Beaten and murdered for allegedly whistling at a white woman, Emmett Till was one of many Black men, women, and children who were lynched without recourse in the century after the Civil War. His legacy endures today
, Bryant Donham’s husband Roy terrorized two other Black teenagers mistaken for Till: one in the Bryant store, and another walking in the road, who was thrown in the back of Bryant’s van before he was released.Photograph via Bettmann, Getty ImagesOn August 28 at 2:30 a.m., Bryant, his brother J.W. Milam, and at least one other person went to the Wright home looking for the boy who had “done the talking” at the grocery store.
The next day, Leflore County Sheriff’s Department arrested both Bryant and Milam and charged them with kidnapping. They admitted to taking Till but claimed they released him. Two days later, Till’s naked body was found floating in the Tallahatchie River with a 75-pound cotton gin fan tied to his neck with barbed wire. His face was disfigured nearly beyond recognition. This all white, all male jury in Sumner, Mississippi, acquitted Roy Bryant and his half brother, J.W. Milam, of murdering Till.Please be respectful of copyright. Unauthorized use is prohibited.In September 1955, J.W.
The jury acquitted Milam and Bryant after deliberating for only 67 minutes. One juror told a reporter they wouldn’t have taken so long if they hadn’t “stopped to drink pop.” In November, the brothers also escaped kidnapping charges.magazine that they took Till to the Tallahatchie River, where they shot him in the head and pushed his body into the water.After his acquittal for Till’s murder, defendant Roy Bryant , smokes a cigar as his wife Carolyn Bryant Donham embraces him. Bryant‘s brother J.
Her son’s casket arrived in Chicago locked with the seal of the state of Mississippi, but Mamie Till fought for the undertaker to open it. Once she saw her son, she made a monumental decision to have an open casket funeral. She famously told the funeral director: “Let the people see what I’ve seen.”