Gun used in Emmett Till's lynching is displayed in a museum 70 years after his murder

Source: AP

By SOPHIE BATES
Updated 12:20 PM CDT, August 28, 2025

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — The gun used in the lynching of 14-year-old Emmett Till is now on display for the public to see, 70 years after the killing.

The Mississippi Department of Archives and History unveiled the .45-caliber pistol and its holster during a news conference Thursday, which is the 70th anniversary of Till’s murder.

The gun belonged to John William “J.W.” Milam who, alongside Roy Bryant, abducted Till from his great-uncle’s home on Aug. 28, 1955. The white men tortured and killed Till after the teenager was accused of whistling at a white woman in a rural Mississippi grocery store.

Till’s body was later found in the Tallahatchie River. Bryant and Milam were charged with Till’s murder, but they were acquitted by an all-white-male jury.



Read more: https://apnews.com/article/emmett-till-lynching-gun-museum-civil-rights-75e381b7a0d46067fbc14778606e43c2

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Today in History: In 1955, Emmett Till, a Black teenager from Chicago, was abducted from his uncle’s home in Money, Mississippi, by two white men after he had allegedly whistled at a white woman four days prior; he was found brutally slain three days later.