Location: Raleigh, Wake County, North Carolina
Age: 18
Year: 1954
Eleanor Rush was killed by prison guards in Raleigh, Wake County, North Carolina.
Eighteen-year-old Rush, who was being held in solitary confinement, and other prisoners were protesting conditions, including a lack of food. Guards claimed Rush was yelling and swearing. In the process of gagging and restraining her, the guards inflicted fatal spinal injuries.
The State Industrial Commission ruled that the prison officials were negligent and awarded Rush’s estate $3,000, which was upheld by the North Carolina Supreme Court.
An essay on this case, researched and authored by a CRRJ student, is available on request.
For more information, search CRRJ’s archive.
In March 2026, North Carolina publication The Assembly published an article by journalist Michael Hewlett, featuring the case of Eleanor Rush. The case was also investigated by the Cold Case Civil Rights Records Review Board, which released federal records in the matter in February 2026.
Read more about Rush’s death on the Burnham-Nobles Digital Archive
About the Archive
The Burnham-Nobles Digital Archive houses case files and documents for more than 1,000 cases of racial homicides in the Jim Crow South. Co-founded by Melissa Nobles, professor of political science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Margaret Burnham, CRRJ director and professor of law at Northeastern, these uncovered stories highlight how violence affected lives, defined legal rights and shaped politics between 1930 and 1954.
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