1877--Parker Mayo Accused of Assault and Lynched
Item
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Title
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1877--Parker Mayo Accused of Assault and Lynched
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Date
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Mar 1877
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Formatted date
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1877-03-01
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Event type
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Lynching
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Description
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Parker Mayo was born in Manakin-Sabot, Goochland County, Virginia, enslaved by a man named William Diedrick. Diedrick’s plantation, known as “Rochambeau” was comprised of over 600 acres. There was a grist mill, saw mill and blacksmith shop on site and Diedrick may have been operating a mercantile on the property at one point as well. In 1850, he held 11 enslaved people; by 1860 that number was reduced to six. Among those enslaved in 1860, was a seven-year old boy; it’s likely that this boy was Parker Mayo. The Mayo name is found among several African American families in Goochland County in census records of 1870.
The Diedrick home is still standing and was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1999. It resembles Boone County’s own Dinsmore homestead.
Based on the ages of the enslaved people held by Diedrick in 1860, it’s possible that Parker’s parents were John and Mary Mayo, who lived nearby the Diedrick farm in 1870. Parker’s name does not appear in the household that year, but there are several other children. It’s possible Parker, who was a teen at the time, was working as a laborer elsewhere and did not get recorded on the census records.
Sometime around 1875, Mayo had made his way to Walton, where he was working sporadically on the construction of the Louisville Short Line railway. Another railroad worker, James Murray, who was white, lived in a shanty just north of the crossing of the Louisville Short Line and the Cincinnati Southern railroad tracks with his wife and several children. In late March, 1877, Murray and his wife took their youngest for treatment at St. Elizabeth Hospital in Covington, leaving their nine-year old daughter, Molly and two other children alone in the shack.
It was alleged that during the absence of James and his wife, Mayo entered their home and raped Molly. It was reported that sometime after the assault, he tried to entice her into the woods to kill her, but the girl refused to go with him. Mayo was next accused of going to the nearby cabin of Mr. Shefly, a tenant farmer on the property of George Gaines where he encountered the man’s wife, who claimed Mayo was armed and threatened her.
Groups of men were dispatched to hunt Mayo down. Mr. Shefly and an acquaintance were looking in the Florence area and decided to rest for the night upon a stack of hay. They claimed to have discovered Parker Mayo sleeping the very haystack they had chosen to rest upon. The Florence constable was summoned and Mayo was arrested. He was taken to Walton before the magistrates and witnesses were brought to testify; bail was set at $500.
On May 29th, 1877, Mayo was being transported in an open-topped wagon to the Boone County Jail in Burlington, in the custody of two officers. The wagon was accosted just outside of Walton, near James Murray’s shack, by a large group of unnamed men. The men took Parker Mayo out of the wagon and the officers fled. Parker Mayo’s body was discovered hanging from a tree just west of the Lexington Pike, two miles outside Walton; the body was buried within one hundred yards of the hanging tree.
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Participant
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African American(s): Parker Mayo
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Other participant(s): William Murray
Walton (Ky.)
