Emmett Till Civil Rights – Mississippi Blues Trail
Emmett Till Civil Rights Story
If the facts as stated in the Look magazine account of the Till affair are correct, this remains: two adults, armed, in the dark, kidnap a fourteen-year-old boy and take him away to frighten him. Instead of which, the fourteen-year-old boy not only refuses to be frightened, but unarmed, alone, in the dark, so frightens the two armed adults that they must destroy him… What are we Mississippians afraid of?
—William Faulkner, “On Fear”, 1956
BORN: July 25, 1941 in Chicago, Illinois
DIED: August 28, 1955 (aged 14) in Money, MS
Emmett Till was a 14-year-old African American boy that lived in Chicago in 1955. However, Emmett travelled to Money, MS August 21st to spend part of the summer with family. While he stayed with his great-uncle, Moses Wright, who was a sharecropper, Emmett spent his days helping with the cotton harvest
Despite his mother’s warnings, Emmett Till continued to joke around during his time in Money, MS. On August 24th, while at a local store, Emmett encountered Carolyn Bryant, a white woman. Later that evening, Carolyn’s husband Roy and his half-brother J.W. Milam abducted Emmett from his great-uncle’s home. The men brutally beat Emmett, shot him, and then tied a heavy cotton gin fan to his body before dumping him in the Tallahatchie River. The murder of Emmett Till shocked the nation and became a catalyst for the civil rights movement.
Emmett Till Civil Rights Timeline
AUGUST 24, 1955
One day, on August 24th, Till, along with a group of other teens, went shopping at a grocery store owned by Roy and Carolyn Bryant after a day of working in the fields. The story varies: One version was that someone said he whistled at Mrs. Bryant, a white woman. Another version is that witnesses stated that one of the other boys dared Till to talk to the store’s cashier, Carolyn Bryant, a white woman. Then Till either whistled at, touched the hand or waist of, or flirted with Carolyn Bryant as he was leaving the store. However, Till neglected to tell his uncle of the incident.
AUGUST 28, 1955
In the early morning hours of August 28th, Emmett Till was abducted from Wright’s home at gunpoint by Roy Bryant and J.W. Milam, Bryant’s half-brother. Subsequently, Bryant and Milam not only kidnapped the boy but severely beat him, gouging out one of his eyes. Afterward, on the banks of the Tallahatchie River, they killed him with a single gunshot to the head. In addition, a large metal fan was tied to his neck with barbed wire, and his body was thrown into the Tallahatchie River. The following day, Till’s great-uncle Wright reported the kidnapping to police. Shortly after, Bryant and Milam were arrested.
AUGUST 31, 1955
On August 31st, Emmett Till’s body was discovered in the river. Consequently, he had been beaten so badly that the only way to identify his body was by the monogrammed ring on his finger that had belonged to his father. As a result, an investigation was opened.
SEPTEMBER 2, 1955
Less than two weeks after Till journeyed south, a casket with his remains were on a train back to Chicago. Shortly thereafter, his mother insisted on having an open casket so the tens of thousands attending his funeral could see the brutality inflicted on her son. Consequently, Emmett Till’s murder became a rallying point for the Civil Rights movement. Tragically, the end to the Emmett Till Civil Rights story.
SEPTEMBER 19, 1955
Despite the testimony from Wright, Bryant and Milam were acquitted of all charges. Furthermore, they were able to profit from a Look magazine article about the case. In their confession, they openly shared the gruesome details of Till’s kidnapping and murder. Additionally, Carolyn Bryant admitted that Emmett Till was innocent of making any advances toward her.
MAY 2004
Furthermore, The Federal Bureau of Investigation reopened the case seeking to obtain a conclusive account of Till’s final hours and to determine if other individuals were involved even though Bryant and Milam were deceased. During the investigation which lasted three years, Milam’s brother Leslie admitted his own involvement in the kidnapping and murder. Additionally, Till’s body was exhumed for a complete autopsy then reburied in a new casket. His original casket was donated to the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture.
However, justice was not served in Emmett Till Civil Rights case. As a result,
this tragic murder helped fuel the growing civil rights movement in this country in the 1950s and beyond.
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The Table of Contents below lists all posts.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
MISSISSIPPI BLUES TRAIL
Clarksdale Blues Markers
Clarksdale Points of Interest
Greenwood Blues Markers
Greenwood Points of Interest
Indianola Blues Markers & Points of Interest
Leland Blues Markers & City Info
Natchez Blues Markers
Natchez City Legacy
Natchez Points of Interest
Old Country Store – Windsor Ruins – Port Gibson Blues Markers
Po Monkey’s – Cleveland – Greenville Blues Markers
Rolling Fork Blues Marker & Mont Helena Indian Mound
Stovall Plantation – Friar’s Point – Tunica Blues Markers
Tutwiler Blues Markers & Emmett Till Story
Vicksburg Blues Markers
Vicksburg City
Vicksburg Civil War Museum & Coca-Cola Museum
Vicksburg McRaven House
Vicksburg National Military Park
Woodville Blues Markers & City
Mississippi Delta History & Jewish History
Mississippi Indian Mounds
Mississippi Sky Lake Preserve
Mississippi Itineraries
