- John Brown: Brown was a white abolitionist who led an armed raid on the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia) in 1859. He was captured by U.S. Marines and hanged in 1860.
- Frederick Douglass: Douglass was an escaped slave and prominent abolitionist who served as an advisor to President Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War. He was also subject to threats of lynching due to his outspoken support for abolition and African American rights.
- Robert Smalls: Smalls was an enslaved African American who commandeered a Confederate transport ship and sailed it to freedom in 1862. He joined the Union Navy and became the first African American captain of a U.S. Navy vessel. Smalls was targeted for lynching by the Confederacy and had to be moved to a safer location.
- Osceola: Osceola was a Seminole Indian leader who was captured and hanged by the U.S. Army in 1838. His death became a symbol of resistance against white oppression and enslavement.
- Davy Crockett: Crockett was a famous frontiersman and congressman from Tennessee who opposed the Indian Removal Act of 1830. He was ambushed and killed by Mexican soldiers during the Texas Revolution in 1836. Although his death was not a lynching in the traditional sense, it can be seen as a form of political assassination for his defense of Native American rights.