Lynching (Englisch)

Lynching – Emmett Till 31.08.10

Lynching

• If someone is brutalized after a real or a supposed crime and killed without being judged by a court this person is lynched
• In the USA blacks received legal or illegal death sentence more often than whites who had been accused for the same crimes
• Collective violence against blacks (many whites lynched less blacks)
• The victims often were raped, their holdings were stolen and they received torture
• Offences were e.g. talking back, looking for white woman, not being able to repay money

Emmett Till

• Black 14-year old boy who lived in the North
• By visiting relatives in Mississippi in 1955 he went to a store whose owners were Roy and Carolyn Bryant
• It is said that Emmett grabbed Carolyn Bryant at the waist, asked her for a date and said “bye bye baby” on the way outside
• Roy Bryant and his half brother John William Milan took Emmett from the house tortured and shot him and threw him into the Tallahatchie River
• Trial started in Mississippi, Mose Wright who was the aunt of Emmett Till identified him and also Bryant and Milan as the persons who took Emmett from the house
• Other persons, mostly blacks also gave evidence against Bryant and Milan, but they were pardoned
• There were lots of protests under the population in the North and the blacks in the South
• The case of Emmett Till is a reason for the beginning of the Civil Rights Movement