Emmet Till 

Emmett Louise Till was born on July 25, 1941 in Chicago, Illinois. He was raised in a middle class black neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago. His neighborhood was full of black-owned businesses therefore he was used to living in a place where black people could thrive. Emmett was described as being responsible, funny, and an infectiously high-spirited child, and was also known for having a speech impediment. When he was 14 years old his great uncle Moses Wright came from Mississippi to visit Emmett’s family. When his uncle left with Emmett’s cousin Emmett wanted to go with them to spend time with his cousins and begged his mother to allow him to go to Mississippi. Reluctantly his mother agreed and this decision would forever be remembered.

Three days after Emmett had arrived in Mississippi on August 24, 1955 he and a group of teenage boys entered Bryant’s Grocery and Meat Market to buy some drinks after being outside all day. The woman working at the cash register, Carolyn Bryant claimed Emmett Till flirted with her by asking for a date and grabbed her hand. She was the wife Roy Bryant who was the owner of the store, and she told her husband about what had happened. Four days after the boys entered the store, at approximately 2:30 am on August 28, 1955 Roy Bryant and his half brother J.W. Milam kidnapped Till from Moses Wright’s house. Then Till was beaten brutally, dragged to the bank of the Tallahatchie River, shot in the head, tied with barbed wire to a large metal fan and his body was shoved into the water. Till’s uncle Moses reported his disappearance to the local authorities and three days later Till’s body was pulled out from the river. His face was so disfigured that he was unrecognizable, and the only way his uncle Moses was able to identify Till was by the ring on his finger that was engraved with his father’s initials “L.T.” After the body was found it was shipped to Chicago. There his mother, Mamie Till decided to have an open-casket funeral and her reasoning was to, “Let the world see what has happened, because there is no way I could describe this. And I needed somebody to help me tell what it was like.”

The kidnapping and murder trial of Roy Bryant and J.W. Milam began on September 19, 1955 and the final verdict was reached on September 23, 1995. Regardless of the tremendous amount of evidence and pleas for justice, the panel of all white male jurors acquitted Bryant and Milam of all charges. The deliberation lasted for 67 minutes. Four months later in January 1956 the two men Bryant and Milam confessed to Look magazine in exchange for $4,000, that they did in fact commit the crime. Because of double jeopardy laws the men were protected and could not be sent to trial again, so they freely told the entire story.

The death of Emmett Till was crucial in triggering the American Civil Rights Movement. Although Mamie Till could never get over the pain of losing her son, she did understand that what had happened to Emmett Till was able to open the eyes of America to the racial hatred that was tormenting the country. Also, by opening their eyes it allowed for a substantial protest movement for racial equality and justice. Only 100 days after the murder of Till, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on an Alabama bus. This then caused the yearlong Montgomery Bus Boycott. Nine years after the Boycott, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964. This Act then outlawed various forms of racial discrimination and segregation. Then one year later in 1965 the Voting Rights Act was passed which outlawed discriminatory voting practices.

The trail of Emmett Till is still not completely over. As of 2007 Carolyn Bryant admitted to lying about what she said Till had said/ done to her while in the market. She confessed to Timothy Tyson who then wrote about it in his book entitled, The Blood of Emmett Till. This does not change the outcome of the trail because the damage has already been done. However, it does exhibit a modern testament to the racist and unfair legal system that has long refused to give African- American people fair treatment and judgment.

Works Cited:

“Emmett Till.” Biography.com. A&E Networks Television, 27 Jan. 2017. Web. 15 Apr.   2017.

“The death of Emmett Till.” History.com A&E Television Networks, n.d. Web. 15 Apr.   2017.

“Emmett Till.” Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 13 Apr. 2017. Web. 16 Apr. 2017.

“Emmett Till Murder.” Famous Trials. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Apr. 2017.

USATODAY. “What’s next for Emmett Till’s accuser after she lied.” YouTube. YouTube, 08 Feb.         2017. Web. 14 Apr. 2017.