John Mitchell, Junior, a former slave who was born in Henrico County, gained his claim to fame as the “Fighting Editor” while working for the “Richmond Planet” newspaper. In 1892, John Mitchel, Junior ran for Richmond’s Board of Alderman, from the city’s predominantly Black neighborhood Jackson Ward, and was re-elected in 1894. and serving in the Richmond City Council.
During the Republican convention in 1921, John Mitchell, Junior was nominated to be the Commonwealth of Virginia’s first Black Republican candidate for Governor. Since no political party in Virginia, the Whigs, the Federalists, the Republican-Democrats, the Democrats, the Republicans, had ever nominated a Black man to be a candidate for governor before, it made John Mitchell, Junior the the commonwealth’s first ever Black governor candidate for any political party.
Hamilton Historical Records 