Feature photo of the Montgomery County Jail building in Rockville (1935), where John Diggs-Dorsey was dragged from to his lynching on July 27, 1880 courtesy of Montgomery History.
Per Montgomery County: The Montgomery County Lynching Memorial Project’s “It Happened in Rockville: Remembering Two Lynchings” exhibit is being displayed at the Montgomery County Public Libraries’ Wheaton branch through Feb. 28. The exhibit will be available during library open hours.
The Wheaton Library is located within the Wheaton Library and Community Recreation Center complex at 11701 Georgia Ave. in Wheaton. The exhibit, launched in collaboration with Peerless Rockville and Montgomery History, memorializes and honors two men who were lynched in Rockville—John Diggs-Dorsey in 1880 and Sidney Randolph in 1896. It also honors George Peck, who was lynched in Poolesville in 1880. The exhibit is intended to reveal the history of these fatal miscarriages of justice that happened in Montgomery County, to remember the victims and to promote reconciliation and healing.
Working closely with the Equal Justice Initiative in Montgomery, Ala., and the Maryland Lynching Memorial Project, the exhibit is part of a larger effort to advance the cause of reconciliation in Maryland and advocates for public acknowledgement of these murders. As highlighted in a proclamation by the Montgomery County Council on Sept. 26, 2021, the exhibit “reminds us of our responsibility to understand our history and to work to repair and heal the damage of the past by acting in the present.”
For more information about the exhibit, contact Chris Borawski at christopher.borawski@montgomerycountymd.gov or the Montgomery County Lynching Memorial Project at mocolynchingmemorial@gmail.com.
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