The murder of Emmett Till
In August 1955 a 14-year-old Black boy from Chicago was tortured and murdered in Mississippi; his mother's decision to hold an open-casket funeral seared the nation's conscience and helped ignite the civil rights movement.
Key figures
On August 28, 1955, Emmett Till, a 14-year-old Black boy from Chicago visiting family in Money, Mississippi, was abducted, tortured, and murdered by two white men after a white woman, Carolyn Bryant, accused him of offending her in her family's store — a claim she reportedly recanted decades later. His body was pulled from the Tallahatchie River, weighted with a cotton-gin fan.
His mother, Mamie Till-Mobley, insisted on an open-casket funeral so the world would see what had been done to her son. Photographs of his mutilated body, published in Jet and the Black press, reached millions and became some of the most consequential images of the century. An all-white jury acquitted his killers in barely an hour; protected against double jeopardy, the two men later confessed in a paid magazine interview.
Till's murder is widely regarded as a catalyst of the civil rights movement — Rosa Parks later said she was thinking of Emmett Till when she refused to give up her seat that December. Nearly seventy years on, in 2022, the Emmett Till Antilynching Act finally made lynching a federal hate crime.
Resources
Books·2
The definitive account of the case, in which Carolyn Bryant reportedly recanted part of her 1955 testimony.
A young-reader history of the 1955 murder of Emmett Till and the trial that helped spark the civil rights movement.
Documentaries·4
The official home of the landmark 14-part civil-rights documentary.
Stanley Nelson''s acclaimed PBS documentary on the murder and trial (clips, transcript, timeline).
The 2005 documentary credited with helping reopen the federal investigation into the case.
Three-part 2022 docuseries on Mamie Till-Mobley and the case, executive-produced by Will Smith and Jay-Z.
The web
Connections to other moments, systems, and investigations — the links rarely drawn together.
- connects to (incoming)·EventThe trial and acquittal of Emmett Till's killers
The trial that followed the murder and ended in acquittal.
- connects to·ThreadJim Crow
An all-white jury acquitted the killers — Jim Crow justice in plain view.
- part of·ThreadThe Civil Rights Movement
A catalyst of the modern civil rights movement.
- part of·ThreadThe Anti-Lynching Movement
A lynching whose exposure powered the long campaign against racial terror.
Where to go next
The trial that followed the murder and ended in acquittal.
An all-white jury acquitted the killers — Jim Crow justice in plain view.
A catalyst of the modern civil rights movement.
A lynching whose exposure powered the long campaign against racial terror.