On This Day…

Bloody Sunday

March 7, 1965

Unarmed marchers are attacked by state troopers with billy clubs and tear gas. Amelia Boynton and others organized a march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama in response to the fatal shooting of activist and deacon Jimmie Lee Jackson by a state trooper the previous month. The unarmed marchers were attacked by state troopers and county possemen with billy clubs and tear gas after they passed over the county line. Boynton was beat unconscious, and the media publicized worldwide a picture of her lying wounded on the bridge. The event became known as Bloody Sunday.