George Reed A Victim of A Mob's Blood Lust In Georgia

 

Jan 3, 1901, Even when there was no evidence sufficient to hold someone and the court had released them, there was a good chance a Black person could die from any accusation. Such was the case with George Reed in Rome, Georgia.

Mr. Reed was arrested for assaulting the wife of white court bailiff J. M Locklear leaving her near death. Another man Joe Wilson was also arrested, both men proclaimed their innocence when arrested. After the arrests a mob of 150 came to the jail and demanded Reed, alone, be released to them so they could take him to Mrs. Locklear so she could identify him, the mob promised to return him. The only person at the jail at this time was the Turnkey Officer named Lemasters who was fired upon, so he turned over the keys. The mob took Reed to see Mrs. Locklear, but she would not identify him as one of her attackers, stating, “no he is not the man.” Amazingly the mob then returned Reed to the jail and custody of the sheriff. Reed might have believed he was safe, but the blood lust of the mob had been aroused. When District Judge W.M. Henry released Reed for lack of evidence. Reed went to a girlfriend’s house after his release and at approximately 10 PM another mob of 150 men gathered and kidnapped Reed from the home of his girlfriend, Lila Glover, and took him from town. Lila tried to get help and eventually told the sheriff and a deputy to look for Reed, however, according to reports the mob scared them off. They then hung Reed from a tree and emptied over 50 guns into his hanging body. The body was found the next morning and the coroner took possession. Although the mob twice took Reed while unmasked and Georgia  Gov. Allen Candler offered a $15,000 no one was ever arrested or charged with his murder.

This was the 2nd lynching in two weeks in or near Rome and in Floyd County a third would happen in April. After Reed was lynched Georgia House of Representatives member Seaborn Wright wrote in the Rome News Tribune, “Is any man fool enough to think he can limit the action of the mob? Today perhaps in righteous indignation it allays the ravisher of women, but understand, tomorrow, it murders men for sport.” Wright was neither a Democrat nor Republican but a third-party supporter of prohibition and clean government. Wright called on readers of the Rome News-Tribune to “think of its hellish influence upon the minds of the young. The children parading the streets today with chips of the tree upon which the negro hung in their pockets, with pieces of his horribly mutilated body in their hands.”

Image photographer C.W. Orr, Vanishing Georgis Collection, Georgia Archives

 

Sources:

https://www.northwestgeorgianews.com/rome/news/local/lynching-reports-recount-gruesome-mob-rule-history-of-lynching-in-floyd-county-part-two/article_29e9b444-fd86-11e6-b03a-9376cc47dabb.html

https://www.newspapers.com/image/275471807/?terms=%22George%20Reed%22&match=1

https://www.newspapers.com/image/26949508/?terms=%22Joe%20Wilson%22&match=1