For the Natchez civil rights monument commemorating black marchers’ “Parchman Ordeal” 54 years ago, $38,300 was included last March in a bill that earmarks money for a variety of local projects around the state.
Natchez Mayor Darryl Grennell has been leading the efforts to build the monument that will memorialize the plight more than 150 blacks endured in 1965 when arrested and jailed by Natchez law-enforcement officers as the marchers were protesting for civil rights.
With a total cost earlier estimated at about $115,000, the black granite monument and accompanying plaza is located at the corner of Jefferson and Canal streets on the Natchez City Auditorium grounds.
The state funds for this can be combined with the $38,300 the city Board of Aldermen has allocated along with more than $15,000 the mayor has said has been raised in private funds for the monument’s construction.
It’ll commemorate the “Parchman Ordeal” when blacks protesting segregation and obstruction of their voting rights were arrested. They were thrown into the city and county jails or corralled into City Auditorium. According to historical accounts, many marchers wound up being bused to the state prison at Parchman, stripped naked in cold weather and inhumanely packed into cells in unsanitary conditions. They were released a few days later.
Grennell has said the monument is “to memorialize those who were part of this horrific event,”
City funds were provided by money it gets from the Magnolia Bluffs Casino in Natchez. The casino pays rent for leasing the city-owned land it occupies.
Plans for the “Proud to Take a Stand” monument called for it to be a six-foot-tall, 12-foot-long semicircle monument. It’s to be accompanied by a sitting wall and small plaza with a written narrative of the event and names of those arrested. It’ll also take note of the official contrition expressed in 2015 by the Natchez Board of Aldermen in a resolution apologizing to blacks “who suffered these injustices.”
From the Parchman Ordeal GoFundMe page:
Our mission is to memorialize and commemorate those who were unjustly arrested in Natchez, MS. October 2-5, 1965 by establishing a monument in honor of those wronged for taking a stand against racism and injustices against blacks in Natchez.
About this project
The Story
The south is no stranger to racial division. Natchez, MS. in the early 1960s was heir to segregation, oppression, and a local tourism economy built on a promotion of white antebellum culture and the motto “Where the Old South Still Lives.” Now, 53 years later, after hundreds of black Natchez citizens faced unjust, harsh imprisonment at Mississippi State Penitentiary in Parchman, the city plans to memorialize those involved in the infamous ordeal by remembering those who took a stand against injustice with a monument.
Background
KKK violence, public marches in Natchez streets, and harassment in retaliation for earl voter registration activities led to a climate of unrest in Natchez by early 1960s. The assassination of Civil Rights Activist Medgar Evers in Jackson and the powerful stand by Rosa Parks in Montgomery were inspirational events to young local activists in Natchez.
With tension on the rise, a list of 12 demands were presented to the Natchez government, with a threat of marches to follow if they were not met. The list included:
1. For the mayor and board of aldermen to denounce the KKK publicly.
2. Equal employment opportunities for blacks, including positions on the police force.
3. To desegregate all public accommodations in compliance with the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
To provide equal public services to residents in Negro sections of Natchez.
5. To desegregate Natchez schools and appoint blacks to the school board.
The Mayor and Board rejected the demands. On Saturday, October 2nd, more than 300 people lined up to march in defiance of the injunction; another 150 planned to march Sunday. Though these marches were to begin from two baptist churches downtown, the participants were picked up immediately on the sidewalks in front of the churches before the marches could proceed and taken to the Natchez City Auditorium for holding.
All were arrested on charges of parading without a permit, and with the local jail filled, those over 12 years of age were sent to Parchman Penitentiary, more than 200 miles away. At Parchman everyone was stripped of their clothing. Men and boys were kept naked and housed and placed in cells that was only intended for 2, but with more than 10, with fans blowing and windows left open to the cold air at night. Women and girls were hosed down but allowed to keep their underwear on. All were given laxatives and allowed only minimal toilet paper. They were left to find their own way back to Natchez, with most being back within 5 days. The KKK harassed and threaded those who drive north to assist or check on them.
More than 100 marchers were arrested on October 4th, bringing the total number of those arrested in Natchez to more than 500.
