Jasper County GaArchives News.....Another Killing in Jasper County, Georgia November 25, 1898
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Don Bankston http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00024.html#0005864 November 18, 2006, 12:00 am

Jackson Argus – Butts County November 25, 1898
This week records another bloody murder in Jasper County, the victim being a 
young man by the name of Joe Pope, a nephew of Sherrod Pope, of the Star 
Store.  The following sent out from Monticello on the 21st inst. Gives the 
details as far as they have yet been discovered:

Joe Pope, a young man eighteen years old, the only son of the late Thomas C. 
Pope, who died only a few months ago, had been missed by his family and friends 
since Saturday night.  This morning after a few hours effort on the part of an 
organized searching party, his mangled body was found in a meadow just in the 
rear of he jail lot.

Young Pope lay under a cedar tree not more than thirty yards form the 
railroad.  The surroundings gave evidence of a stubborn struggle, a two pound 
weight and an open knife being found on the spot, whilst the fence and trees 
were besmeared with blood.  The skull was crushed and the brain partly beaten 
out.  A bullet hole passed from the forehead to the back of the head showed 
that a rifle or pistol also had played a part in the crime.

The young man had drawn a sum of money Saturday afternoon.  A strong 
combination of circumstances point to the guilt of two negroes, now under 
arrest, and they may feel grateful if they are favored with a trial.

Sherrod Pope, who went to Monticello to attend the funeral of his nephew, 
returned on Tuesday night and reports that Ed Merriwether, the negro murderer, 
was taken from the jail Tuesday and lynched.  The coroner had been all the 
morning engaged in investigating the murder of young Joe Pope, which occurred 
Saturday night, and as soon as the jury returned a verdict that the negro did 
the killing and that his purpose was robbery, the citizens overpowered the 
sheriff and took his jail keys.

They at once made way to the jail and dragged the crouching negro from his 
cell.  He pleaded piteously when he found that there was no longer any chance 
for him to escape punishment for his crime.  He was carried a few hundred yards 
to a skirt of woods and in a few minutes several hundred pistol shots rang out 
and as the volume of smoke rolled away toward the foothills the residents of 
the town knew that it was all over.




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