REMEMBERING EMMETT TILL

Young Emmett Till had his life violently cut short on this day (28th August) in 1955. Racists lynched the 14-year-old.

This happened after he was falsely accused by Carolyn Bryant of whistling at her and threatening her. Two men, one of them her husband, kidnapped Emmett, tortured him to death, mutilated his body and dumped it in a river.

Even after the men confessed to the murder, they were acquitted by an all-White jury.

Emmett’s vile murder shaped the Black civil-rights movement in America. 250,000 people attended his funeral. Close-up photographs of his face and body, and the television coverage of the funeral, turned his lynching into a global symbol of racial injustice.

But even in death, racists won’t leave Emmett alone. White nationalist and supremacist groups over the years have found ways to desecrate his memorial marker - located at the place where his swollen and disfigured body was discovered.

Who knows what a life this beautiful boy would have gone on to have. His fate is a cause of great sadness and a reminder of the atrocities our people have had to endure. May he inspire our continued resistance.

Continue to rest in peace, Emmett Till.