The Lynching of George Green

Marker Text: On November 16, 1933, a white mob lynched an African American man named George Green in his home near this site off North Adams Street in Taylors for challenging a wrongful eviction. A farm laborer in his sixties, Mr. Green lived with his wife, Mary Green, in a sharecropper’s dwelling owned by his white employer, C.F. James. After a dispute arose about Mr. Green’s wages, James ordered Mr. Green to immediately vacate the property. However, Mr. Green checked with the local magistrate and learned he was entitled to stay on the property through the end of the year. Mr. Green’s resistance to the unlawful eviction angered James, who enlisted local Ku Klux Klansmen to terrorize the Green family. On the night of November 16, about a dozen armed Klansmen broke into Mr. Green’s home. Mr. Green tried to defend himself and his wife against the attack, but the white men shot Mr. Green in the chest, killing him in his home. After the lynching of her husband, Mrs. Green sued Greenville County for damages and was awarded $2,000. However, on appeal, the South Carolina Supreme Court ordered a new trial. The new jury reversed the ruling, providing no compensation to Mr. Green’s widow. Over the next year, despite multiple arrests and indictments that included C.F. James, there is no evidence that anyone was ever convicted or sentenced for the lynching of George Green.