Named event or history
Morrow family killings, 1869
Reconstruction-era violence against the Morrow family.
The dated events and research sources on this page document this event. Explore the dated events, or browse the research sources.
Orange County Indexed has not yet linked any indexed works directly to this event. If you know a useful source, tell us.
In the chronology
Dated events connected with this event, earliest first. See these 4 dated events in the chronology →
- Washington Morrow, Thomas Jefferson Morrow and Daniel Morrow are lynched Early on August 7, 1869, about 100 disguised white men took Washington Morrow and his brother Nelson from the Hillsborough jail, where they were held on barn-burning charges, and shot Washington as they fled; he died of the wound. On October 14 a mob hanged their father, Thomas Jefferson Morrow, and their uncle, Daniel Morrow. People: Washington Morrow, Daniel Morrow, Jefferson MorrowJames Madison University, Memorializing Racial Terror: The Lynching of Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Daniel Morrow
- Hillsborough constable describes Orange County Klan killings to a U.S. Senate committee W. G. Turrentine, a Hillsborough constable, told the Senate select committee in Washington that five Black men had been killed in Orange County and many people whipped, some for voting Republican. He described how, in August 1869, 75 to 100 disguised men forced the Hillsborough jail and shot a prisoner held on a barn-burning charge, who died.Internet Archive: Report on the Alleged Outrages in the Southern States, Senate Select Committee, March 10, 1871
- Lucinda Morrow of Hillsborough testifies at Governor Holden's impeachment trial Called by Holden's defense, Lucinda Morrow, then living in Hillsborough, described disguised men breaking into her Cane Creek home in Orange County in the fall of 1869 and hanging her husband, Thomas Jefferson Morrow. Prosecution counsel William A. Graham objected to her evidence, and Augustus S. Merrimon argued it was irrelevant unless tied to Alamance County. People: William A. Graham, Jefferson MorrowInternet Archive: Trial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina, vol. 2 (1871)
- Soil collection ceremony at the Orange County courthouse honors Cyrus Guy and four other 1869 lynching victims The Orange County Community Remembrance Coalition held a soil collection ceremony for Washington Morrow, Wright Malone, Daniel Morrow, Thomas Jefferson Morrow and Cyrus Guy, all lynched in 1869. One jar for each man was to go to the Equal Justice Initiative's memorial collection in Montgomery, Alabama, and a second jar was to stay in Orange County. People: Daniel Morrow, Jefferson Morrow, Washington Morrow, Wright Malone, James WilliamsSearch the index · Chapelboro: 'Do Not Forget Us': Soil Collection Ceremony Held for 5 Orange County Lynching Victims (May 1, 2023)
Places in this history
Buildings, schools, churches and other sites named in the dated events on this page, the most often named first. The map shows them all.
Map tiles © OpenStreetMap contributors. Site locations from the N.C. State Historic Preservation Office survey, Open Orange and OpenStreetMap; town and community pins mark the middle of their mapped buildings.
- Orange County jail, Hillsborough Public buildings and services · Hillsborough · 2 events here
- Orange County Courthouse, Hillsborough Public buildings and services · Hillsborough · 1 event here
Start at OCPL
Books in OCPL’s Rebecca B. Wall Local History Collection whose titles, catalog subjects, or descriptions match this event. The Friends’ recommended starting points are labelled. Books marked Wider context cover the broader subject rather than this event itself.
- Foundational · NC 973.8 ZUB
North Carolina During Reconstruction
Zuber, Richard L. · 1969
Published in 1969 by the State Department of Archives and History, Richard L. Zuber's short history follows North Carolina through Reconstruction after the Civil War. It runs 67 pages with illustrations, facsimiles, portraits and a bibliography, and was later reprinted by the Division of Archives and History.
- Foundational · NC 973.745 NOR
North Carolinians in the Era of the Civil War and Reconstruction
2008
Paul D. Escott edits nine essays on North Carolinians from secession through Reconstruction: Piedmont disaffection, Wild's Raid and guerrilla war in the northeast, African Americans under Union occupation, soldiers and the 1864 governor's race, the war's end as seen by Chapel Hill writer Cornelia Phillips Spencer, Zebulon Vance and university president David L. Swain, women and the law, divorce at the 1868 constitutional convention, the roots of Jim Crow, and Vance's memory. UNC Press, 2008.
- Influential in its time · NC 975.6 HAM
Reconstruction in North Carolina
Hamilton, Joseph Grégoire de Roulhac · 1964
J. G. de Roulhac Hamilton, a Hillsborough native who taught history at the University of North Carolina from 1906, grew this political history of Reconstruction in the state out of his Columbia dissertation under William A. Dunning. Columbia issued the full text in 1914 (683 pages, with a folding map); Peter Smith reprinted it in 1964. Written from the Lost Cause outlook of the Dunning school, it went unchallenged for about fifty years.
Show 1 more
- Wider context · NC 970.004 EVA
To Die Game: The Story of the Lowry Band, Indian Guerrillas of Reconstruction
Evans, William McKee · 1971
Henry Berry Lowry and his band of Lumbee guerrillas raided plantations and eluded posses in Robeson County through Reconstruction, after the execution of Lowry's father and brother in 1865; their fight ended in 1872, when Lowry vanished after a raid on Lumberton. W. McKee Evans tells their story in this history, published by Louisiana State University Press in 1971; 282 pages with maps and portraits.
Research sources
Background context 7
Background from selected state and local sources
- NCpedia: Lynching NCpedia
- Marker: Lynching In America ⎯⎯⎯ The Lynching of Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Daniel Morrow Historical Marker Database (HMdb.org)
- NCpedia: Ku Klux Klan NCpedia Related to the chronology entry “Racial-terror lynchings in Orange County” (1869–1898).
- Orange County Community Remembrance Coalition: Those We Honor Other source Related to the chronology entry “The Morrow Family Killings Expose Reconstruction-Era Terror” (August 7–October 14, 1869).
- NCpedia: Strudwick, Frederick Nash NCpedia Related to the chronology entry “Racial-terror lynchings in Orange County” (1869–1898).
- Chapelboro: Soil Collection Ceremony Held for 5 Orange County Lynching Victims Chapelboro (97.9 WCHL) Related to the chronology entry “The Morrow Family Killings Expose Reconstruction-Era Terror” (August 7–October 14, 1869).
Show all 7
- Equal Justice Initiative: Lynching in America, North Carolina Equal Justice Initiative Documented racial-terror lynchings by county, with the report behind the county’s 2022 resolution
Read contemporary evidence 3
Newspapers, photographs, and records of the time
- Daily Tar Heel: marker unveiled for the Morrow lynching victims (Feb. 2025) Other source Contemporary coverage of the memorial marker and the people it commemorates
- DigitalNC newspapers: 1 Orange County pages for “Morrow lynched” DigitalNC Searchable pages from historic Orange County newspapers
- Internet Archive: Testimony taken by the Joint Select Committee, North Carolina volume Internet Archive Related to the chronology entry “Racial-terror lynchings in Orange County” (1869–1898).
Additional research sources
Other catalogs to search and local organizations that can help.
- Places to visit: James Madison University, Lynching Markers: Orange County, North Carolina, 1869 Other source Related to the chronology entry “The Morrow Family Killings Expose Reconstruction-Era Terror” (August 7–October 14, 1869).
- Search beyond the index: NC LIVE: prepared search for Morrow family killings, 1869 NC LIVE An advanced search of the state’s shared databases already scoped to Orange County’s places and this subject; edit it freely, and sign in through your North Carolina library to read
- Ask locally: Rebecca B. Wall Local History Collection, Orange County Public Library Rebecca B. Wall Local History Collection (OCPL) The county library’s local-history room at the Main Library in Hillsborough: books, journals, maps, and microfilm of county records from 1752
- Ask locally: Local History Help Hours and request form OCPL Local History Liaison The library’s Local History Liaison helps in person most Mondays, 12 to 3, at the Main Library, or by the online request form
More to discover
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