1955

Emmett Till was only 14 years old when he visited his uncle’s family in Mississippi. On August 24th, 1955, he went into Bryant’s grocery store and was accused of catcalling a white woman, Carolyn Bryant. Carolyn’s husband, Roy Bryant and his half-brother, John Milam tracked down Till at his uncle’s house where they forced Emmett into the back of their pick up truck at gunpoint. The men drove Emmett to a barn in Drew, Mississippi. At the barn they severely beat him, stole a 70 pound cotton gin fan and lynched him with it tying it around his neck with barbed wire. Then they shot him and dumped his body over the Black Bayou Bridge in Glendora, Mississippi, near the Tallahatchie River. Three days after his abduction and murder, Till's swollen, mutilated and disfigured body was found by two boys who were fishing in the Tallahatchie River. Emmett’s mother, Mamie Till Bradley demanded that the body be sent back to his hometown of Chicago and she decided to have an open-casket funeral, saying, "I just wanted the world to see." Tens of thousands of people lined the streets to view Till's body, and thousands more attended his funeral at Roberts Temple Church of God in Christ. Both Bryant and Milam were found not guilty of murder and the kidnapping, even though they admitted to taking Emmett from his home. Sometime after the trial, Milam and Bryant admitted that they had murdered Till. The Justice Department re-examined the case in 2004 when John Milam’s wife, Juanita Milam, stated that Carolyn’s story was fabricated, but no one was charged. In 2007, Carolyn admitted that she had falsified her testimony, many believe it was an act to clear her conscience so she could get into heaven. Till became an icon of the Civil Rights Movement.

1955

Works Cited