Much of my writing concerns victim sanctity taboos and taboo enforcement. It’s not uncommon for me to find myself blocked by someone on twitter that I’ve never tried to follow.  

This is the hardest article I’ve ever written, it deals with subject matter that others would prefer be left alone.  Sometimes there’s lessons in uncomfortable things that no one talks about.

Mamie and Louis Till had a tumultuous relationship. Mamie and Emmett lived in a very nice 3 bedroom, 1 bathroom, apartment in South Chicago. 

Louis Till had been given a choice to go to war or to go to jail. Like most men of his generation, he chose war. 

It was the right thing to do.  

This article tells the story of Emmett Till’s short life through the choices of the adults around him. In some ways, it also illustrates the differences between how differently society treats Black men and how they treat Black women. 

Not all of these are comfortable, not all of them suit your political narrative.

Early Years

1. Emmett Till was raised by a single mother.

While Mamie Elizabeth Till-Bradley-Mobley nee’ Carthan had been married to Emmett’s father at the time of his birth, he was derogated from the home. Like many men, he went to Germany in World War II and did not come home. 

Mamie married and divorced Pink Bradley, in less than two years, when Emmett was a child.  

We can not say that Emmett Till was more impulsive than other teenage boys. We do know with certainty that   Female led households without biological fathers tend to produce more impulsive, self-destructive children, especially boys.  

This is independent of race, and while taboo and undiscussed, is non-controversial.  

2. Louis Till’s Popularity with Women, Physical Aggression and Execution

Louise Till was a boxer and very popular with women. Mamie broke off their engagement, but he persisted and they were married at 18. Emmett was born 9 months later.

Mamie left Louis and threw scalding hot water at him for his infidelity and choking her to unconsciousness when Emmett was still a baby. 

She obtained a restraining order, which Louis violated and was then forced by a judge to choose between enlisting in the war or going to prison.

Louis entered the U.S. Army in 1943 and was subsequently tried and executed for “willful misconduct.”  That willful misconduct was the alleged rape of two women and the rape and murder of another woman.

American Poet Ezra Pound, who was in prison with Louis, memorialized him in his wartime poem, Pisan Cantos:^[6]

Lines 171–173 of Canto 74

“Till was hung yesterday

for murder and rape with trimmings”

Life Magazine wrote, “Louis Till died fighting for his country in France” – which is technically true.  

I can tell you first-hand, being the child of a serial murderer from a violent household doesn’t guarantee that a person will have emotional and/or impulse control issues. The teen years, in particular, can create significant challenges.  

Emmett Till only had one to help him work through these complex issues.

The Teen Years

3. The ages of the accuser and the accused

Accused

Little is known about the year Emmett Till spent as a teenager, other than that his uncle had come to visit him in Chicago. They planned a visit to Mississippi. His mother told him Chicago and Mississippi were different cultures and to be careful. 

He said he understood.

Emmett had been a teenager for one year, three months, and three days when he walked into that store in Money, Mississippi.  

Teenage boys are dumbasses. There are no exceptions, although some are also smart asses.  Every honest person who’s ever raised a boy to manhood knows both of these facts. They are reckless, risk taking, and constantly testing out boundaries on their way to maturity.  

We don’t discuss these realities about Till.  He is only to be perceived as a victim – a patient, deserving of care. Once established as a victim, it becomes harder to perceive that person as an agent.

Agents do things, they’re responsible; Victims have things done to them, they’re not responsible in any way.

Accuser

Ask any 18 year-old college student whether they believe that 21 year-olds are fully mature adults, and you will get a different answer than you would get if you asked a seasoned neuroscientist.  

Human brains are not fully formed until somewhere between the ages of 24-26. It is not until then that they create healthy cause and effect connections.

Carolyn Bryant, 21, and her husband, 24, and Till himself for that matter, could have never seen how these events might have played out.  Their brains were not that developed.

There are many conflicting versions of what happened inside the store, but there’s general agreement that many people saw Carolyn come out of the store yelling and brandishing a gun. 

When asked about this by her husband Roy Bryant, she had a lot of explaining to do. 

The Elephant in the Court is a Kangaroo

The Elephant – The Agency of Women

Humans lie; Women are Humans; Women therefore lie. This logical state is guaranteed to trigger some cognitive dissonance in the post MeToo era.  Some bigots will say, “What motivation would she possibly have to lie?” 

For one, to protect her husband, who owned the store she undoubtedly relied on for her livelihood.  Secondly, to protect herself and distance herself from a histrionic overreaction to Till.  

Many years later, she recanted the story she told her husband and what she said in court.  While we’ll never know what she told her husband, we do know her testimony was not allowed in front of the jury.

The Other Elephant – The Agency of Blacks

It’s been widely understood that poor whites in the South were angry with Southern Blacks about the Civil War. I’ve never heard if Blacks in the South were angry about slavery.  The racism of Southern Whites is the stuff of legend, the animus of Southern Blacks is far less discussed.  

Some prominent cultural critics say that Blacks can not be racist because of their definition of racism.

Veteran Journalist David Halberstam, who’d covered the notorious Bruno Hauptmann and Machine Gun Kelly trials, said that this was the most publicity for any trial he had ever seen.  People from all over the country descended on Money, Mississippi – population 400. The trial was held in neighboring Sumner, roughly the same size. (60/40 white/Black racial split, for those keeping score)

Many accounts have been made of “white men being allowed to wear guns” but I’ve never seen any information about strong security inside or outside of the courtroom.

Following WWII, many adult men were trained in the use of firearms.  Army photographer, Ernest Withers, from Memphis, famously smuggled a 1950’s camera into the courtroom, despite a court order prohibiting them.

There were 180 people inside the segregated courtroom, mostly people from out of town, and tensions were high.

Photos of a mutilated body and a grieving mother had been printed and distributed, nationwide. A person would have to suspend considerable disbelief to believe everyone in that courtroom had legitimate safety concerns.

A significant portion of today’s population believe that Blacks fearing violence from whites is rational and that whites fearing violence from Blacks is irrational and racist.  

The agency of Women and the agency of Blacks is taboo. The enforcement of the patiency (universal victimhood) of Women and Blacks deserves its own article.

The Trial of J.W. Milam and Roy Bryant

Criminal trials in the US are adversarial, by design. The Prosecution must present its case and prove it beyond a reasonable doubt, AND prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendants are guilty.  The Defense has an obligation to make the State prove that case. 

The jury heard the testimony and cross-examination of the State’s witness, Mamie Till. 

The jury did not hear the testimony and cross-examination the Defense’s witness, Carolyn Bryant.

The Defense maintained that the body found was not Emmett Till’s, and questioned Mrs. Till’s motives due to a $400 life insurance policy. The mutilated body in the famous open-casket funeral had originally

been identified as a white male.

Here’s a 1.5 page press release, written by St. Paul, MN native, Roy Wilkins, Executive Secretary of the NAACP, within 24 hours of the body being found.  

Here is a link to the 354 page transcript which was released 60 years after the trial. And here is Carolyn Bryant’s complete testimony, which contrary to popular belief was not heard by the all white jury, as well as Vault 1 and Vault 2 of the FBI investigation.

The press release contains every relevant detail in the standard narrative.  The other documents present information you’ve probably never heard before. 

The Alleged Murder Conspiracy Confessions

We’ve all heard that Look magazine paid the men, now protected by double jeopardy, to admit to the killing for an article. That’s half true, and few of us have heard that both men recanted that paid confession.

We didn’t hear the second half of that story.

We also heard about an historian who interviewed Carolyn Bryant who admitted “she lied!” and that the FBI reopened the case.  

Fewer of us have heard that she didn’t. Virtually no one knows, and her book, “More than a Wolf Whistle” is being withheld from publishing until 2038, after her death.

In December 2021, the U.S. The Department of Justice under Joe Biden, announced that it had closed its investigation of the case.

Mamie Till broke fundraising records until a falling out with the N.A.A.C.P. over money.  As of this writing, Emmett’s name is being used in legislation proposed in the Federal government and Minnesota, as well as for fundraising.

Bryant testified that Till had grabbed and threatened her inside the store – and that he had used an “unprintable” word when he told her he had been intimate “with white women before.”

There’s a lot we don’t talk about with this case.