[Archived] City of Alexandria Commemorates the Anniversary of the 1897 Lynching of Joseph McCoy

­­For Immediate Release: April 23, 2020

Today, the City of Alexandria invites the community to join in the remembrance of Joseph McCoy, who was killed by a lynch mob at the corner of Lee and Cameron Streets in 1897. All are invited to visit alexandriava.gov/Historic to watch a video of a proclamation by Mayor Justin Wilson; read and reflect on writing by Alexandria Black History Museum Director Audrey Davis; read a poem by Poet Laureate KaNikki Jakarta; and watch a message from Pastor James Daniely of the Roberts Memorial United Methodist Church. 

McCoy’s death was one of two documented lynchings in Alexandria, out of 11 that occurred in Northern Virginia, and among the 100 documented lynchings that occurred in the Commonwealth between 1882 and 1968. This virtual memorial is part of the Alexandria Equal Justice Institute Community Remembrance Project. 

The nonprofit Equal Justice Institute’s National Memorial for Peace and Justice includes over 800 steel monuments, one for each city or county in the United States where a racial terror lynching took place. The names of the lynching victims are engraved on the pillars. A field of identical monuments is in a park adjacent to the memorial. The EJI Community Remembrance Project invites cities and counties across the country to claim their monuments and install them in the areas they represent. In addition to installing the pillars, EJI encourages participating communities to place a historical marker and to collect soil from the site of each lynching, to "allow communities to gain perspective and experience that we believe is crucial to managing the monument retrieval process wisely and effectively." One of the main goals of Alexandria’s Community Remembrance Project is to bring the pillar with the names of Alexandria’s two documented lynching victims -- Joseph McCoy and Benjamin Thomas - from Alabama to Alexandria for placement in a prominent location. 

Visit alexandriava.gov/Historic for more information about Alexandria’s Equal Justice Initiative Community Remembrance Project, future programming, the history of lynching in Alexandria, and frequently asked questions.

For media inquiries, contact Andrea Blackford, Senior Communications Officer, at andrea.blackford@alexandriava.gov or 703.746.3959.