President Joe Biden set to announce national monument for Emmett Till

Joe Biden set to create Emmett Till national monument to honor lynched teen

• Emmett Till was lynched in 1955 after he was accused of whistling at a white woman outside of a grocery store
• His killers were acquitted, but images of his mutilated body helped spark civil rights cries
• President Joe Biden is set to announce new monuments to honor Till and his mother, Mamie Till-Mob, in Illinois and Mississippi

President Joe Biden is set to create a national monument for Emmett Till – the 14-year-old boy lynched in Mississippi after allegedly whistling at a white woman.

Biden is set to make the announcement Tuesday on what would have been Till’s 82nd birthday, according to the Associated Press. 

Till, who was born in Chicago, was abducted, tortured and killed in 1955 after he was accused of flirting with a woman outside of a grocery store. 

After he was killed, Till’s mutilated body was put on display in an open casket. The images of his remains helped spark civil rights rallying cries. 

The newest monuments will be constructed in Illinois and Mississippi and will honor both Till and his mother. 

Emmett Till, who was lynched in Mississippi in 1955, is set to be honored with a national monument 

Joe Biden is set to make the announcement Tuesday on what would have been Till’s 82nd birthday

Officials say the monuments will protect places that were central to Till’s life and death. They will also mark the acquittal of his white killers and his mother’s activism. 

In August 1955, Till visited relatives near Money, Mississippi. He spoke to Carolyn Bryant, a white woman, who was married to the owner of a grocery store. Till was accused of flirting with her. 

Nights after the incident, her husband, Roy, and half-brother, J.W. Millam, went to abduct Till. They took him away, beat and mutilated his body. Till was then shot in the head and his body was sunk in the Tallachatchie River. 

Till’s body was recovered days later. His mother, Mamie Till-Mob, held an open casket funeral in Chicago. The images of Till’s remains helped rally support for black civil rights and white sympathy.

Roy and J.W. were acquitted of the murder but later admitted to the crime. 

His mother, Mamie Till-Mob, held an open casket funeral in Chicago. Both will be honored with the new monuments

The images of Till’s remains helped rally support for black civil rights and white sympathy.

Outside Bryant’s Grocery in Mississippi, Till was accused of flirting with a white woman

In August 2022, a grand jury declined to indict Carolyn Bryant Donham, 88, whose accusations set off the series of events that ended in Till’s death. 

After hearing seven hours of testimony, they determined that there was not sufficient evidence to indict Donham. Charges of both kidnaping and manslaughter were considered.  

The DailyMail.com exclusively revealed that Donham, 88, is living in a small apartment community in Kentucky. She suffers from cancer, is legally blind and is receiving end of life hospice care – and photos showed her with oxygen tubes looped over her ears.

Asked if she or her son, Thomas Bryant, would speak about Till and the events that destroyed and re-shaped the worlds of so many, Bryant, shook his head while Donham stood by silently.

After their acquittal in the Emmett Till trial, defendant Roy Bryant (right), smokes a cigar as his wife happily embraces him and his half brother, J.W. Milam (left) and his wife show jubilation

In August 2022, a grand jury declined to indict Carolyn Bryant Donham , 88, whose accusations set off the series of events that ended in Till’s death

The news that the grand jury had declined to charge Donham made it increasingly unlikely that she will ever be prosecuted for her role in the events that led to Till´s death. 

A group searching the basement of the Leflore County Courthouse in June discovered the unserved arrest warrant charging Donham, then-husband Roy Bryant and brother-in-law J.W. Milam in Till’s abduction in 1955.

The warrant was based on the Sheriff’s belief that Donham played a part in the kidnapping of Till, that she drove around the town of Money, Mississippi seeking him out and ultimately identified the terrified teen when he was brought to her on the night of Sunday August 28 that year, dragged from his bed, to be tortured and murdered by Bryant and Milam.

A police note on the back of the warrant says that she wasn’t arrested because she was not in the county.

Yet a local sheriff told reporters at the time that he didn’t want to ‘bother’ her since she had two little boys to care for.

Donham’s former husband, Bryant, who died in 1994, was ultimately acquitted of murder. Donham, however, managed to evade charges or any consequences in a case that shocked the world for its brutality. 

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