Mr. John Diggs-Dorsey (b. 1856-1860; d. 1880)

Marker Text: Mr. John Diggs-Dorsey, a Black man in his early twenties, liced and worked in Darnestown as a servant to James and Linnie Tschiffely. On July 25, 1880, Linnie Tschifely accused Diggs-Dorsey of rape and physical assault, a charge he denied. After a two-day manhunt, Diggs-Dorsey was brought to the county jail in Rockville, the present day location of the County Council Building. On July 27, a lynch mob kidnapped him, marched him in leg-irons for one mile and hanged him on Route 28. Four months later, the local jury and grand jury both returned verdicts of death by “violence committed by parties unknown.” (Side 1)

The news of Diggs-Dorsey’s murder was printed in dozens of papers nationwide, carrying headlines like “Lynch Law in Maryland.” He was described with deorgatory terms to suggest he deserved his fate. Judge Richard Johs Bowie, who oversaw the grand jury inquest of the lynching, condemned the act even though he had been an enslaver favored the relocation of formerly enslaved people to Liberia. Bowie told jury members on November 12: “But who shall say that a man whom te law presumed to be innocent was not so, except a jury of the county by fair and full trial.” (Side 2)