Bloody Injuries: The Lynchings in Oconee County, 1905-1921

In an article entitled “The Last Lynching in Athens,” published in the Flagpole on Sept. 10, 1997, I recounted the tragic story of the only lynching incident in Clarke County since lynching statistics began. It happened in February 1921. The victim, a black man named John Lee Eberhart, was wrested from an Athens jail by a mob and burned at the stake. By contrast, in our sister county, Oconee County, until recently far less populous than Clarke County, there have been at least two, perhaps three, lynching incidents during the same period. At least 10 and possibly 11 persons were lynched. All the victims, except one, were black