Quaker History/Free Quakers/Lynch, Charles

Terror in a name

Lynchburg News and Advance/Lynchburg/VA/USA/31-Jul-05

… “‘Lynch’s Law,’ or lynching, as such punishment has been called, did not at first include hanging. According to local tradition, accused loyalists were tied to a large black walnut tree at Lynch’s home, Green Level, and whipped, not hanged. In contrast with the lynchings that began the next century, legally appointed officials meted out ‘Lynchburg’s Law’ mostly with fines and jail terms.”

Charles Lynch, named for his father, was an adventurous young man who discovered a better way to make gunpowder and owned half of Oxford Furnace, where musket balls were produced. Needless to say, neither of these activities fit the pacifist philosophy of the Quaker meeting organized by his mother Sarah, and Charles was expelled. Later, he rose to the rank of colonel in the Colonial militia, and was the leader of a group of men who mixed vigilante law enforcement with the political persecution of British-leaning Tories, serving as both judge and jury. ...