Rest in Power

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George Junius Stinney, Jr.

Died: June 14, 1944 — Just Because They Were Black
On June 12, 1944, the State of South Carolina executed by electrocution a ninety-pound Black boy, fourteen-year-old George Junius Stinney, Jr. (1929–1944), for the murder of two White girls, Mary Emma Thames (age seven) and Betty June Binniker (age eleven). Seven decades later, a judge vacated the... Read more...

Abram Smith

Died: August 7, 1930 — Lynching
On August 7, 1930, a mob of White people, using crowbars and hammers to break into the Grant County jail in Marion, Indiana, dragged 19-year-old Abram Smith (1911–1930) into the street, where they beat, stabbed, tortured, and hanged him, along with 18-year-old Thomas Shipp. A third young man, 16-... Read more...

Thomas Shipp

Died: August 7, 1930 — Lynching
On August 7, 1930, a mob of White people, using crowbars and hammers to break into the Grant County jail in Marion, Indiana, dragged 19-year-old Thomas Shipp (1912–1930) into the street, where they beat, stabbed, tortured, and hanged him, along with 19-year-old Abram Smith. A third young man, 16-... Read more...

Sam Carter

Died: January 2, 1923 — Lynching
On January 2, 1923, a mob of White men, including members of the Ku Klux Klan, searching for a wanted Black man named Jesse Hunter, kidnaped, tortured, shot, and hanged Sam Carter (????–1923) of Rosewood, Florida, a Black man whom the mob suspected had helped Jesse Hunter escape. This incident was... Read more...

Mary Turner, Mary Hattie Graham Turner

Died: May 19, 1918 — Lynching
In 1918, in Lowndes County, Georgia, a white mob lynched and burned Mary Hattie Graham Turner (1899–1918), hanging her by her feet from a bridge, and riddled her body with bullets after cutting her unborn baby from her body and stomping it to death. Mary had married Hazel "Hayes" Turner the... Read more...

Hazel "Hayes" Turner

Died: May 18, 1918 — Lynching
In 1918, a white mob on a manhunt for the murderer of a plantation owner lynched Hazel "Hayes" Turner (1898?–1918) in Brooks County, Georgia, although he was innocent of the crime another man committed. His wife, Mary Turner, whom he had married in Colquitt County, Georgia, and who spoke out about... Read more...

Jesse Washington

Died: May 15, 1916 — Lynching
On May 15, 1916, more than 15,000 people (about half the town's population) gathered near Waco, Texas, to watch the lynching of Jesse Washington (1898?–1916), a farm laborer who was illiterate and mentally disabled. Jesse had been accused and convicted of the bludgeoning death of Lucy Fryer on the... Read more...

Octavius Valentine Catto

Died: October 10, 1871 — Just Because They Were Black
On Election Day, October 10, 1871, a White man and Democratic Party operative named Frank Kelly shot to death educator and activist Octavius Valentine Catto (1839–1871) in an attempt to keep him and other Black citizens of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, from voting following that state's ratification... Read more...

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