Montgomery County Jail, Winona, MS

On June 9, 1963, Fannie Lou Hamer was arrested at Staley’s Café in Winona, Mississippi. She and five of her arrested colleagues, including Annell Ponder, Euvester Simpson, and 15-year-old June Johnson, were returning via Trailways Bus from a voter education workshop near Charleston, South Carolina. The Montgomery County Jail used to occupy this piece of land and all six were brought here—to be held, tortured, and perhaps even murdered. All three were beaten. But Hamer’s was particularly severe as State Highway Patrolman John Lutellas Basinger tracked down her name (and thus activism) in Sunflower County. Because of her injuries, Hamer would not allow her immediate family to see her for several weeks.

The five white Winona law enforcement officials involved were eventually arrested. And Hamer later traveled to Washington, DC where she allowed the FBI to photograph her bruised and battered body and later be used as evidence during a federal trial. The five men were tried and found not guilty by an all-male and all-white federal jury.

Hamer suffered permanent injury from the beating, inflicted on her by two black trustees (inmates): Roosevelt Knox and Sol Poe, forced by the law enforcement officials to participate in their crimes.