Portrait of a racist : Byron De La Beckwith and the assassination of Medgar Evers / Reed Massengill.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Massengill, Reed, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Beckwith, Byron de la.

Evers, Medgar Wiley, 1925-1963--Assassination.

Evers, Medgar Wiley.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (440 pages)

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

New York, NY : St. Martin's Press, [2024]

Summary:

Originally published in 1994, Portrait of a Racist is an astonishing biography of Byron De La Beckwith (1920-2001), who murdered Black civil rights leader Medgar Evers in June 1963. Written by Beckwith's nephew by marriage, the book is based on dozens of exclusive personal interviews with Beckwith and people who knew him-as well as letters Beckwith wrote directly to the author. These unique sources provide as definitive a glimpse into the chilling psychological landscape of a man devoted to murderous intolerance as we will likely ever have. Although the slaying of Evers helped to galvanize the civil rights movement in the South, the killer evaded justice for three decades after the crime. Twice tried for murder in the 1960s-both times by all- male, all-White juries-Beckwith was finally convicted in a third trial in 1994.Accompanied by new illustrations that have never been printed before, this new edition includes an afterword that recounts the author's participation as a witness and his introduction of new evidence in the third trial. It also chronicles Beckwith's last years of declining health behind bars, examines the rich scholarship on Evers and civil rights that has arisen since this book's original appearance, and reflects on the catastrophic persistence of Beckwith's ideology- Christian nationalism and white supremacy-in our own times.

Contents:

Intro

Contents

Prologue: Portrait of a Racist

1. Tangled Branches

2. Return to Glen Oak Plantation

3. Identifying the Enemy

4. Misalliance

5. Separate and Unequal Lives

6. The Rising Tide of Discontent

7. The Lone Suspect

8. "Such Is the Fate of a Patriot

9. "My Ass, Your Goat and the Republic

10. And Ten Crosses Burned

11. A Period of Self-Delusion

12. "Jewishprudence

13. The Outskirts of Heaven

Epilogue: Out of Darkness

Afterword to the 2024 Edition

Acknowledgments 2024

Appendix. Selected FBI Documents

Notes

Bibliography

Index.

Notes:

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

Description based on print version record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9781621908562

1621908569

9781621908555

1621908550

OCLC:

1430660384