The burning of Ell Persons
22 May 1917The Wolf River bridge on Macon Road, Shelby County, TN
Ell Persons was burned alive at the Wolf River bridge before a crowd of thousands who came out by car with their children. The NAACP's investigation founded its Memphis branch.
Note: Describes a public burning attended by families, and the display of remains.
Ell Persons was a woodcutter, arrested for the murder of sixteen-year-old Antoinette Rappel after a confession obtained under interrogation that no one has since considered reliable.
On 22 May 1917 he was taken from the officers moving him and burned alive at the Wolf River bridge on Macon Road, east of Memphis. The time and place had circulated in advance. Thousands came - estimates run from five thousand upward - driving out from the city, bringing children, buying sandwiches from vendors who had set up at the site. Afterwards parts of his body were thrown into Beale Street, the centre of Black Memphis, as a message.
The NAACP sent James Weldon Johnson to investigate. His report, and the organising that followed, produced the Memphis branch of the NAACP, which became one of the strongest in the South. No one was prosecuted. A memorial was placed at the site a century later.
Sources
- May 22, 1917: Thousands Lynch Ell Persons in Memphis, TennesseeA History of Racial Injustice, Equal Justice Initiativecalendar.eji.org
- LynchingTennessee Encyclopedia, Tennessee Historical Societytennesseeencyclopedia.net