Lynching of John Glover

John "Cockey" Glover was a 35-year-old African-American man lynched in Holton, Bibb County, Georgia, by a mob of approximately 300 white men on August 2, 1922. His death was recorded as the 43rd of 61 documented lynchings in the United States that year.

The events leading to his death began on July 29, 1922, just after 6:00 p.m., when Deputy Sheriff Walter C. Byrd entered Hatfield's Pool Hall on Hollywood Avenue in Macon. The pool hall was owned by Charles Henry Douglass, described as the wealthiest Black man in Macon. Byrd, who had previously worked at the local prison before being transferred to the Sheriff's department due to brutality toward inmates, had developed a reputation for racial brutality. A scuffle broke out inside the pool hall, and Glover, claiming self-defense, shot and killed Byrd. Another deputy present, Romas Raley, shot and killed George Marshall and mortally wounded Samuel Brooks, two Black men who were playing pool at the time and were not otherwise connected to the altercation.

Glover fled the scene. Police responded by stopping all trains in the area and issuing a bulletin offering a $300 reward (equivalent to roughly $5,800 in 2025) for his capture, describing him by physical appearance and clothing. The following day, Macon police conducted door-to-door warrantless searches in the majority-Black neighborhoods of Pleasant Hill, Tindall Field, Unionville, and other areas of the city.

Glover was ultimately arrested by police officers T.F. Phelps and Jim Huckabee in Griffin, Georgia, as he attempted to flee by train toward Chicago. News of the arrest reached Macon, and a mob of about 300 white people traveled to Griffin. Police attempted to transport Glover back to Macon secretly, but the convoy was intercepted by the mob on the road approximately 2 miles from Holton in Bibb County.

Glover was tied to a tree, shot repeatedly, and set on fire. Members of the mob then took his mutilated body and paraded it through Black neighborhoods of Macon, attempting to display it at C.H. Douglass's theatre. Police eventually took custody of the body but left it on the curb outside the theatre rather than removing it entirely. Thousands of Macon residents came to view the body, and some reportedly fought over souvenirs taken from the corpse.

Glover's case is among those commemorated at the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, which opened in Montgomery, Alabama, on April 26, 2018, and displays hanging steel monuments representing U.S. counties where documented lynchings occurred, including Macon–Bibb County.