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-Ida B. Wells (1862-1931), renowned civil rights and anti-lynching activist.

More than a Victim: Known Narratives of Lynching Victims in the United States

*Trigger Warning*: This post speaks extensively about racially-motivated, extrajudicial murders perpetuated against the Black community in the United States. Discretion is advised.

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This post catalogues the stories of all of the known victims of racial terror lynching in the United States. Specifically, it memorializes the victims of systemic lynching perpetuated against the Black community after the end of enslavement. It will be updated regularly with new victims on the anniversary of their deaths. We will update as frequently as possible, but please keep in mind our limited capacity.

The first victim we are honoring is John Simms, one of five known victims of racial terror lynchings in Anne Arundel County, Maryland. Little is known about him beyond his lynching.

If you want to learn more about the history of racism and racially-motivated violence in the U.S., please visit EJI.org.

If you want to learn about your own advocacy efforts in memorializing victims of lynching, please feel free to reach out to the Maryland Lynching Memorial Project for guidance (no matter where you are in the country, they have some of the leading national experts in honoring and educating on this history).

And feel free to suggest known victims that you want to see honored.

The History and Historical Themes of Racial Terror Lynchings

History

Following the end of enslavement, many practices and systems were put in place to keep the Black community subjugated to the white ruling class. This was especially prevalent in the South.

Racial terror lynchings served numerous purposes in maintaining systemic white supremacy. Lynchings were often treated as a spectacle, with many having an even carnival-like atmosphere as a warning to local African American communities. Lynchings served as a constant warning to African American communities throughout the country that they were never truly safe. At any moment, for any reason, the same fate could befall them simply because of their race.

Organizations like the Equal Justice Initiative focus on a specific time period in U.S. history…

For many activists and advocates, the era of lynching hasn’t ended: like many white supremacist practices, it merely adapted.

Themes

-Lynchings are defined by their extrajudicial nature. It is impossible to know whether or not the victims committed the crimes they were accused of because that fact-finding opportunity (i.e. a fair trial judged by a jury of their peers) was deprived from the victim.

“Times without number, since invested with citizenship, the race has been indicted for ignorance, immorality and general worthlessness declared guilty and executed by its self-constituted judges. The operations of law do not dispose of negroes fast enough, and lynching bees have become the favorite pastime of the South.” –Ida B. Wells

-Many lynchings took place when Black men and boys were accused of sexual impropriety or assault by white women. In some cases, these relationships were consensual affairs that the white women were attempting to cover up.

“…A new cry, as false as it is foul, is raised in an effort to blast race character, a cry which has proclaimed to the world that virtue and innocence are violated by Afro-Americans who must be killed like wild beasts to protect womanhood and childhood.” –Ida B. Wells

-The further South you go, lynchings are more likely to be more drawn out and involve torture.

-Many mainstream news outlets of the time paint a whitewashed picture of racial terror lynchings. They are routinely biased towards the white lynch mob and often use dehumanizing language to describe the Black victims.

-Accountability for victims is exceedingly rare (if it even happened at all). Even in cases where we know the identities of mob members, almost no one has ever been held accountable for their role in a lynching.

A headline on the lynching of Henry Davis in Annapolis, Maryland. It demonstrates a lot of the common themes we see in racial terror lynchings, including an accusation of sexual impropriety and clear media bias.

More Than a Victim: Histories of Each Known Victim

See statistics nationwide through EJI’s Lynching Map.

Maryland

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John Simms

June 14, 1875  •  Annapolis, Anne Arundel County

Of the five known lynchings that took place in Anne Arundel county, John Simms’ murder is the one we know the least about. Simms was lynched in an area of Annapolis known as Perry’s Gate. Like many victims of lynching, Simms was accused of sexual assault against a white woman.

According to the Maryland Lynching Memorial Project, Simms’ narrative is as follows:

The young victim of an alleged assault near Odenton identified John Simms, a farmer from Virginia, as her attacker. He was arrested and jailed in Annapolis. A mob of at least ten men, led by an elderly White man, traveled to Annapolis, broke into the jail, and searched for Simms. Although he resisted, Simms was eventually seized by the mob. Still shackled, Simms was dragged into the “dark woods” near an area known as Perry Gate and hanged from a tree.

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Learn more about John Simms:
Maryland Lynching Memorial Project Archives
Maryland State Archives

A newspaper article on Simms’ lynching.

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A flag flying from NAACP headquarters in New York. It flew for the first time in 1936 in response to the lynching of A. L. McCamy in Dalton, Georgia.

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