Eleanor Rush
Eleanor Rush, age 18, was killed by prison guards in Raleigh, North Carolina in 1956, as she protested the condones of her incarceration. This March 2026, Women’s History Month, we share Rush’s story, following the release of federal records by the Cold Case Civil Rights Records Review Board last month, and the publication of an article in The Assembly featuring her tragic case.
Hattie DeBardelaben’s killing first investigated by CRRJ a decade ago, records now available through National Archives
The 1945 killing of Hattie DeBardelaben, first investigated by Northeastern Law’s Civil Rights and Restorative Justice Project (CRRJ) more than a decade ago, is one of the cases in the first set of records…
Rubin Stacy: Lynched, Florida 1935
Pvt. Booker T. Spicely, 34, was killed by Herman Lee Council in Durham County, North Carolina in 1944.
Edward Bracey, killed Labor Day Weekend 1935
Edward Bracey, a farmer, was killed in 1935 by a mob in Hope Hull, Montgomery County, Alabama. During a cotton pickers’ strike, a gang of landlords and vigilantes opened fire on Bracey’s house.
Della McDuffie
Della McDuffie, 67, was a housewife and café owner, who was killed by police in Wilcox County, Alabama, in 1953. Wheelchair-bound and unable to flee, officers beat her to death.
Hosea Carter: Carpenter Lynched in Mississippi, 1948
Hosea “Shant” Carter, who was lynched in Marion County, Mississippi on May 2, 1948. Photo courtesy of The Burnham-Nobles Digital Archive. On December 17, 1951, a national civil rights organization accused the United…
Reverend Captain Leonard Butler: Union Man Killed in Alabama, 1948
“He had organized the union, and that is why the company killed him.” – Vida Butler Rouse, daughter of Reverend Captain Leonard Butler Reverend captain leonard butler Nearly 70 years after the murder…
Quinzy Hill
Quinzy Hill, 40, a farmer, was killed by C.W. Davis in Coleman, Texas. Davis was Hill’s employer in 1940.
Dan Carter Sanders
Dan Carter Sanders, 26, a sawmill worker and WWII veteran, was killed in 1946 by Bobby Johnson, age 16, in Johnston County, North Carolina.
Edward Clifford Williams
Edward Clifford Williams (1911-1943), a laborer, was killed by three sailors in Algiers, Louisiana.
Thomas P. Foster
Thomas P. Foster, 25, was a US Army sergeant who was killed by city police officer Abner J. Hay in Little Rock, Pulaski County, Arkansas.
Pvt. Albert H. King
Pvt. Albert H. King (1919 – 1941) was killed by military police officer Robert Lummus at Fort Benn ing in Muscogee County, Georgia.
Joseph H. Mann
Joseph H. Mann, 38, was a minister who was killed by two unidentified white men in Norfolk, Virginia in 1951.
Ollie Hunter
Ollie Hunter, 55, was a domestic laborer who was killed by an unidentified white store manager in Seminole County, Georgia, in 1944.
Woodrow Wilson
Woodrow Wilson, 24, was a house painter and WWII veteran who was killed by police officers C.L. Teague and R.W. Young in Greenville, Pitt County, North Carolina.
Wilson knocked on the door of a white family — the Steppes — who called the police alleging that he was trying to break in.
Theris Rudolph Wood
Theris Rudolph Wood, 19, was shot to death in 1948 by police officers H. W. Brewer, J. A. Hale and J. M. Lawson in Birmingham, Alabama.
Knox Fail
Knox Fail, 38, was a saw mill worker who was killed by police officers in Birmingham, Alabama, in 1943.
Fail had allegedly entered a white women’s restroom.
Harrison Lee
Harrison Lee (1906 – 1946), was a barber who was killed by police officer F.R. Brockman in Birmingham, Alabama.