The Leesburg Town Council in Virginia has voted to approve funding for a memorial along East Market Street to honor Charles Craven, a Black man who was lynched by a mob in 1902.
Craven had been arrested and charged in connection to the murder of a Confederate veteran, as well as an unrelated robbery.
Based on research conducted by the NAACP, Craven was in Leesburg jail on July 31, 1902, awaiting trial. That day, a mob of approximately 300 people gathered outside the jail.
“Tensions escalated as the mob clashed with an Emancipation Day parade led by formerly enslaved persons,” according to the town council staff report.
The mob stormed the jail and brought Craven to a potter’s field located near what is currently the intersection of East Market Street and Catoctin Circle.
The Clarke Courier, a conservative local newspaper in operation at the time, reported Craven was hung from a tree limb before being shot.
“About 400 shots were fired at his body,” the news source wrote. “After riddling his body with bullets, the crowd dispersed and all was quiet.”
Although several men from the mob were identified and criminally charged, none were convicted.
In approximately 2018, the Loudoun Branch of the NAACP approached the town about erecting roadside historical markers to record the lynchings of Craven, Page Wallace and Orion Anderson. In 2019, a memorial was dedicated to Anderson.
The memorial for Craven will be erected on a grass border adjacent to a sidewalk along East Market Street near Catoctin Circle.
The Town Council will contribute $3,000 for an easement and installation of the sign. The NAACP will pay $3,400 to fund the application process to the Virginia Department of Historical Resources.
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