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Emmett Till’s Ring and the Personal Effects of Violence
CW: mentions of rape, violence, gruesome crime scene details, murder
Yesterday I had every intention of writing an article to commemorate the death of Emmett Till. Since, for the last several months, I’ve been close reading and annotating case files related to his murder, I figured I’d have the facts and data required to compose an informative essay. “Today, August 28th,” I typed, “is a painful reminder of a family tragedy that made national headlines many decades ago.” Then I stopped. The words felt empty, forced, robotic.
Pages 74 and 85 of the 464 page FBI document that details the days leading up to and following the murder of Emmett Louis Till feature photos of a ring that city officials used to identity his body. The document describes the discovery as follows:
“Upon arriving at the scene, they found the body to be lying, face down, in a boat. The boat was pulled up on the bank of the river. They turned the body over and discovered a silver ring on one of the body’s fingers.”
The document goes on to explain that the ring was inscribed “May 25, 1943” and with the initials “L.T.” Given the fact that his body was horribly disfigured as a result of a brutal and bloody beating, the ring helped city officials identify him.
Again, I’ll stop. Because phrases like “horribly disfigured” and words like “brutal” and “bloody” don’t even begin to capture the terror and violence that he experienced in his final moments.
Chester A. Miller, the Mississippi undertaker tasked with picking up a body on the banks of the Tallahatchie River, arrived at Emmett’s final resting place on August 31, 1955. He found Emmett’s body lying face down on a boat on the river bank and, after turning the body over, saw Emmett’s silver ring.
Before I continue I want you to take note of the date that Miller found Emmett’s body: August 31, 1955. That is three days after Emmett’s death. According to weather observations between September 1942 and December 2012, August temperatures in Mississippi in 1955 were in the 90s. So when Miller found Emmett’s body — with barbed wire wrapped around his neck, pieces of his skull beside his body in the boat, “the whole crown of his head” crushed in, and several other gruesome…
