Personal Testimony
of
Euvester Simpson
“My Reflections on Mrs. Fannie Lou Hamer”
Whenever I saw her, she always reminded me to call my mother to let her know that I was ok. We became friends. She taught me Freedom Songs. I remember riding on the bus to Atlantic City to attend the 1964 Democratic National Convention. Mrs. Hamer asked me to sit by her so we could sing. “This Little of Mine” was her signature song and on that trip, she taught me a verse that I had never heard before:
“Monday, he gave me the gift of love, Tuesday, manna from above, Wednesday, he told me to watch and pray, Thursday, he gave me a little more grace, Friday, he gave me peace of mind, Saturday, he gave me love divine, Sunday, he told me to go to church just to let my little light shine.”
Mrs. Hamer was fearless because she had mastered her fear of death. She once said “If I fall, I’ll fall five feet four inches forward in the fight for freedom. I’m not backing down.”
The greatest fear that most of us have is the fear of death. When the fear of death is conquered, there is an understanding that takes place within, and we come to know that our true nature is undying and continues for all eternity. When this takes place, we know that there is nothing on earth that can truly harm us.
When we were returning to Mississippi from the Citizenship Education Workshop in South Carolina, six of us were arrested in Winona, MS.
I shared a jail cell with Mrs. Hamer. She and several others were brutally beaten.
The brutality and hatred that we experienced in the Winona jail had a profound effect on all of us and especially on Mrs. Hamer.
I believe this was a turning point in her life. I also believe it was during that horrific night in the Winona jail, that she overcame her fear of death. During that long night I tried to soothe her pain and bring her fever down by applying cool, wet washcloths to her face and swollen hands. After some of her pain had subsided, she started singing very quietly and she asked me to sing with her.
That night I learned that her favorite song was “Walk With Me Lord.”
(Photos (far top left) of Ms. Simpson and Fannie Lou Hamer at a rally in Ohio during Freedom Summer 1964 courtesy of Ms. Euvester Simpson. Photo of Ms. Simpson and Hamer’s daughter, Jacqueline Hamer Flakes (above) at the unveiling of a historical marker at the Winona Jail Site by Mississippi Today and Vickie D. King)
“I had heard about Mrs. Fannie Lou Hamer several months before I met her. I heard about her seeming fearlessness, and her amazing singing voice, and about her ability to move people to action with her powerful speeches. I finally got the chance to see her in person in the early Spring of 1963 at a mass meeting in Greenwood, MS. But I really got to know her when a group of civil rights activists from the Mississippi Delta traveled to Charleston, SC to attend a week-long Citizen Education Workshop in June 1963. It was on this trip that I learned what an amazing person Mrs. Hamer was.
What I learned about Mrs. Hamer is that she was easy to get to know. She was personable, and down to earth. She loved to laugh. Mrs. Hamer never talked down to me even though I was 17 years old, and she was in her mid-forties when we first met. She believed that everyone had something of value to offer. However, there were boundaries that were set, and I never forgot that I was a teenager, and she was the adult.
I never called her Fannie Lou—it was always “Mrs. Hamer.”
When I heard Mrs. Hamer sing this song later in mass meetings and other places after we were released from jail, it sounded different. I realized it was no longer a dirge-like song that was pleading and begging Jesus to walk with her. It had changed to an invitation for Him to come and join her on this journey and be her friend as she traveled through this life speaking her truth, demanding freedom, justice, and respect for all people because we are all God’s children.
Mrs. Hamer was a woman of faith. She believed in the power of prayer. But she also believed in the power of activism. While speaking at a mass meeting in Indianola, MS, she said, “You can pray until you faint, but if you don’t get up and try to do something, God is not going to put it in your lap. She also said “We can’t ask the white man to give us everything (education, voting), we have to build our own power. If the white man gives you something, you can be assured that he will take it back.”
Mrs. Hamer was brilliant. She used her God-given intellect to speak truth to power and to help build a better world for all of us. So many of the things Mrs. Hamer said remain relevant today.”