Chapter 15 in To Kill a Mockingbird is a significant part in the novel. In this chapter, Harper Lee shows us a few new ideas through the actions of the characters. The mob is Lee’s way of showing us the town and how the town acts and thinks. The people in the mob are angry with Atticus for “movin’ [Tom Robinson] to the county jail”(Lee 194). At night, the mob finds Atticus at the Maycomb jail and are aggravated by the way he treats everyone the same, including African Americans. Atticus believes that Maycomb can change, and that they can treat everyone equally too. However, the town does not want to change, and they show it that night, when a man tells Atticus to “get aside from the door”(Lee 202), because they want to do something, most likely harm, Tom Robinson. Lee has shown this same idea a few times already, and we witness it once again with Atticus. Atticus has lived in Maycomb most of his life and like everyone else living there, he knows the town and the people in it. The town knows this, and they don’t want to kill Atticus because he is an insider; instead, they go after what they believe to …show more content…
Cunningham is a critical character in this chapter. He is the only character that we recognize in the mob. Lee does this on purpose in order to show the reader a few meaningful concepts. Mr. Cunningham was mentioned earlier in the book as a man that was poor. Scout and her family know him because Atticus defended him; however, instead of paying with actual money, Mr. Cunningham pays them with crop. When Scout questions about the payment situation, Atticus explains how he understands that “that’s the only way [Mr. Cunningham] could pay [him]”. Mr. Cunningham should be thankful that Atticus understands him, and he defended him even though the payment method was strange. However, a few years later, he becomes part of a mob that is against him. It seems that he has forgotten who It is Scout’s interaction with Mr. Cunningham that made him remember who he actually