Montgomery County Jail - Winona, MS
On June 9, 1963, Fannie Lou Hamer was arrested outside Staley’s Café in Winona, Mississippi. She and her six colleagues: Euvester Simpson, 17, Annell Ponder, Ruth Davis, James West, Rosemary Freeman and 15-year-old June Johnson were returning via a Continental 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. Hamer, Ponder and Johnson 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. Hamer was falsely charged with disorderly conduct and resisting arrest. Her injuries were so severe, she didn’t allow her immediate family to see her for several weeks. Hamer suffered permanent injuries 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.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.A historical marker was unveiled on the jail site in June 2023, 60 years after the vicious assault on Hamer and the others to commemorate the tragic, but historic events of that time.Listen as Fannie Lou Hamer describes what happened to her in Winona, Mississippi
Annell Ponder
Fannie Lou Hamer's Booking Photo at Winona jail.
June Johnson
The exterior of Staley's Cafe & Bus Depot in Winona, MS in June 1963 when Hamer was arrested
Euvester Simpson
Rosemary Freeman
The interior of Staley's Cafe in Winona, MS in June 1963.
The Colored Entrance to the Bus Depot in Winona, MS in June 1963.
The interior of the Contiental Trailways Bus Depot next to Staley's Cafe in Winona, MS in June 1963.
The city of Winona sign at what used to be the train station/depot.
The Montgomery County Jail where Fannie Lou Hamer was taken and beaten as it looked in June 1963. The jail was closed in November 1998 and torn down in early 1999.
The exterior of the Bus Depot and Staley's Cafe in Winona in June 1963.
A Continental Trailways Bus similar to that Fannie Lou Hamer and her compainions were on when they arrived in Winona, MS in 1963.
The site of the old Montgomery County jail on the corner of Oak and Sterling Streets in Winona, MS.
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