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Press Coverage Of 1891 Lynchings In New Orleans

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There have been many cases revolving around lynching. For instance, the famous case of Emmit Till, a young African American boy brutally murdered. Before the murder, Till decided to whistle at a white woman named Carolyn Bryant. Consequently, little did Till know that the funny joke of a whistle would cause him great misery and agony. On the night of the tragedy, two men, Roy Bryant, and J.W. Milam, went to Till’s granduncle's house looking for Till. They carried a pistol and demanded to know where the "fat boy from Chicago" was (Klawans, 2005). To teach Till a lesson for whistling at Bryant's wife, Bryant and Milam dragged Till out of the house to a deserted place. The two men "beat and gouged and hacked and shot him, wrapped the corpse in …show more content…

This case is "often considered the largest documented lynching in U.S. history" due to most lynchings being undocumented (Fouts, 2017). A tremendous mob of more than six thousand American individuals gathered outside of a prison to take justice into their own hands. The militia stormed the jail and opened fire on nineteen Italian prisoners, killing nine of them. To delight the mob, the militia hauled two Italian prisoners out into the streets and hung them, to the satisfaction of the crowd. As a result, eleven individuals were murdered. To justify the United States' actions, Italy demanded that the United States pay reparations to the victims’ families. As a consequence of the United States not paying the fine, there was a diplomatic standoff for more than a year. Subsequently, in April 1892, the United States compensated twenty-five thousand dollars to Italy (Fouts, 2017). This example shows how lynching impacts nations, making it a risk to go to war. Another illustration, after the Dakota War of 1862, on December 26, 1862, thirty-eight members of the Dakota tribe in Minnesota were

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