Moore's Ford lynchings

In the aftermath of World War II, there was considerable social unrest in the US, especially in the South. African-American veterans resented being treated as second-class citizens after returning home and began to press for civil rights, including the ability to vote. But many white supremacists resented them and wanted to reestablish dominance. The number of lynchings of black people rose after the war, with twelve lynched in the Deep South in 1945 alone. The states' exclusion of most black people from the political system across the South since the turn of the century had been maintained through a variety of devices, despite several challenges that reached the US Supreme Court. In April 1946, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that white primaries were unconstitutional, making way for at least some African Americans to vote in Democratic Party primaries that year. In Georgia, some black people prepared to vote in the July primary, against the resistance of most whites. This change is believed to have contributed to the lynchings, as related to the continued white effort to intimidate blacks and suppress their voting. In 1946, the three-time former governor of Georgia, Eugene Talmadge, was involved in a difficult battle to win the Democratic primary for nomination as governor in the general election that year. At the time, whites in the South voted overwhelmingly for Democratic candidates and winning the Democratic primary was tantamount to winning a general election for an office. While campaigning in Walton County, Talmadge held a rally attended by about 600 in Monroe. She was reported by a newspaper to allegedly be pregnant. She was also known as Doris and Millie Kate. On July 11, Roger Malcom allegedly stabbed Barnette Hester, a white man who was his boss and landlord; Malcom was arrested and held in the county jail in Monroe, the Walton county seat. In 2007, the Associated Press reported revelations about former governor Eugene Talmadge, based on 3,725 pages of FBI material related to its 1946 investigation of the Moore's Ford lynching. Talmadge returned to Monroe on July 12, a day after the stabbing of Barnette Hester. This was five days before the Democratic gubernatorial primary on July 17, and he was seeking rural votes. (According to the county unit system, he could win the primary if he won enough counties, even if his popular vote was not the highest.) The FBI's investigation later that year reported a witness saying that Talmadge was seen talking to George Hester, the brother of Barnette Hester, in front of the Walton County courthouse in Monroe. Talmadge reportedly "offered immunity to anyone 'taking care of negro'." He hoped the Hester family would use their influence to help him win Walton County in the imminent Democratic primary for governor. Talmadge needed to win enough rural counties in Georgia in order to offset the popularity of his opponent Carmichael in urban areas with higher numbers of residents. ==Mass lynching==

On July 25, Harrison drove Malcom's wife Dorothy and the Dorseys Harrison drove with the two couples back to his farm. At 5:30 p.m. that day, he was forced to stop his car near the Moore's Ford Bridge between Monroe and Watkinsville, where the road was blocked by a gang of 15 to 20 armed white men. According to Harrison: Harrison watched. One of the black women identified one of the assailants. At that point, the man in the expensive suit ordered: "Get those damned women too". The mob took both the women to a big oak tree and tied them beside their husbands. The mob fired three point-blank volleys. The coroner's estimate counted 60 shots were fired at close range. The two couples were shot and killed on a dirt road near Moore's Ford Bridge, which spanned the Apalachee River, east of Atlanta. Reaction The mass lynching received national coverage and generated widespread outrage. Large protests and marches against the lynchings took place in New York City and Washington, DC. President Harry S. Truman directed the Justice Department to investigate the crimes under federal civil rights law, the first time the FBI would do so. He also created the President's Committee on Civil Rights in December 1946. The Truman administration introduced anti-lynching legislation in Congress, but was unable to get it passed against the opposition of the white southern Democratic bloc in the Senate. Together with outrage about the Columbia, Tennessee 1946 race riot, the Moore's Ford lynchings generated increased awareness and support from more of the white public for the growing Civil Rights Movement. Demonstrators marched outside of the White House demanding the end of lynchings. On July 28, 1946, a funeral for the Dorseys and Dorothy Malcom was held at the Mount Perry Baptist Church. As George Dorsey was a World War II veteran, and his coffin was draped in an American flag. The funeral was well attended by the national news media, although many black people stayed away out of fear. One black man at the funeral told a journalist from The Chicago Defender: "They're exterminating us. They're killing Negro veterans and we don't have nothing to fight back with except our bare hands". In his article "The Murders in Monroe", in The New Republic (September 1946), lawyer H. William Fitelson raised a number of questions about the Moore's Ford case: why did Sheriff L.S. Gordon of Walton County set the bail for Roger Malcom at only $600 (a relatively low sum) and why did Harrison bail out Malcom although he knew Malcom likely be convicted soon and go to prison? Fitelson said that sharecroppers were easy to replace, and he thought it odd that Harrison spent $600 just to get a man who was likely to be temporary labor, when he could have hired another sharecropper to replace Malcom for much less money. Fitelson noted that Harrison could have driven the Malcoms and the Dorseys to his farm via the paved highway, which was faster and more convenient, but instead drove down an unpaved dirt side road that was much slower and less used by travelers. He suggested this choice likely ensured no outside witnesses to the mass lynching. Fitelson wondered about how the lynch mob knew the precise time of day and the road Harrison would use to return to his farm. He thought it strange that Sheriff Gordon personally released Malcom from the Walton County jail late in the afternoon, but he had not visited the crime scene nor attended the coroner's inquest. Fitelson noted that Mae Dorsey was said to have called out the names of several members of the lynch mob before her death, while Harrison, who had lived his entire life in Walton County, claimed not to know any. Finally, Fitelson noted that Harrison was not harmed by the lynch mob. Even if he truthfully could not identify them that day, the mob let Harrison live, knowing he could recognize one or more of them in the future. Fitelson noted that if charged, members of the lynch mob would have faced four counts of first-degree murder. He wrote that it was most peculiar that the lynch mob allowed a witness to live who had seen them kill four people. ==Investigation==

Georgia Governor Ellis Arnall offered a reward of $10,000 for information, to no avail. For the first time, President Truman ordered the FBI to investigate the murders under federal civil rights law. They interviewed nearly 3,000 people in their six-month investigation, and issued 100 subpoenas. The investigation received little cooperation: no one confessed, and suspected perpetrators were offered alibis for their whereabouts. The FBI found little physical evidence, and the prosecutor did not have sufficient grounds to indict anyone. Harrison made contradictory statements as he changed his story, at one point saying he had been "directed" by someone whose name he claimed not to remember to use a less traveled road on the way home; the police suspected that he may have been involved in plans for the lynching. Talmadge died on December 21, 1946, of liver cirrhosis caused by his alcoholism. His body lay in state at the Georgia capitol, where the coffin was surrounded by wreaths of flowers left by well wishers; one card read KKKK (Knights of the Ku Klux Klan). In 1943, columnist Ralph McGill of the Atlanta Constitution reported that Talmadge was a member of the Klan and had been speaking at Klan events. When questioned by the media about it, Talmadge proudly admitted this and said he was sorry that the media had missed all the "fun" Klan rallies at which he had spoken. ==Grand jury investigation==

On December 2, 1946, U.S. District Judge T. Hoyt Davis selected and charged a 23-man grand jury, which included two African Americans, to hear testimony in the case. At the time Governor Ellis Arnall claimed "that 15 to 20 of the mob members are known by name." The case was presented to the jury by United States District Attorney John P. Cowart and John Kelly from the Criminal Division of the Department of Justice. The judge "pointed out that federal courts have no jurisdiction over the offense of murder except under well defined conditions." Barnette Hester, the man allegedly stabbed by Roger Malcom, testified. He was followed by Harrison, the farmer who had employed the two couples, who testified for six hours. The following Monday was the fifth day of testimony. On that day, Harrison's sons Loy Jr. and Talmadge testified. Additionally, B. H. Hester, the father of Barnette and George Hester, testified. Perry Dillard, Eugene Evans, Emmerson Farmer, and Ridden Farmer, who lived near the location of the four shooting murders, testified that day as well. The last to be questioned that day was FBI Agent George Dillard. On December 10, the sixth day of hearings, ten witnesses were heard. They were: Joe Parrish, Harrison's brother-in-law; George Robert Hester and James Weldon Hester, brothers of Barnette Hester; Grady Malcom, Weyman Fletcher Malcom, Cleonius Malcom, Levy Adcock, Willie Lou Head, and FBI Agent Dick Hunter. On the seventh day of testimony, six people were questioned. Among them were African Americans Mrs. Elizabeth Toler, Eugene White, Boysie Daniel, and Paul Brown. Monday's testimony was highlighted by the appearance before the grand jury of Mrs. Jesse Warwick. The wife of a Monroe minister, she testified to seeing men in at least two carloads gather on a roadside in the vicinity of Monroe at some point between the stabbing of Hester and the incident at Moore's Ford. That event was believed to have been a rehearsal for the lynching. The government intended to show planning, possibly with the knowledge of Walton county law officers and Harrison. Other witnesses that day were Monroe chief of Police Ben Dickerson; Gene Sloan, a youth from the Georgia Boys' Training School at Milledgeville; and Mrs. Moena Williams, mother of Dorothy Malcom, who said that Dorothy was killed on her twentieth birthday. George Alvin Adcock, a resident of Monroe, was indicted by the federal grand jury for perjury. He was accused of two counts of false testimony regarding his statements on December 11, 1946. The first count alleged he denied leaving his house the day of the crime. He supposedly visited the town of Monroe that day. The second count states that he denied visiting the scene of the crime on July 26. Sixteen witnesses were questioned that day, including Mrs. Powell Adcock. After hearing nearly three weeks of testimony, the grand jury was "unable to establish the identity of any persons guilty of violating the civil rights statute of the United States." ==Beating of Lamar Howard==

At about four o'clock on January 1, 1947, brothers James and Tom Verner walked into the municipal ice house, briefly speaking with plant manager Will Perry. When the pair walked to where Lamar Howard was sitting, Tom Verner slapped the cap of the young African American to the floor. James asked him, "What did you tell 'em down at Athens?" To which he replied that he knew nothing to tell them. They started to attack him. Howard's employer, Will Perry, allegedly suggested that the two "take him out in the back." The Verner brothers continued beating Howard while questioning him. The beating concluded after 10 or 15 minutes with no resistance from Howard, as he feared he would be killed. When the Verners stopped, Howard got to his car and drove home. U.S. Attorney John P. Cowart arrested the Verner brothers and charged them with "unlawfully injuring Golden Lamar Howard because of his having testified before a federal grand jury" and "conspiring to injure" him. The Verners' $10,000 bonds were signed by H.L. Peters of Walton County, who put up of land as security. Howard had testified to a grand jury in the Moore's Ford lynchings, but the proceedings were supposed to be secret. James Verner acknowledged he had beaten Howard until his fists were bloody. His brother Tom testified, as did other witnesses, who said that James Verner committed the crime for which he was charged. Despite the testimony, the jury deliberated for nearly two hours and rendered a verdict of not guilty. ==Memorial committee and reopened investigations==

In 1992, Clinton Adams told the FBI that he had been a witness to the murders at Moore's Ford Bridge. Only ten years old when he saw the lynchings, Adams had avoided talking about them, and had moved away; for 45 years, he feared for his life. After extensive research, reporter Laura Wexler wrote a book about the case, Fire in a Canebrake: The Last Mass Lynching in America (2003). She said that Adams had "holes in his story." Also in 1999, the Memorial Committee arranged for a military memorial service to honor veteran George Dorsey on the anniversary of the lynching. In 2001 Gov. Roy Barnes officially reopened investigation into the case with the Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI). By 2006, the FBI had reentered the case. It was among a dozen cold cases related to the civil rights era which the Department of Justice was investigating. In June 2008, as part of this, the GBI and FBI searched an area at a farm home in Walton County near Gratis and collected material which they believed to be related to the lynching. While the FBI questioned an 86-year-old man about the lynchings in 2015, it closed its investigation, unable to prosecute any suspect. In 2007, the Associated Press reported on findings from more than 3,700 pages of the previously closed FBI files, having gained access through an Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. There was evidence suggesting that the lynching of Malcom was ordered or at least encouraged by former three-term governor Eugene Talmadge, overheard a day after the stabbing as having offered immunity for people taking care of the African American. He was in a highly competitive race for the 1946 Democratic primary for the governor's office; it was held five days later and the county voted in his favor. He won the office in the general election as well, but died before inauguration. ==Grand jury testimony remains sealed==

Researcher and author Anthony Pitch located the sealed grand jury testimony in the National Archives. He sued to have the records unsealed. Despite government opposition, a federal court ruled in his favor, and on February 11, 2019, the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, in a 2–1 decision, affirmed the lower court's ruling that the transcripts of the grand jury proceedings should be released. The Trump administration's Department of Justice under Attorney General William Barr asked for a rehearing in the court of appeal, maintaining that to open the testimony would undermine the confidentiality of a grand jury investigation. In an editorial on April 26, 2020, the Toledo Blade condemned the 8–4 decision of the appeals court, stating: ==Location==

A newer highway bridge has been built near the site, located at the extreme eastern edge of Walton County, Georgia, between Monroe and Athens, near the Athens–Clarke County region west of the University of Georgia. The Georgia Historical Society erected a state historical marker near the site. The historical marker was one of the first in the US to document a lynching. The sign is at , at the intersection of US 78 and Locklin Road, on the right when traveling east on US 78. ==See also==