The Montgomery County Lynching Memorial Project invites the public to a remembrance pilgrimage walk and soil collection ceremony on Sunday, Sept. 26.
The walk and ceremony will memorialize two men who were lynched in Rockville. John Diggs-Dorsey, a man in his early 20s from Darnestown, was dragged from the county jail and lynched in 1880. Sidney Randolph, a native of Georgia in his mid-20s, was lynched in 1896.
The walk, from noon-3 p.m., will begin at the site of the old county jail (now the County Council Building, at 100 Maryland Ave.). It will pass places central to the African American community and where the men were lynched. Parts of the walk will follow routes taken by the lynch mobs, ending at Welsh Park at Martins Lane and Mannakee Street. The walk is limited to 100 people. Registration is required by Wednesday, Sept. 22.
The soil collection ceremony, held at Welsh Park from 4-5:30 p.m., will include stories of what took place, music and reflections from local leaders and representatives of the Equal Justice Initiative. Attendance numbers at the ceremony are not limited, but registration is requested.
To register, visit mdlynchingmemorial.wixsite.com/montco/events2. For more information, email [email protected].
These events are part of Remembrance Weekend, in partnership with the Montgomery County Remembrance and Reconciliation Commission, Montgomery History, Peerless Rockville and other community partners. It will include a symposium hosted by Montgomery History on Saturday, Sept. 25.