Bill Saul Thompson
Thompson was held in a Kentucky jail when, on November 10, 1858, a mob of two or three hundred people took him and two other men from it and hanged them from an elm tree. One account, printed in the Louisville Journal, says the sheriff and local citizens appealed to the crowd and that their appeals failed. The Staunton Vindicator reports that the sheriff and jailor protested but could not stop the crowd, which carried him about twelve miles before the hanging. Both accounts say he wept and prayed aloud on the way and asked for a prayer on his behalf, which was offered before he died. The accounts differ on the town where the jail stood, and one of them gives his name as Hill Saul Thompson while the other gives it as Bill Saul Thompson.
Cause of death, as reported: Taken from custody and lynched. According to a Louisville Journal correspondent's letter, a mob took him from the Greensburg jail and hanged him from an elm tree, and the sheriff and jailor protested but could not stop the crowd.
Reported by: Louisville Journal correspondent's letter from Campbellsville (reporters).