Emmett Till was a 14-year-old African American boy who tragically became a symbol of the Civil Rights Movement in the United States. In August 1955, Till, a native of Chicago, was visiting family in Money, Mississippi, when he was accused of whistling at or making inappropriate remarks to a white woman named Carolyn Bryant, who owned a local store.
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A few days later, Bryant’s husband, Roy Bryant, and his half-brother, J.W. Milam, abducted Till from his uncle’s house. They brutally beat him, mutilated his body, and then shot him before dumping his body in the Tallahatchie River. Till’s body was discovered three days later, weighted down with a cotton gin fan tied around his neck with barbed wire.
Till’s mother, Mamie Till-Mobley, insisted on an open-casket funeral to show the world the brutality of her son’s murder. The widely publicized images of Till’s mutilated body sparked outrage across the nation and galvanized the Civil Rights Movement.
Despite overwhelming evidence, including a confession by Bryant and Milam to a journalist, an all-white jury acquitted them of Till’s murder. Double jeopardy laws prevented them from being retried for the same crime.
Emmett Till’s death is often cited as a catalyst for the Civil Rights Movement. The case brought national attention to the pervasive racism and violence faced by African Americans in the Jim Crow South and fueled the determination of activists to fight for racial justice and equality.
REST IN PEACE, EMMETT TILL
Emmett Louis Till
BIRTH 25 Jul 1941
DEATH 28 Aug 1955 (aged 14)
BURIAL Burr Oak Cemetery Alsip, Cook County, Illinois, USA
GPS 41.664028, -87.732268 PLOT Maplewood Section, 200 plots
