[4] [5] In 1906, a mob in Salisbury, North Carolina lynched five black men who were accused of murdering a white family.

The next day, Glenn, at the sheriff's request, sent the military companies to Salisbury to guard the jail now holding one alleged lyncher.

Glenn went to Salisbury himself two days later to testify in the trial of the soon to be convicted lynching "leader," George Hall.

Public outcry over the lynching and concern about its negative effect on North Carolina's business prospects prompted Glenn to send out an executive order to all county sheriffs and all state militia companies to inform him immediately of any rumor of a lynching in the future, and to shoot to kill if necessary to guard prisoners threatened by mob violence.

His boyhood home, Lower Sauratown Plantation, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1984.