Thread by @donovanreyno1ds

History of Forsyth County
GA’s Former Sundown County
(a thread)

Like most of GA prior to colonization, Cherokee groups lived in the area that would later become Forsyth County.

But after the GA Gold Rush in the 1830’s, the Govt, led by President Andrew Jackson, forcibly removed natives from their lands to accommodate white settlers.

The county is named after a Jackson supporter, Senator, Governor & Secretary of State during this time, John Forsyth.

By 1850, the census shows that Forsyth county was home to about 4k white men, 4k white women, 6 free black men, 5 free black women & 1k enslaved people.

After President Lincoln & the Emancipation Proclamation (begrudgingly) mandated that the enslaved population be freed in 1863, many black people stayed & lived in the county farming & sharecropping despite racial tensions.

Until 1912…

In September of 1912, 5 months after the sinking of the Titanic, 18 year old, Mae Crow, was walking down a quiet street in a small village called Oscarville, when she was brutally raped & beaten into a coma.

She succumbed to the injuries about 2 weeks later.

If you read my thread about Atlanta’s Black Wall St - Auburn Ave, you’d remember that when things like this happened, it wasn’t uncommon for black people to get blamed for these crime with no actual evidence.

So that’s exactly what happened.

4 people were arrested for the murder, Rob Edwards, his wife Jane Daniel, her brother Oscar Daniel & their cousin, a 16-year-old boy, Ernest Knox.

What would ensue next would lay the foundation for Forsyth becoming a sundown county.

(Oscar - 2nd from left & Ernest far right)

Edwards was dragged from a county jail by an angry mob of whites.

He was stripped naked, beaten w/ crowbars & dragged through the town square by wagon.

Eventually he was hung from a telephone phone while onlookers emptied their guns into his corpse.

No one was arrested.

The 2 boys, Knox (16) & Daniel (18) were tried in 1 day, by an all white jury.

They were hung outside of town. Public executions were outlawed by 1912, so the judge ordered that a blind be built.

It was burnt down the night before.

5,000 out of a county of 10k came & watched.

Over the next several weeks, white people of the area went door to door threatening black families to leave town, burning down churches & homes.

Almost overnight, Forsyth became a whites-only county who would meet black people w/ continued violence for much of the century.

Property abandoned by blacks was stolen & bought up illegally, some families losing up to 160+ acres.

With deed records conveniently missing, current home owners would have no way of even knowing that, their land had belonged to a Black family forced out in the dead of night.

The 1910 census shows 1,098 Black/mixed residents living in Forsyth. By the 1920 census, that number was reduced to nearly 0.

Some Black residents lost property that is worth 8 figures today & others land is now at the bottom of Lake Lanier, created ≈ 40 years after the riots.

For 75 years, the only Blacks that existed in Forsyth were ones that were buried in the graveyards next to abandoned Black churches.

Recently, about 8 headstones were found at the old Stoney Point Baptist Church wedged now b/w rows of upscale homes in 2 wealthy subdivisions.

So now some of the most valuable real estate in the Atlanta suburbs is twice-stolen: First in the Cherokee removal & again in the 1912 attacks.

Forsyth County would go on like this as an all white county….

Until national attention in 1987.

In 1 of the largest civil rights marches in GA history, a group led by civil rights activists Hosea Williams & Joseph E Lowery staged a march in Cumming, gaining nearly 20k-25k black & white marchers.

They were soon met with violence from Forsyth’s population & the KKK. 1/2

2/2

A month after the marches, a new, young, popular talk show host, Oprah Winfrey, brought the 1st season of her talk show down to Cumming, GA for a roundtable discussion of the county's racial history & the demonstrations. 1/2

“Oprah said her and her producers knew it was dangerous to go down there. But said they were smart enough to leave town before the sun went down.” 2/2

Today, Forsyth has over 250k people & is about 70% white, 15% Asian, 10% Hispanic & 4% black. The county is expected to double in size by 2050.

While many people, are attracted to the area by the McMansions, access to the mountains & Lake Lanier, some old sentiments linger.

In the 2000s & 2010s, Forsyth County grew exponentially, due to white flight from north Fulton County as a result of the rapid increase of Asians Americans settling in that area which borders the southern part of Forsyth County.

For example Northview High went from 60% white & 30% Asian in 2007 to 50% Asian & 30% white in 2017.

Many white parents claimed Fulton County schools w/ a high % of Asian students became too academically competitive, negatively impacting their kid’s mental health & social life.

In 2016, Daniel Blackman was the 1st black person to ever run for ANY elected office in Forsyth county. TWENTY-SIXTEEN. He was beat handily, losing 80% of the vote. In Forsyth…

80% voted Romney in 2012.
78% voted McCain in 2014
71% voted Trump in 2016.
65% voted Trump in 2020.

The county is slowing trying to participate in redemption & acknowledgement.

Remember these from earlier? They’re soil from where Rob Edwards was lynched. The jar will join 100s of others representing lynching victims at the Equal Justice Initiative memorial in Montgomery.

The Community Remembrance Project of Forsyth County is a group behind the push for the marker on Cumming Square, which was approved unanimously by local leaders.

While it does not make up for injustices of the past, unless history is shared, it is forgotten.

These type of monuments are important.

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