Ell Persons

The interfaith prayer ceremony Sunday, May 21, marking the centennial of the lynching of Ell Persons included several mentions of the removal of Confederate monuments in the last month in New Orleans.

But during the two-hour ceremony in a field off Summer Avenue near the lynching site there were no overt calls for the city of Memphis to take the same approach of removing such monuments without advance notice.

U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen of Memphis called the actions in New Orleans “commendable.”

Descendants of both victims — the black man who was lynched and the white girl he was falsely accused of murdering — plan to be here for Sunday's prayer service.

The two women, one from Chicago, the other from Memphis, plan to go down to the river, rain or shine, to stand and pray with hundreds of others near the site of both brutal murders.

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"We have to acknowledge and address the pain before we can begin to heal," said Laura Wilfong Miller. Her great-grandmother and Antonetty Rappel's mother were sisters.

He was burned alive while at least 5,000 spectators stood by watching near the Wolf River.

On the day of his death, The Commercial Appeal published a headline alerting the public of the intended lynching. After being burned to death, parts of his charred, dismembered body were taken to Beale Street and thrown at black pedestrians.

His name was Ell Persons; and though his murder made national headlines on May 22, 1917, it was quickly forgotten and rarely mentioned.

When a pair of new historical markers on Summer Avenue are unveiled later this month, it will be the latest milestone in current discussions about what happened long ago in Memphis.

The markers will be unveiled at and near the site where Ell Persons was burned by a lynch mob 100 years ago this month.

The May 21 ceremony marks 100 years to the day that a group of men took Persons from a train bringing him back to the city to stand trial for the rape, murder and decapitation of 16-year-old Antoinette Rappel.

Many thanks to Martha Parks and the Memphis Flyer for this wonderful article about the involvement of high school students in the Ell Persons story:

This time last year, the 100th anniversary of Ell Persons' lynching seemed far on the horizon. A lot has happened over the course of the year, as Memphians have rallied around the work of the Lynching Sites Project.

The upcoming Interfaith Prayer Ceremony on May 21, 2017 is on the CA's list of "Five things to do in May":

Some Memphians are trying to make sure a dark chapter of our history is not forgotten.

There are about 200 historical markers in Memphis, but only one of them commemorates a lynching: the People's Grocery marker at Walker Avenue and Mississippi Boulevard.

Activists are trying to change that.

Lynching Sites Project said each of the more than 30 recorded lynchings that happened in Shelby County since the Civil War should be recognized and remembered.