Wilmington Ten Case Marks Civil Rights Era Activism

The Wilmington Ten refers to ten civil rights activists who were falsely convicted and incarcerated for nearly a decade following a 1971 riot in Wilmington, North Carolina, over school desegregation. Wrongfully convicted of arson and conspiracy, the Wilmington Ten—eight African American high-school students, an African American minister, and a white female social worker—were victims of the racial and political turmoil during America’s civil rights era.

Background

Wilmington’s modern racial unrest began when Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. canceled his visit to speak at the all-black Williston Senior High School in Wilmington on April 4, 1968. Instead, he remained in Memphis, Tennessee, where he was assassinated. While April 5 began with peaceful protests of King’s murder by African American high-school students, the following three days were marked by violent rioting that ended only when 150 National Guardsmen occupied the city.

School Desegregation

Until 1969, Wilmington had three high schools: all-white New Hanover and Hoggard, and the African American Williston Senior High School. Although the 1954 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education had struck down the “separate but equal” ruling of Plessy v. Ferguson (1896), many Southern school boards resisted integration for over a decade before it was finally instituted. When desegregation came in the summer of 1969, African American students and teachers were reassigned to New Hanover and Hoggard, while Williston was closed (later to become a desegregated junior high school). The closure of Williston stunned the African American community, which had taken great pride in the school. The sudden presence of African American students in the formerly all-white schools brought resentment from both sides. African American students who had been active in athletics and clubs at Williston were excluded from such activities at New Hanover and Hoggard. Taunts and attacks resulted in fights, and police presence was constant. The high-school unrest escalated into citywide rioting and arson, including the burning of the school board’s building.

Protests and Rising Tensions

In January 1971, hundreds of African American students boycotted the schools. The white pastor of Gregory Congregational United Church of Christ, Eugene Templeton, offered his integrated church as a gathering place and school alternative. On February 1, 1971, the national United Church of Christ’s Commission on Racial Justice sent Reverend Benjamin Chavis to Wilmington to organize and provide structure for the students. Chavis delivered speeches denouncing segregation and demanding social justice. Images of Chavis speaking to crowds of African Americans with raised fists dominated local news.

Escalation and Arrests

Soon, members of a white supremacist group, The Rights of White People (ROWP), a Ku Klux Klan affiliate, arrived. Heavily armed, the ROWP held Klan-like meetings in a public park, increasing tension. African American protesters repeatedly marched to City Hall, requesting a citywide curfew to stop the gunfire aimed at Gregory Congregational. A curfew was denied.

On February 6, 1971, Mike’s Grocery, a convenience store near Gregory Congregational, was firebombed. Responding police and firefighters were met with sniper fire, which they returned, killing 17-year-old Steven Corbett, an African American teenager armed with a gun. There was a perception that snipers were in or near the church. The next day, a white man with a pistol, Harvey Cumber, was killed in his truck near the church by unknown persons. Rumors of guns, dynamite, and bomb making in Gregory Congregational circulated. Mayor Williams requested assistance from the National Guard and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, and a curfew was finally declared.

By March, police had compiled a list of 16 suspects. Ultimately, 10 were arrested and convicted of felonious burning and conspiracy to assault responding emergency personnel, based on the testimony of three African American teenagers. The Wilmington Ten—nine African American men (Chavis, Willie Vereen, Wayne Moore, Marvin Patrick, William [“Joe”] Wright, Reginald Epps, Connie Tindall, James McKoy, and Jerry Jacobs) and a white social worker (Anne Sheppard Turner) were sentenced in 1971.

Legal Challenges and Pardons

The Wilmington Ten’s story gained international attention as Amnesty International publicized and protested their status as political prisoners. Writer James Baldwin, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Andrew Young, and many others condemned their convictions and long sentences. In 1978, thousands of protesters marched in Washington, D.C., demanding their release.

North Carolina Governor James Hunt commuted their sentences in 1978, and, though he refused to pardon them, the Wilmington Ten were all released by 1979. In 1980, the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals voided the convictions due to prosecutorial misconduct by Assistant District Attorney Jay Stroud, who had coached and bribed witnesses and altered a written statement. Three key witnesses also recanted. On December 31, 2012, North Carolina Governor Beverly Perdue officially pardoned the Wilmington Ten, stating that their sentences were “tainted by naked racism.”