Reconstruction Era Lynchings in Union County / Union County Jail Raid Massacre

Marker Text: Reconstruction Era Lynchings in Union County – After the Civil War, Black Americans were emancipated after more than two centuries of chattel slavery. Formerly enslaved people purchased land, built churches and schools, and eligible Black men registered to vote, served in the militia, and participated on juries. In 1868, Black people elected three formerly enslaved men to represent Union County in the state legislature. White people threatened by Black freedom attacked and lynched Black people for asserting their rights, leaving plantations, participating in politics, working towards economic independence, violating white social customs, being accused of crimes, or for sheer racial terror. White leaders, sympathizers, and bystanders tolerated deadly violence and racial terrorism used to oppress Black people. At least 15 Black people were lynched in Union County from 1865 to 1877. In 1865, a white mob lynched Sax Joiner for allegedly writing a letter to a white woman. In June 1871, Reverend Lewis Thompson, an AME Zion preacher and teacher in Goshen Hill, found a death note posted on the door of his church ordering him to cease preaching. Soon after, he was abducted, tortured, and lynched by a white mob. Lynching inflicted terror not just on the people killed, but also traumatized their families and the entire Black community in an attempt to break their social, spiritual, and cultural bonds, and to maintain white supremacy.

Union County Jail Raid Massacre – The devastating Union County Jail Raid massacre was one example of how racial violence was designed to terrorize the Black community during Reconstruction. In early 1871, white mobs abducted 12 Black men from the county jail on January 4 and February 12. These men, Captain J. Alexander Walker, Charner Gorden, Andrew Thompson, Sylvanus Wright, Barret Edwards, Thomas Byers, Aaron Thompson, Joseph Vanlue, Ellison Scott, William Fincher, Mac Bobo and possibly Amos McKissik were either hanged or shot at the ‘hanging grounds’ before any determination was made of their guilt. These Black men were SC state militia members who were accused of killing a white man named Mat Stevens while he was illegally transporting bootlegged whiskey. Months later, the US Congress held hearings in former Confederate states to investigate incidents of racial violence, including the Union Jail Raid Massacre. By the time of the hearings, some Black people had already fled the area, but despite intimidation, many family and community members like Eliza Chalk and Samuel Nuckles bravely testified. No one was held accountable for this massacre and other acts of violence. Union County’s Black community resisted violence by migrating to safety or staying and building community institutions. Their resilience was a powerful opposition to continued white supremacy throughout Reconstruction, Jim Crow and beyond.