Carolyn Bryant Donham dead: Woman at the center of Emmett Till’s lynching dies at 88
Luke Gentile
Video Embed
Carolyn Bryant Donham, the woman whose accusation led to the brutal lynching and death of Emmett Till, died Tuesday at 88 in Louisiana.
The death was confirmed by Chief Investigator for the Calcasieu Parish Coroner’s Office Megan LeBoeuf, according to a report.
WATCH: KARI LAKE RECALLS HEATED CONFRONTATION WITH MIKA BRZEZINSKI AT AIRPORT
Donham had been battling cancer when she died in end-of-life care, LeBoeuf said.
Her death brings a sad chapter to a close, according to Devery Anderson, author of Emmett Till: The Murder That Shocked the World and Propelled the Civil Rights Movement.
Individuals “have been clinging to hope that she could be prosecuted,” Anderson said. “She was the last remaining person who had any involvement. … Now that can’t happen.”
“It’s going to be a wound, because justice was never done,” he added. “Some others were clinging to hope she might still talk or tell the truth. Now it’s over.”
Till had just turned 14 years old when he traveled from Chicago to visit family in Mississippi.
While there, he allegedly whistled at Bryant, a white woman, at a store in the small town of Money.
Roy Bryant, Donham’s then-husband, and J.W. Milam, his half-brother, later kidnapped Till from the bed he was sleeping in, savagely beat him, shot him in the head, and discarded his corpse in the Tallahatchie River.
Both men were acquitted of murder charges, only to later confess they had beaten and killed the Chicago teenager.
Till’s funeral was attended by over 50,000 people, and his casket was left open so the world could see what had happened to him.
Onlookers were shocked when they saw Till’s bloated and brutalized body, and his lynching helped fuel the Civil Rights Movement.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
Donham long maintained her innocence in the Till case, and her testimony about his lynching and her role in it has changed throughout her life.
A grand jury declined to indict her in 2007, according to the report.