A trip to Montgomery, Alabama, to visit The Legacy Museum chronicling the African-American experience, the Rosa Parks Museum at Troy University, and the profoundly moving National Memorial for Peace and Justice prompts Martha to delve into the etymology of the word lynch. This term for killing by a mob to punish individuals and terrorize communities is likely an eponym deriving from the name of Captain William Lynch, who led vigilante groups during the American Revolution. In later years, between 1877 and 1950, more than 4400 African-Americans were lynched in the United States. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of ““Lynch” Likely Comes from Captain William Lynch and Vigilante “Lynch Law””
You’re listening to A Way with Words, the show about language and how we use it.
I’m Grant Barrett.
And I’m Martha Barnette.
This summer, I went on one of the best trips I’ve ever taken. A friend and I visited the National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Alabama. And there we learned that between the years of 1877 and 1950 in this country, more than 4,400 African-American men, women, and children were lynched by white mobs. And this new memorial there is a way of preserving their stories.
And I have to tell you, Grant, it was one of the most profoundly moving, incredibly eloquent works of public art I’ve seen anywhere. It’s sort of abstract, but it engages the visitor in a way that’s so brilliant and so powerful that I hesitate to describe it in detail because everybody who goes there is going to have their own experience. All I can say is that if you have the opportunity to get to Montgomery, start with the affiliated legacy museum that chronicles the whole African-American experience and then visit the memorial and afterwards stop by the Rosa Parks Museum, which is there at Troy University.
And of course, while I was there, I found myself wondering about the origin of the word lynch. And it turns out that the word lynch is an eponym. It derives from somebody’s name. The most likely story is that it comes from the name of a Captain William Lynch of Pittsylvania, Virginia. And in 1780, he had his own law and order group of vigilantes who administered their own justice outside the courts during the American Revolution. And usually what that meant is that they would seize somebody and punish them either by flogging them or tarring and feathering them, not killing them.
And soon after that, we see the term Lynch Law in reference to people taking justice into their own hands. And it took a few years before lynching came to apply specifically to a mob actually executing somebody. And usually, as you know, that was by hanging. And it was from the 1890s on that lynching was usually used to specify the murder of black people by white mobs. And again, we’re talking more than 4,400 of them in the space of less than 75 years. So lynching is an eponym, and it’s a term that’s evolved over time. But in any case, I urge everybody to get to Montgomery if you have the chance, because it’s an extraordinary experience.
Well, thank you for that and the etymology of the word. I knew a little bit of that, but the details are horrifying. Language is lovely, but also unlovely in places. Yeah, the English language is a record of beauty and cruelty.
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