Remembering Willie Earle is a short documentary film which premiered in 2019. In 2022, it was shown on US television (PBS) (SCETV Specials).
[The letters SCETV stand for South Carolina Educational Television]
The topic of this film is the life and death of Willie Earle, a young African American man, who was born in 1923 and killed in February 1947.
He was the victim of a lynching. The last recorded lynching in South Carolina.
Here is some basic information about this film:
** Directors: Frank Carroll, Thomas Espy, Cassie Harding, and Stevie Jefferis
** Language: English
** Subtitles: English
** Run time: 17 minutes
Three persons are interviewed in this film
Here are the names of the participants
Listed in alphabetical order
** Aquillious Jackson (1929-2020) – he was a friend of Willie Earle’s
** Daniel Aldridge – he is a professor of history, Davidson College
** Ruth Ann Butler – she is the founder of Greenville Cultural Exchange
How and why did Willie Earle die?
Here is a brief account of his final moments:
On 15 February 1947, the cab driver Thomas W. Brown picked up a passenger – perhaps the passenger was an African American man
At the end of the ride, the cab driver Thomas W. Brown was attacked by the passenger. The attack was deadly. The cab driver died shortly after the attack.
On 16 February 1947, a young African American man Willie Earle was arrested and brought to the local police station where he was placed in a holding cell.
According to the police investigation, Willie Early
was the criminal who had attacked the cab driver Thomas Brown. But this fact was never proved in a court of law.
On 17 February, a large group of people, mostly local cab drivers, drove to the police station. They were convinced Willie Earle was guilty of the attack.
They feared the court system was going to let him off
easy. They did not want this to happen. They had their own plan for him.
When they got to the police station, they entered the building where they found a guard. They told him to open the cell and hand the prisoner Willie Earle over to them.
Faced with many angry men, some of whom were armed, the guard did not try to resist. He opened the cell and handed the prisoner over to the mob.
Willie Earle was taken to a car and the convoy left the police station. When the convoy reached a deserted place, they stopped and they all got out.
Willie Earle was pulled out of the car. He was
surrounded by a large group of angry men, apparently more than 30 persons, who
told him that he was a killer, and they were going to punish him.
First they beat him; then they stabbed him; and finally they shot him.
It was a lynching.
The term "lynching" does not have to be an operation in which a rope is used to hang a person. It can be used about any extrajudicial killing which is conducted by a mob.
When Willie Earle was dead, they left him on the ground and drove away. The next day his body was found. A police investigation began.
Apparently, more than thirty persons had attended the killing of Willie Earle.
Police officers were able to find more than thirty persons, mostly cab drivers, who admitted that they had been present when Willie Earle was
killed, but they all insisted that they did not do the killing. It was somebody else.
Twenty-six persons signed a confession which stated that they were present when the killing took place.
Twenty-eight persons were charged with taking part in the killing of Willie Earle. A trial was held. A jury of twelve white men listened to the statements made in court.
On 21 May 1947, when the case was over, the jury retired to deliberate. After a few hours, the jury returned with a verdict: all 28 defendants were found not guilty!
The defendants celebrated, when the verdict was announced in court. But members of the African American community had nothing to celebrate.
The trial was covered by local and national media. When the trial was over, and when the verdict was announced, the New York Times declared that something positive had happened here.
What was so positive about this case?
Here is the answer:
This was the first time that white men, who were responsible for the lynching of a black man, had been brought to trial for doing this.
This time, the defendants were acquitted, but next time, things might be different.
Maybe the perpetrators will be found guilty?
Maybe those who are responsible for a lynching will be punished?
Members of the white community seemed to understand that this was probably the last time a group of white men would be able to get away with killing a black man.
The February 1947 killing of Willie Earle was the last recorded lynching in South Carolina.
What do reviewers say about this short film?
This question is not easy to answer
It is not listed on IMDb
There are no user reviews
I have not seen any reviews of this item
Here is my opinion:
The story is important. It deserves to be told, and in this short film, it is done very well.
I want to go all the way to the top with this product. I think it deserves a rating of five stars (100 percent).
PS. In 2010, a historical marker was erected in the spot where the killing took place in 1947. Two years later, in 2012, the marker was stolen.
It seems some people in South Carolina cannot accept the fact that the story of Willie Earle is told in a public place, even though it happened more than fifty years ago.
REFERENCES
# 1. Items available online
Rebecca West
“Opera in Grenville,”
The New Yorker
06 June 1947
“On This Day – 17 February 1947 – White Mob Lynches Willie Earle Near Grenville, South Carolina,”
The Equal Justice Initiative
“The lynching of Willie Earle,”
The Historical Marker Database
Mary Elizabeth DeAngelis
“Beneath the Veneer: Documentary Film Probes a Heinous Crime, Justice Left Undone,”
Davidson College News
11 January 2021
Arielle Lowe
“The lynching of Willie Earle prompted a trial, but no convictions,”
Word in Black
29 November 2021
Adam Mack
“The Lynching of Willie Earle,”
South Carolina Encyclopedia
Posted on 17 May 2016
Updated on 26 July 2022
# 2. Books
100 Years of Lynching
By Ralph Ginzburg
(1996)
At the Hands of Persons Unknown:
The Lynching of Black America
By Philip Dray
(2002 = hardcover)
(2003 = paperback)
Rough Justice:
Lynching and American Society 1874-1947
By Michael J. Pfeifer
(2006)
Lynching in America:
A History in Documents
By Christopher Waldrep
(2006)
Popular Justice:
A History of Lynching in America
By Manfred Berg
(2011 = hardcover)
(2015 = paperback)
They Stole Him Out of Jail:
Willie Earle, South Carolina’s Last Lynching Victim
By William B. Gravely
(2019)
Race and the Law in South Carolina:
From Slavery to Jim Crow
By John W. Wertheimer
(2024)
*****
A mugshot of Willie Earle
(1923-1947)
Greenville, South Carolina
Prisoner # 13948
*****
Historical marker 23 41
(the front)
The lynching of Willie Earle
*****
Historical marker 23 41
(the reverse)
The lynching of Willie Earle
*****
They Stole him Out of Jail:
Willie Earle,
South Carolina's
Last Lynching Victim
By William B. Gravely
(2019)
*****
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