Source: Unknown / Public Picture
#SayHisName
Timothy Tyson is the author of The Blood Of Emmett Till which required him to conduct research naturally but I don’t think he was ready for what he was about to find. Carolyn Bryant Donham, the 21-year old woman who accused Emmett Till of making verbal and physical advances toward her, confessed that,
“Nothing that boy did could ever justify what happened to him,”
She admitted that her on record statement was mostly fabricated. Here is her statement from the 2007 interview with Timothy Tyson:
She said that while she was unable to utter the “unprintable” word he had used (as one of the defense lawyers put it), “he said [he had]’”—done something – “with white women before.’” Then she added, “I was just scared to death.”
Although a jury did not even hear Carolyn’s words, the court spectators put her words on the record, which led to the jury acquitting the murderers of the 14-year-old boy.Carolyn Bryant and her testimony influenced the local white public’s perception of the motive for Emmett Till’s murder, saying that Till had grabbed her and verbally threatened her.
Source: Scott Olson / Getty
In 1955, 14 year old Emmett Till was abducted by two white men, J.W. Milam and his half brother Roy Bryant for flirting with Carolyn Bryant Donham. Till, on a trip visiting family in Money, Mississippi, went to a store with cousins and friends. After friends dared him, Till walked in to the store and bought some bubble gum. He came out the store saying “Bye Baby” to the clerk (Donham). Roy Bryant, the proprietor of the store, went to Till’s great uncle’s house demanding to see the boy and forced Emmett into their car. 3 days later, the corpse of Emmett Till was found and flown back to Chicago where his mother had an open casket funeral. Jet Magazine covered the story and made it a national story shifting and shaping the complexities of civil rights in America.
Source: Vanity Fair
