The Barn: The Secret History of a Murder in Mississippi

Political leaders spoke about God’s support of segregation to crowds of thousands that summer in 1955. Lamar Smith, who was encouraging Black Americans to vote, stood in front of a courthouse with absentee ballots. Such ballots allowed Black Americans to vote without intimidation. In front of dozens of witnesses, Smith was shot. The sheriff allowed one of the killers to escape, and the grand jury declined to indict any of the accused. 

It was into this environment that Till arrived. Maurice Wright, Simeon’s brother, picked up Till, Parker, and Moses at the train station. He noticed that Till was chubby and not dressed for the cotton fields. A few days later, the local boys “got terrified” when Till set off firecrackers in town (236). They told him never to do that again, as it angered white people. The cotton picking was very difficult work for Till. After the first day, Moses allowed him to stay home and help there.

Several children went into Bryant’s Grocery in Money. They were not supposed to be in Money, as Black Americans were supposed to go to the store in East Money. Present on the trip were Till, Parker, Maurice, Simeon, Ruthie Mae Crawford, and Roosevelt Crawford. Till and Parker went into the store for snacks. When Parker exited the store, only Till and Carolyn Bryant, the clerk, were in the store. When Till did not emerge from the store momentarily, Simeon entered, and the two came out. 

While conflicting accounts emerged of what happened in the store, Simeon said that nothing inappropriate happened. When Till left the store, he simply said goodbye without adding the deferential “ma’am” (243). Angry at the slight, Carolyn left the store to retrieve the gun in her car. At that point, Till whistled. When the others heard that, they panicked and left. When the boys returned to the Wrights’ that night, Till asked his cousins not to tell Moses about what happened. He feared that he would be sent home. After a couple of days, the incident faded from the children’s memories.

Another family bought the grocery store two months later, and it closed in the 1980s. One of the jurors, Ray Tribble, bought the store and allowed it to rot. Its old doors are in a museum. In a sense, Thompson comments, the rotting store is “a metaphor for the way Mississippi has tried to stop time” (246).

Thompson received a copy of Carolyn’s memoir when she was in hospice. Her version of events kept changing and was factually incorrect. Nevertheless, it was the story told in court. She claimed that Till grabbed her in the store and asked for a date, telling her that he had had white women before. At the time, Carolyn feared that her husband, Roy, knew about the incident. He had heard from someone else, and that angered him. Three days later, there was a knock on their door in the middle of the night. J. W. Milam was there, and Roy came back to the bedroom to retrieve his pistol. Carolyn denies going with them, yet Moses heard a woman’s voice identify Till as the “right one.” Johnny Washington, who was Black, was suspected of informing the men of Till’s location. Washington left Money soon thereafter. Both J.W. and Roy feared that other white people would judge them harshly if they did not punish Till. J.W. drove the three miles to the Wrights’ house. 

There were two Black Americans in the back who were “unwilling accomplices” (258). They are believed to have been Too Tight Collins and Henry Lee Loggins. Roy and J.W. entered the home and ordered Elizabeth Wright back to bed. They shined a light in Parker’s face and moved on to the next room. There, they found Till and Simeon. J.W. told Till to get dressed. Elizabeth pleaded with the men not to take him. Milam asked Till if he “did the smart talk up at Money” (260). Till replied affirmatively. Moses begged the men to whip Till outside, and Elizabeth offered money, to no avail. J.W. threatened Moses’s life if he identified the kidnappers.

Such home invasions were not unique in Mississippi. What was different about this one was “that the world bore witness” (262). After a female voice, most likely Carolyn, identified Till, he was placed in the back of the truck, which then headed toward Money. FBI agent Dale Killinger thinks that Till attempted to escape in Money but was returned by one of the Black accomplices. They took Till to the barn in Drew at sunrise within sight and earshot of Willie Reed. In the last hour, Reed heard Till cry for his mother. Reed saw seven people with Till in the truck: J.W., Roy, Leslie Milam, Roy’s brother-in-law Melvin Campbell, Collins, Loggins, and Hugh Clark. It is also possible that Elmer Kimbell was there.

Moses got someone to drive him to Money. When no one answered his knock at the Bryants’ store, he feared that he was looking for a corpse. Curtis Jones rang his mother in Chicago and asked that she inform Mamie that her son was missing. Mamie contacted the newspapers when she learned that her son had whistled at a white woman. A friend of the family, Rayfield Mooty, ran the local steelworkers’ union. When he learned that Till had been taken, he “got on the phone and mobilized serious people with serious power” (267). In the Delta, Elizabeth went to her brother’s house and would leave the state in a matter of days. Simeon was with a neighbor, while Moses remained to guard the house. Moses felt guilty, even though there was a gun to his head. Thompson observes that the “murder destroyed the close-knit East Money community” (269). It sped up the exodus from the Delta.

Back in Mississippi years later with Parker, Thompson discussed the pain of the journey. Parker lamented that Till simply had no idea about Southern rules. Maurice was later falsely accused of telling Roy about the incident with Carolyn. That false accusation got to him. Maurice died living on the streets of San Francisco in 1991, with his brother Simeon’s address in his pocket. Simeon brought him home. Thompson notes that Parker is 24% white and that his father “was closer in blood to the men who took Emmett than to Emmett. That’s flat-earth logic” (250). When Roy and Carolyn’s baby girl was born deaf, Roy sobbed and exclaimed that God was punishing him for what he did.

When there was no sign of Till, Parker’s father asked his brother to get Parker home safely. They missed the train that night and had to wait until morning. Terrified, Parker paced the house all night. Early that morning, William Parker drove him to the train station. When Parker arrived in Chicago, someone from the family took him to Mamie. A few nights later, white terrorists came looking for him.

In the days after the kidnapping, the Wright family had to return to the fields and pick cotton. Thompson comments, “The horror of that gets glossed over” (276). A sheriff’s deputy took Moses to Glendora, where Robert Hodges had discovered a body while fishing. The face “looked chopped up with an axe” (276). Wright identified the body as Till’s and later sat on his porch moaning. A newspaper in Chicago heard about the body and called a friend of Mamie’s, who then broke the news to her. 

Sheriff Strider and other Mississippi officials wanted the body immediately buried, given the evidence of torture. However, Mamie prevailed, and the officials agreed to send the casket north on the condition that it would remain sealed. The casket was then opened at Mamie’s request. She kept that casket open for the world to see. She then went on a crusade, speaking to crowds about this crime.

The police arrested J.W. Milam and Roy Bryant. However, “the partisan political machine” soon cast the case as one between the NAACP and white people in Mississippi (283). At issue, per this casting, was the ability to “protect” white women. The trial began on September 19, 1955. Although the jury was sequestered, the killers, jurors, defense attorneys, and politicians all had communal ties. 

At 64 years old, Moses took the stand and identified J.W. by pointing his finger. After his testimony, he spent only three more days in Mississippi. Due to death threats, he had to leave his beloved dog and the life he knew behind. He never fished or hunted again. After he died in 1977, he was buried in the same cemetery as Till.

While no transcript of the trial exists, newspaper coverage makes clear that the trial was about the challenge to segregation. As Thompson observes, “A way of life was being defended, not just two disposable rednecks” (295). The defense attorneys played to this sentiment in their closing arguments, referring to “rabble rousers” who were trying to destroy their way of life. On September 23, the jury adjourned. It took the jury only 67 minutes to reach a unanimous decision of not guilty. The jury bought the ridiculous story that Till had been hidden by the NAACP so that Mamie could collect life insurance. The purpose of this alleged ruse was to end segregation.

That November, J.W. and Roy faced kidnapping charges, to which they had already confessed. Moses returned to Mississippi to testify to a grand jury, at considerable risk. The grand jury refused to indict, and both men were released on November 9, 1955. Two weeks later, the landowner kicked Leslie and Frances Milam out and sold the barn and land to Reg Shurden.

Parker’s wife, Marvel McCain Parker, took him back to Mississippi 13 years after the murder. Marvel grew up in Mississippi before moving to Chicago. She is one of the Black descendants of Alexander McCain. The late Senator John McCain is another. After Parker returned that first time, he came back to Mississippi often. Decades later, he spoke to a crowd at the Smithsonian Museum of American History about the sign, shot 317 times, honoring Till. He has been true to his commitment to Mamie of never letting people forget Till. There is an Emmett Till exhibit at the National Museum of African American History and Culture.

In 1974, Leslie Milam was 46 and dying of cancer. He, J.W., and Roy had been ostracized by the white community following the trial. Unable to get a workforce, Leslie sold used cars and drugs. His wife, Frances, claimed not to have heard anything that night in 1955. FBI Agent Killinger finds that claim incredible, as windows were open in the summer. 

As he was dying, Leslie told a preacher that he was involved in the murder of Till. J.W. could not get anyone to rent him land after the trial. He lived in shacks and repeatedly got into trouble. In 1980, at 61, J.W. had cancer of the lungs and bladder. He died that year.