Lynchburg, Tennessee, is a small, historic town in Moore County, known globally as the home of the Jack Daniel’s Distillery. This association often overshadows the town’s deep history and the story behind its name. The origin of its name is rooted in the early 19th-century settlement of the Tennessee Barrens. Understanding how Lynchburg received its designation requires looking into the records of its pioneer founders.
The Early Settlement and Establishment
Settlers began arriving in the area that would become Lynchburg around 1801, drawn to the fertile land and the reliable water sources of the East Fork Mulberry Creek. The region was part of the Tennessee Barrens, a unique landscape that offered both open land for farming and dense timber for construction. The presence of clear, limestone-filtered water was a significant geographical factor that would later prove instrumental to the town’s most famous industry.
The settlement began to take shape as a formal community in the early 1800s, with the establishment of essential infrastructure. Thomas Roundtree, an early proprietor of the land, laid out the town’s initial lots around 1818, creating the foundation for a central village. Early businesses quickly followed, including a cotton mill established by Roundtree along the creek. By the 1830s, the community supported a gristmill, a cotton gin operated by William P. Long, and a large tannery, signifying its transition from a collection of homesteads to a recognized trading center. This growth necessitated a formal identity, leading to the town’s incorporation by the Tennessee General Assembly in 1841–1842.
The Origin of the Name
The exact historical event that led to the town being named Lynchburg is not definitively recorded, resulting in a few competing accounts that have persisted through local lore and historical documents. The most commonly cited theory suggests the town was named after an early resident named Tom Lynch. This individual was a prominent figure in the nascent community, often identified as a Justice of the Peace or a respected early settler.
Another specific account links the name to Thomas Roundtree, the man who laid out the town in 1818. This theory suggests Roundtree named the town after a “lynching post,” a famous beech tree near his house that was used to administer corporal punishment to early offenders. This practice of vigilante justice, or “Judge Lynch’s law,” was a rough form of frontier order common in the post-War of 1812 era.
A third theory, recorded in an 1876 issue of the Lynchburg Sentinel, proposes that an early settler simply named the town after his native Lynchburg, Virginia. While the identity of the specific person honored remains debated, the most accepted historical narrative centers on a person named Lynch who held a position of authority, linking the name directly to the establishment of order in the early settlement.
Lynchburg’s Enduring Legacy
The town’s name, rooted in the pioneer era, set the stage for its later fame. The clear, iron-free water that drew the first settlers and powered the early mills became the foundation for the Jack Daniel’s Distillery, established in 1866. This industry transformed the small, agrarian community into a globally recognized destination.
Lynchburg is defined by a unique irony: it is the home of a world-famous whiskey, yet Moore County remains a dry county due to the temperance movement. Despite this modern contradiction, the town’s historical name serves as a constant reminder of its origins. It connects the present community to the individuals and the frontier justice that characterized the settlement’s establishment.