I wrote a piece on the Rosewood massacre and lynching which I will send to anyone on the list who contacts me. To avoid the to and fro, I tried to send it, so that those who were interested could download it, but the list does not permit this. -- Stephan On 24 Jun 2007, at 01:58, Laura Fortune wrote: > The term "lynching" originated in Altavista, Virginia, during the > Revolutionbry War, when Col. Charles Lynch took the law into his > own hands > instead of taking British sympathizers to Williamsburg for trial. > He tied > the accused to a tree on the Avoca property and lashed them. The tree > remains, filled with concrete, are on the Avoca Museum property. > Later the > term came to mean "hanging by the neck until dead". > > Just a tidbit of Virginia history. > > Laura Catherine D. Fortune > James R. Fortune