Frequent inquiry has been made within the last year as to the origin
of Lynch's law. This subject now possesses historical interest. It
will be perceived from the annexed paper, that the law, so called,
originated in 1780, in Pittsylvania, Virginia. Colonel William Lynch,
of that county, was its author; and we are informed by a resident, who
was a member of a body formed for the purpose of carrying it into
effect, that the efforts of the association were wholly successful. A
trained band of villains, whose operations extended from North to
South, whose well concerted schemes had bidden defiance to the
ordinary laws of the land, and whose success encouraged them to
persevere in depredations upon an unoffending community, was dispersed
and laid prostrate under the infliction of Lynch's law. Of how many
terrible, and deeply to be lamented consequences--of how great an
amount of permanent evil--has the partial and temporary good been
productive!
"Whereas, many of the inhabitants of the county of Pittsylvania, as
well as elsewhere, have sustained great and intolerable losses by a
set of lawless men who have banded themselves together to deprive
honest men of their just rights and property, by stealing their
horses, counterfeiting, and passing paper currency, and committing
many other species of villainy, too tedious to mention, and that those
vile miscreants do still persist in their diabolical practices, and
have hitherto escaped the civil power with impunity, it being almost
useless and unnecessary to have recourse to our laws to suppress and
punish those freebooters, they having it in their power to extricate
themselves when brought to justice by suborning witnesses who do swear
them clear--we, the subscribers, being determined to put a stop to the
iniquitous practices of those unlawful and abandoned wretches, do
enter into the following association, to wit: that next to our
consciences, soul and body, we hold our rights and property, sacred
and inviolable. We solemnly protest before God and the world, that
(for the future) upon hearing or having sufficient reason to believe,
that any villainy or species of villainy having been committed within
our neighborhood, we will forthwith embody ourselves, and repair
immediately to the person or persons suspected, or those under
suspicious characters, harboring, aiding, or assisting those villains,
and if they will not desist from their evil practices, we will inflict
such corporeal punishment on him or them, as to us shall seem adequate
to the crime committed or the damage sustained; that we will protect
and defend each and every one of us, the subscribers, as well jointly
as severally, from the insults and assaults offered by any other
person in their behalf: and further, we do bind ourselves jointly and
severally, our joint and several heirs &c. to pay or cause to be paid,
all damages that shall or may accrue in consequence of this our
laudable undertaking, and will pay an equal proportion according to
our several abilities; and we, after having a sufficient number of
subscribers to this association, will convene ourselves to some
convenient place, and will make choice of our body five of the best
and most discreet men belonging to our body, to direct and govern the
whole, and we will strictly adhere to their determinations in all
cases whatsoever relative to the above undertaking; and if any of our
body summoned to attend the execution of this our plan, and fail so to
do without a reasonable excuse, they shall forfeit and pay the sum of
one hundred pounds current money of Virginia, to be appropriated
towards defraying the contingent expenses of this our undertaking. In
witness whereof we have hereunto set our hands, this 22d day September
1780."