1918.