Lynching
In an orchard in Person County, North Carolina, July 7, 1920, the screams of Edward Chambers' daughter alerted people that she felt threatened by Red Roach. He was able to jump on a Norfolk and Western train at Helena, NC but was arrested by police at the next train stop. He was escorted back to Roxboro, North Carolina and put in jail. A White mob soon formed and stormed the jail dragging Roach to a tree in the courtyard of a church. He was shot to death. A rope was strung over a branch but it was too short so a chain was used to hang Red Roach to death. In the crowd watching was the 13-year-old daughter of tobacco farmer Edward Chambers.
Red Roach was part of a work party fixing county roads. After his death, his working party refused to work out of fear they would be lynched by association. After the lynching, letters sent and published in The Crisis journal claimed that Roach was killed in a case of mistaken identity.
Roxboro is a city and the county seat of Person County in the U.S. state of North Carolina. The population was 8,134 at the 2020 census. The city is 30 miles (48 km) north of Durham and is a part of the four-county Durham–Chapel Hill Metropolitan Statistical Area, which has a population of 649,903 as of the 2020 Census. The Durham–Chapel Hill MSA is a part of the larger Raleigh–Durham–Cary Combined Statistical Area, which has a population of 2,043,867 as of the 2020 Census.
Red Summer was a period in mid-1919 during which white supremacist terrorism and racial riots occurred in more than three dozen cities across the United States, and in one rural county in Arkansas. The term "Red Summer" was coined by civil rights activist and author James Weldon Johnson, who had been employed as a field secretary by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) since 1916. In 1919, he organized peaceful protests against the racial violence.
The Knoxville riot of 1919 was a race riot that took place in the American city of Knoxville, Tennessee, on August 30–31, 1919. The riot began when a lynch mob stormed the county jail in search of Maurice Mays, a biracial man who had been accused of murdering a white woman. Unable to find Mays, the rioters looted the jail and fought a pitched gun battle with the residents of a predominantly black neighborhood. The Tennessee National Guard, which at one point fired two machine guns indiscriminately into this neighborhood, eventually dispersed the rioters. Headlines in the immediate aftermath stated five people were killed, while the Washington Times reported "Scores dead." Other newspapers placed the death toll at just two, though eyewitness accounts suggest it was much higher.
Jim McMillan was lynched in Bibb County, Alabama on June 18, 1919.
The Washington race riot of 1919 was civil unrest in Washington, D.C. from July 19, 1919, to July 24, 1919. Starting July 19, white men, many in the armed forces, responded to the rumored arrest of a black man for the rape of a white woman with four days of mob violence against black individuals and businesses. They rioted, randomly beat black people on the street, and pulled others off streetcars for attacks. When police refused to intervene, the black population fought back. The city closed saloons and theaters to discourage assemblies. Meanwhile, the four white-owned local papers, including the Washington Post, fanned the violence with incendiary headlines and calling in at least one instance for mobilization of a "clean-up" operation.
Berry Washington was a 72-year-old black man who was lynched in Milan, Georgia, in 1919. He was in jail after killing a white man who was attacking two young girls. He was taken from jail and lynched by a mob.
The Morgan County, West Virginia race riot of 1919 was caused by big business using African-American strikebreakers against striking white workers in Morgan County, West Virginia.
The 1919 Coatesville call to arms was when the black community of Coatesville, Pennsylvania formed a large armed group to prevent a rumoured lynching. Only later when the armed group had surrounded the jail to prevent the lynching did they learn that there was no suspect and no white lynch mob.
The Newberry 1919 lynching attempt was the attempted lynching of Elisha Harper, Newberry, South Carolina on July 24, 1919. Harper was sent to jail for insulting a 14-year-old girl.
The Darby 1919 lynching attempt was the attempted lynching of Samuel Gorman in Darby, Pennsylvania on July 23, 1919. Samuel Gorman, a 17-year-old black boy was sent to jail for the alleged murder of William E. Taylor.
The Wilmington, Delaware race riot of 1919 was a violent racial riot between white and black residents of Wilmington, Delaware on November 13, 1919.
The Laurens County, Georgia race riot was an attack on the black community by white mobs in August 1919. In the Haynes' report, as summarized in the New York Times, it is called the Ocmulgee, Georgia race riot.
Miles Phifer and Robert Crosky were lynched in Montgomery, Alabama for allegedly assaulting a white woman.
After young African-American men volunteered to fight against the Central Powers, during World War I, many of them returned home but instead of being rewarded for their military service, they were subjected to discrimination, racism and lynchings by the citizens and the government. Labor shortages in essential industries caused a massive migration of southern African-Americans to northern cities leading to a wide-spread emergency of segregation in the north and the regeneration of the Ku Klux Klan. For many African-American veterans, as well as the majority of the African-Americans in the United States, the times which followed the war were fraught with challenges similar to those they faced overseas. Discrimination and segregation were at the forefront of everyday life, but most prevalent in schools, public revenues, and housing. Although members of different races who had fought in World War I believed that military service was a price which was worth paying in exchange for equal citizenship, this was not the case for African-Americans. The decades which followed World War I included blatant acts of racism and nationally recognized events which conveyed American society's portrayal of African-Americans as 2nd class citizens. Although the United States had just won The Great War in 1918, the national fight for equal rights was just beginning.
Paul Jones was lynched on November 2, 1919, after being accused of attacking a fifty-year-old white woman in Macon, Georgia.
On Sunday, November 16, 1919, four African-Americans were lynched in Moberly, Missouri. Three were able to escape but one was shot to death.
Chilton Jennings was lynched on July 24, 1919, after being accused of attacking a white woman, Mrs. Virgie Haggard in Gilmer, Texas.
African Americans Irving "Ervie" Arthur (1903–1920) and his brother Herman Arthur (1892–1920), a World War I veteran, were lynched—burned alive—at the Lamar County Fairgrounds in Paris, Texas, on July 6, 1920. The event extended and amplified regional and national flashpoints for justice. It happened just a year after the racial violence of 1919's Red Summer. The family was attacked by some of the town's white population and were forced to flee to the north, mostly settling in Chicago. This and other attacks on Black Americans encouraged civil rights groups to fight against lynchings in America. Media outlets reported on the 100-year-old anniversary but the memorial events were scaled down due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Oscar Mack was an African-American World War I vet. An attempt was made to lynch Oscar Mack in Kissimmee, Osceola County, Florida. According to the United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary it was the 39th of 61 lynchings during 1922 in the United States. The New Britain Herald reported that he was lynched in Lake Jennie Jewell, in Orange County.
