Thurgood Marshall Nearly Lynched in Tennessee After Columbia Riot Defense

After successfully defending most Columbia, TN riot defendants, Thurgood Marshall's car is stopped multiple times by police and a white mob on a rural Tennessee road at night. Companions believe they are about to be lynched. Marshall is removed from one car while police search for whiskey (to frame him for drunk driving) and his companions rush him away before the mob closes in. The incident illustrates how even prominent civil rights attorneys faced existential danger in the South.