by Till-Mobley, Mamie; Benson, Christopher; Jackson, Jesse Rev (FRW)
PRAISE FOR
Death of Innocence
“The book does what it should: informs or reminds people of what a courageous figure for justice [Mamie Till-Mobley] was and how important she and her son were to setting the stage for the modern-day civil rights movement.”
—The Detroit News (four out of four stars)
“In Death of Innocence … Till-Mobley offers to history the gift of her son. Now it’s possible to ask questions about the murder and, in a new, deeper way, take the real-life boy into account.”
—The Columbus Dispatch
“A testament to a mother’s devotion to her son.”
—The Dallas Morning News
“Till-Mobley speaks with a powerful voice that produces tears of profound sadness, anger, and finally, great admiration for this mother who experienced the death of her only child.”
—Library Journal (starred review)
“In Death of Innocence, Till-Mobley describes how she dealt with her grief and rage by speaking publicly about Emmett’s murder and how the story of his life and death inspired people to protest the brutal racism that oppressed Southern blacks.”
—Chicago Sun-Times
“Death of Innocence is really a testament to the power of the indestructible human spirit—of which the tortured face of Emmett Till speaks as eloquently as the diary of Anne Frank.”
—Washington Post Book World
“Death of Innocence presents a riveting account of the tragedy that upended her life and ultimately the Jim Crow system in the South.”
—Chicago Tribune
“In Death of Innocence … Till-Mobley courageously tells how [Emmett’s] killing changed her life and our country’s history.”
—Reader’s Digest (Editor’s Choice)
“Death of Innocence documents an American tragedy and the stubborn faith it took to transcend it.”
—O: The Oprah Magazine
“None of us can really know [Till-Mobley’s] pain, but through Death of Innocence, we do know her grace. Her book is a story of faith and hope—but not blind faith and hope; rather faith and hope as action, as being worthy of the challenge.”
—NIKKI GIOVANNI, Essence
“Mamie Till-Mobley still has a message that should be heard and discussed by citizens of all races and all ages.”
—The Chicago Defender
“Death of Innocence is an important document from an extraordinary woman.”
Black Issues Book Review
“I am so thankful for the bravery and courage Mamie demonstrated when she shared her only child with the world. The news of Emmett’s death caused many people to participate in the cry for justice and equal rights, including myself. The respect I have felt for her since 1955 will always live with me. She was blessed among women to carry the mantle with grace and dignity.”
—ROSA PARKS
“Death of Innocence reveals Mamie Till-Mobley for what she was: one of the greatest, but largely unsung, heroes in all of African-American history. Her words are powerful; her strength and vision in the face of the unspeakable horror of her son’s death are astonishing. The life and work of Mamie Till-Mobley serves as an inspiration to all who love justice.”
—STANLEY NELSON, executive producer and director
of the documentary The Murder of Emmett Till
“An epic drama of despair and hope. The most powerful personal story, so far, from the civil rights movement.”
—MORRIS DEES, Southern Poverty Law Center
“Mamie Till-Mobley has written a powerful book in which she reveals to us the life she shared with her son, Emmett Till, and her pride and joy as he became a remarkable young man. This story shows us how the cruelty of a few changed the life of a loving, caring mother and the history of a nation.”
—KADIATOU DIALLO, author of
My Heart Will Cross This Ocean:
My Story, My Son, Amadou
“Mamie Till-Mobley has always deserved our admiration for her insistence that the world know her son’s terrible fate, and for her determination to confront his killers in a Mississippi courtroom. Now, in the final act of her life, she gives us an account of the crime, its victim, and its aftermath that is as historically valuable as it is inspiring.”
—PHILIP DRAY, author of
At the Hands of Persons Unknown:
The Lynching of Black America
A One World Book
Published by The Random House Publishing Group
Copyright © 2003 by Mamie Till-Mobley and Christopher Benson
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by One World, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. Originally published in hardcover by Random House, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, in 2003.
One World is a registered trademark and the One World colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.
“I Have a Dream” copyright © 1963 Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Copyright © 1991 Estate of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Reprinted by permission of Writer’s House, New York.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Till-Mobley, Mamie, d. 2003.
Death of innocence: the story of the hate crime that changed America / by Mamie Till-Mobley and Christopher Benson.
p cm.
eISBN: 978-1-58836-324-4
1. Till, Emmett, 1941–1955—Death and burial. 2. Lynching—Mississippi. 3. Hate crimes—Mississippi. 4. African American youth—Crimes against—Mississippi. 5. Racism—Mississippi. 6. Trials (Murder)—Mississippi. 7. Mississippi—Race relations.
I. Benson, Chris, 1953– II. Title.
HV6465.M7T55 2003 364.1′34—dc21 2003046928
www.oneworldbooks.net
v3.1
We cannot afford the luxury of self-pity. Our top priority now is to get on with the building process. My personal peace has come through helping boys and girls reach beyond the ordinary and strive for the extraordinary. We must teach our children to weather the hurricanes of life, pick up the pieces, and rebuild. We must impress upon our children that even when troubles rise to seven-point-one on life’s Richter scale, they must be anchored so deeply that, though they sway, they will not topple.
MAMIE TILL-MOBLEY
November 5, 1989
Dedication of the Civil Rights Memorial,
Southern Poverty Law Center Headquarters,
Montgomery, Alabama
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Foreword
Introduction
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Afterword
Dedication
Acknowledgments
Other Books by This Author
About the Authors
FOREWORD
God’s magnificent women.
God chooses ordinary people to do extraordinary things when they honor His will and His way. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., contended all cannot be famous because all cannot be well known, but all can be great because all can serve.
The struggle for our emancipation is a history of strong women who by their courage, commitment, and craftiness made America honor her creed of “… life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness …” for all. Magnificent women: Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth, Ida B. Wells, Constance Baker Motley, Madam C. J. Walker, Fannie Lou Hamer, Rosa Parks, Gertrude Johnson Williams, mother of John H. Johnson. In that tradition of a high league of service has stood Mamie Till-Mobley. She was an emancipation heroine.
Magnificent women.
Strong women don’t merely birth children. They cultivate them to render service. One example is that of the mother of the Biblical Moses.
When the government’s decree was issued to kill the firstborn babies, she didn’t just cry and pray and hope. She acted. She crafted a plan, made a basket, hid him in the water, floated him toward Pharaoh’s daughter, who, in turn, would become emotionally connected to the baby and adopt Moses. Later, Moses’ mother volunteered to “babysit” her own baby.
Magnificent women who made a difference.
Mother Mary traveled by donkey to Bethlehem, and gave birth outdoors in a stable. When King Herod was frustrated that he couldn’t find Baby Jesus, he ordered all firstborn babies killed. The impression is that most mothers wept and wailed. Mary was so committed to Jesus she traveled to Africa to hide Him. Likewise, Gertrude Johnson Williams said to her son John, the dreamer, “I will give you all I have; my prayers, my love, my five hundred dollars, and put my furniture in hock.” Women of faith are courageous, committed, and crafty.
All these women went beyond giving birth, all the way to magnificent action. Mamie lost her only son so that we might have salvation. She planned to be a mother, yet she became a freedom fighter. In 1954, Brown v. Board of Education broke the legal back of segregation. But the murder of Emmett Till broke the emotional back of segregation. Emmett’s death—and Mamie’s life—gave us the backbone to resist racism.
The 1954 legal victory changed the assumptions of our lives, but hardly our emotional mind-set. I remember in 1954 my grandparents trying to describe what integration meant, because the law had changed, but nothing around us had changed.
On August 28, 1955, when Emmett Till was killed, unlike with Brown there was no need for definition. It shook the consciousness of a nation. It touched our bone marrow, the DNA of our dignity.
People tend to want to cover up a lynching. But Mamie put the struggle for emancipation and her outrage above personal privacy and pride. She allowed the distorted, water-marked body from the Tallahatchie River to be displayed in an open casket, at that time the largest single civil rights demonstration. More than 100,000 demonstrated their disgust at that casket. Each one of those people who saw how her son was defaced left telling their own story. They were never the same again. Mamie’s courage unsettled people of conscience into action.
Mamie empowered the media to nationalize the lynching. Jet magazine exploded, and the tragedy became the Chicago Defender’s finest hour. It was an earthquake and Mamie used the aftershocks of that earthquake to awaken, to transform a people, and to redirect our course. Montgomery, Alabama, in 1955; Little Rock, Arkansas, in 1957; Greensboro, North Carolina, in 1960 are aftershocks of the murder of Emmett Till and the genius of his mother.
We often think of the modern civil rights movement as beginning in Montgomery in 1955 because of the dramatic arrest of Rosa Parks and the emergence of Dr. King. But that is not so. There is a scientific theory that the earth was born through the big bang. One could make the case that Emmett Till was “the big bang,” the Tallahatchie River was “the big bang” of the civil rights movement.
When Ms. Parks was asked “Why did you not go to the back of the bus after such threats?” she said she thought of Emmett Till and said she couldn’t go to the back.
Usually death stops everything. That is the calculation of the enemy. But here, death started everything. The murderers of Emmett Till miscalculated the power of people who have faith in God. People of faith are convinced and are able to say, “Though you slay me yet will I trust you, God.” The enemy puts faith in death. They feel death can protect their tyranny. If Pontius Pilate and the Roman government had known the power of the resurrection beyond the crucifixion they would have gone another way. If they had known when they lifted Him up on the cross that He would draw men unto Him, they would not have chosen state-sponsored murder, resulting in a religious movement known as Christianity.
If the men who killed Emmett Till had known his body would free a people, they would have let him live.
God had the last answer. Even death cannot stop our God. Mamie turned a crucifixion into a resurrection. Well done, Mamie, well done. You turned death into living. Well done. You awakened the world. Well done. You gave your son so a nation might be saved. Well done.
A magnificent woman.
REVEREND JESSE L. JACKSON, SR.
Chicago
January 11, 2003
INTRODUCTION
Hardly a moment goes by when I don’t think about Emmett. There are constant reminders. I see his face everywhere. It is on my datebook, on the calendar on my wall, on a special T-shirt I wear. Everywhere. Pictures and mementos fill my house, his presence fills my life. At times I will think about something he said or did—something funny, something so many years ago—and it will still make me laugh, each time just like the first time. When I am out and about, people recognize me and they want to talk about him, what his death meant to them, what I mean to them still. They just can’t help it. On the news, there are human interest stories about mothers and sons and grandsons, and I find myself thinking about what life might have been like if I still had a son to look after me in my old age, or grandsons whom I might look after, and spoil rotten. Then there are the tragic reports of child abductions and hate crimes. I know about these things. I know about them the only way you really can know about them. And I quietly pray for the grieving mothers of other missing or murdered children, hoping they will find the peace and the meaning that took me so long to find. We are connected, these other mothers and I. We share a bond, the knowledge of an exclusive few: that there can be no greater suffering than the pain of a mother who must bury her child, and be left alone to wonder if there might have been even one small thing she could have done to make a difference.
Hardly a moment goes by when I don’t think about Emmett and the promise of a lifetime. There are constant reminders. But, then, a mother really doesn’t need reminders. Just as you always remember the agony of childbirth, you can never forget the anguish of losing a child. You don’t need to be reminded of the horror you have seen—even for a brief moment—in your boy’s battered body. That vision plays back forever like a perpetual nightmare. Emmett Louis Till, my only son, my only child, was kidnapped, tortured, and murdered at the hands of white racists on August 28, 1955. That was so many years ago, yet it seems like only yesterday to a mother who needs no reminders. After all, every shattered piece of my heart has its own special memory of Emmett.
They say there are lessons to be learned from every experience in life. It has taken practically all my life to sort out the lessons here. I couldn’t see how there might possibly be any good to come of something so evil. What could the lesson have been? How could anyone deserve this? Then there was the mistreatment, the indifference of those who I thought really cared, the betrayal by those I trusted, the injustice at the hands of the justice system.
It has taken all these years of quiet reflection to recognize the true meaning of my experience, and Emmett’s. It took quit
e a while for me to accept how his murder connected to so many things that make us what we are today. I didn’t see right away, but there was an important mission for me, to shape so many other young minds as a teacher, a messenger, an active church member. God told me, “I took away one child, but I will give you thousands.” He has. And I have been grateful for that blessing.
That is why, for forty-seven years, I wasn’t quite ready to write this book. It took a long time for me to reach this kind of deep understanding. I have been approached, oh, so many times by people who wanted to tell my story or put words in my mouth to tell their version of my story. But I just couldn’t do that. I owe Emmett more than that. I owe him the absolute understanding I finally have come to appreciate; the deep understanding of why he lived and died and why I was destined to live so long after his death. You see, my story is more than the story of a lynching. It is more than the story of how, with God’s guidance, I made a commitment to rip the covers off Mississippi, USA—revealing to the world the horrible face of race hatred. It is more than the story of how I took the privacy of my own grief and turned it into a public issue, a political issue, one which set in motion the dynamic force that led ultimately to a generation of social and legal progress for this country. My story is more than all of that. It is the story of how I was able to pull myself back from the brink of desolation, and turn my life around by digging deep within my soul to pull hope from despair, joy from anguish, forgiveness from anger, love from hate. I want people to know about all of that and how they might gain some useful understanding for their own lives from my experience. But I also want people to know my Emmett, the way they might have known him had they met him so many years ago—as the driven, industrious, clever boy that he was at age fourteen. Forever fourteen.
Thankfully, Emmett has helped to steer me in my lifelong odyssey. He does still. I often hear his voice guiding or chiding, the voice of a boy much older than his years. In fact, as I began discussions for this book, I sat down at my kitchen table, my workspace. As I sometimes do, I asked that a trifold picture frame of images of Emmett and me be taken down from atop the china hutch in my living room and placed on the table in front of me. I focused on my son while I considered this book. I scanned the pictures that portrayed a life from infancy through boyhood into adolescence. I prayed and asked for help in making this important decision. The result is in your hands. Now, only now, I can share the wisdom of my age. I am experienced, but not cynical. I’ve been disappointed by so many of the people I’ve trusted over the years, but still I am hopeful that we all can be better than we are. I’ve been brokenhearted, but I still maintain an oversized capacity for love.