MOCO's Remembrance Weekend To Recognize Lynching Victims

ROCKVILLE, MD — Montgomery County will remember and recognize John Diggs-Dorsey and Sidney Randolph, two victims of lynching in Rockville, at its Remembrance Weekend planned for this Saturday and Sunday. Three historians will talk about the lives of Diggs-Dorsey, who was murdered in 1880, and Randolph, who was murdered in 1896.

Diggs-Dorsey and Randolph are two of three men who are known to have been lynched in Montgomery County. The third man, George Peck, was honored in 2019 when the Montgomery County Lynching Memorial Project collected soil from the site where he was murdered, and sent it to the Equal Justice Initiative in Montgomery, Ala., where it is on display, The Washington Post reported.

The weekend is sponsored by the Montgomery County Remembrance and Reconciliation Commission, Montgomery History and the Montgomery County Lynching Memorial Project.

Schedule

Saturday, September 25
9 a.m. – 12:30 p.m. - “Unwritten Law”: A Symposium on the Lynchings in Rockville
This event is virtual. Sign up for the Zoom here.

Sunday, September 26
Noon – 3:00 p.m. - Remembrance Pilgrimage Walk

4 – 5:30 p.m. - Soil Collection Ceremony
The Sunday events are in-person, and you can register in advance here.

"Beginning at the site of the old county jail where Mr. Diggs-Dorsey and Mr. Randolph were both held, the walk passes locations that were central to a vibrant African American community, including the sites where the men were lynched," the county said about the remembrance walk in a news release. "The ceremony will honor the memories of Mr. Diggs-Dorsey and Mr. Randolph with a soil collection, music, and reflections by community leaders and by a representative of the Equal Justice Initiative from Montgomery, Alabama."

Read the history of John Diggs-Dorsey and Sidney Randolph here.