operated by a young couple, Roy and Carolyn Bryant, who lived with their two small sons behind the shop. Roy was away that afternoon.
Outside on the porch Till and his cousins were joking around. Till pulled out his wallet and showed them a picture of a white girl he knew in Chicago, started boasting he’d “had” her.
If he was so good with white girls, one cousin told him, why didn’t he go on in and talk to the woman in the store? Or was he chicken? The cousins giggled, wide-eyed, as Emmett Till walked into the store alone.
Carolyn Bryant later testified that Till grabbed her and asked her for a date. All the kids outside heard was Emmett Till saying, “Bye, baby,” as he came back out on the porch. Some say he whistled, a wolf whistle. Some say that since the boy stuttered, his words sometimes came out in a whistle. He didn’t mean anything by it.
The cousins hustled Till into the old Ford and drove back to the preacher’s house. Nobody told Mose what had happened.
That Saturday night Mose Wright woke up to a pounding at his cabin door. Roy Bryant and his brother, J. W. “Big” Milam, had come for Emmett Till.
Three days later some fishermen found Till floating in the Tallahatchie River. The body was bloated and eaten by fish. One eye was missing; part of the head was crushed. A seventy-four-pound cotton gin fan had been fastened to the neck with barbed wire. There was a bullet in the skull.
For all the black men who wound up dead in the Mississippi swamps, this lynching was different. He was a stranger from Chicago, and his grieving mother wanted an open casket for his funeral. Jet magazine printed a photograph of the corpse. A red spotlight was focused on Mississippi. The lynching of a fourteen-year-old Negro boy made headlines in every state. Before long the Delta was crawling with reporters. They sent back stories about the conditions in Mississippi that a hundred NAACP press releases never could have inspired. Emmett Till’s murder gave a name and a face to the unspeakable.
For Negroes in Mississippi the lynching telegraphed an unmistakable message: the white man could kill you for any reason. It didn’t matter whether you tried to vote or joined the NAACP or did nothing at all. They would kill you just for being black.
Milam and Bryant were arrested and charged with murder within days of the abduction, and tried two weeks later.
The NAACP scrambled to investigate the case. Medgar Evers, Ruby Hurley, and Sam Baily put on dungarees and field hats and drove north to Money to look for witnesses to the abduction.
Mose Wright was the prosecution’s star witness. The old man sat in the witness box in his Sunday best and slowly told the story of the night Milam and Bryant had come for the boy. Milam had said he was going to take the boy.
Do you see this man in the courtroom?
Mose Wright stretched out a long bony finger, and in a courtroom so quiet you could hear sweat drop, said, “Dar he,” as his finger fell to Milam. The judge was already pounding his gavel, shouting, “Order, order!”
The white men never denied kidnapping the boy to teach him a lesson. They just said he was alive the last time they saw him.
A jury of twelve white men took one hour and seven minutes to acquit the killers. Two months later Milam and Bryant sold their story to Look magazine and described in great detail how they had killed Emmett Till. Since they couldn’t be tried again for the same crime, they felt that they could say whatever they wanted. They insisted they never meant to kill the boy, just teach him a lesson he wouldn’t forget. It was the boy’s smart mouth that killed him. He just wouldn’t back down, they said, wouldn’t see the error of his ways. He told them that he’d had white women. They said he told them he was as good as they were. So they stripped him naked, beat him, and made him carry the heavy metal fan to the river. Then Big Milam shot him in the head.
This is what J. W. Milam
Outside on the porch Till and his cousins were joking around. Till pulled out his wallet and showed them a picture of a white girl he knew in Chicago, started boasting he’d “had” her.
If he was so good with white girls, one cousin told him, why didn’t he go on in and talk to the woman in the store? Or was he chicken? The cousins giggled, wide-eyed, as Emmett Till walked into the store alone.
Carolyn Bryant later testified that Till grabbed her and asked her for a date. All the kids outside heard was Emmett Till saying, “Bye, baby,” as he came back out on the porch. Some say he whistled, a wolf whistle. Some say that since the boy stuttered, his words sometimes came out in a whistle. He didn’t mean anything by it.
The cousins hustled Till into the old Ford and drove back to the preacher’s house. Nobody told Mose what had happened.
That Saturday night Mose Wright woke up to a pounding at his cabin door. Roy Bryant and his brother, J. W. “Big” Milam, had come for Emmett Till.
Three days later some fishermen found Till floating in the Tallahatchie River. The body was bloated and eaten by fish. One eye was missing; part of the head was crushed. A seventy-four-pound cotton gin fan had been fastened to the neck with barbed wire. There was a bullet in the skull.
For all the black men who wound up dead in the Mississippi swamps, this lynching was different. He was a stranger from Chicago, and his grieving mother wanted an open casket for his funeral. Jet magazine printed a photograph of the corpse. A red spotlight was focused on Mississippi. The lynching of a fourteen-year-old Negro boy made headlines in every state. Before long the Delta was crawling with reporters. They sent back stories about the conditions in Mississippi that a hundred NAACP press releases never could have inspired. Emmett Till’s murder gave a name and a face to the unspeakable.
For Negroes in Mississippi the lynching telegraphed an unmistakable message: the white man could kill you for any reason. It didn’t matter whether you tried to vote or joined the NAACP or did nothing at all. They would kill you just for being black.
Milam and Bryant were arrested and charged with murder within days of the abduction, and tried two weeks later.
The NAACP scrambled to investigate the case. Medgar Evers, Ruby Hurley, and Sam Baily put on dungarees and field hats and drove north to Money to look for witnesses to the abduction.
Mose Wright was the prosecution’s star witness. The old man sat in the witness box in his Sunday best and slowly told the story of the night Milam and Bryant had come for the boy. Milam had said he was going to take the boy.
Do you see this man in the courtroom?
Mose Wright stretched out a long bony finger, and in a courtroom so quiet you could hear sweat drop, said, “Dar he,” as his finger fell to Milam. The judge was already pounding his gavel, shouting, “Order, order!”
The white men never denied kidnapping the boy to teach him a lesson. They just said he was alive the last time they saw him.
A jury of twelve white men took one hour and seven minutes to acquit the killers. Two months later Milam and Bryant sold their story to Look magazine and described in great detail how they had killed Emmett Till. Since they couldn’t be tried again for the same crime, they felt that they could say whatever they wanted. They insisted they never meant to kill the boy, just teach him a lesson he wouldn’t forget. It was the boy’s smart mouth that killed him. He just wouldn’t back down, they said, wouldn’t see the error of his ways. He told them that he’d had white women. They said he told them he was as good as they were. So they stripped him naked, beat him, and made him carry the heavy metal fan to the river. Then Big Milam shot him in the head.
This is what J. W. Milam
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