{"id":9435,"date":"2023-04-24T22:19:36","date_gmt":"2023-04-24T22:19:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/library\/?page_id=9435"},"modified":"2023-04-24T22:19:36","modified_gmt":"2023-04-24T22:19:36","slug":"malcolm-yawn-oral-history","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/library\/malcolm-yawn-oral-history\/","title":{"rendered":"Malcolm Yawn Oral History"},"content":{"rendered":"[vc_row type=”in_container” full_screen_row_position=”middle” column_margin=”default” column_direction=”default” column_direction_tablet=”default” column_direction_phone=”default” scene_position=”center” text_color=”dark” text_align=”left” row_border_radius=”none” row_border_radius_applies=”bg” overlay_strength=”0.3″ gradient_direction=”left_to_right” shape_divider_position=”bottom” bg_image_animation=”none”][vc_column column_padding=”no-extra-padding” column_padding_tablet=”inherit” column_padding_phone=”inherit” column_padding_position=”all” column_element_spacing=”default” background_color_opacity=”1″ background_hover_color_opacity=”1″ column_shadow=”none” column_border_radius=”none” column_link_target=”_self” gradient_direction=”left_to_right” overlay_strength=”0.3″ width=”1\/1″ tablet_width_inherit=”default” tablet_text_alignment=”default” phone_text_alignment=”default” bg_image_animation=”none” border_type=”simple” column_border_width=”none” column_border_style=”solid”][divider line_type=”No Line”][vc_column_text]\n

Malcolm Yawn Oral History<\/span><\/h1>\n[\/vc_column_text][divider line_type=”No Line”][page_submenu alignment=”center” sticky=”true” bg_color=”#008542″ link_color=”#ffffff”][page_link link_url=”https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/library\/manuscripts-and-guides\/” title=”Manuscripts & Subject Guides<\/strong>” id=”1682374489857-9″ tab_id=”1682374489857-9″] [\/page_link][page_link link_url=”https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/library\/guides-to-the-collection-page\/” title=”Collections Portal<\/strong>” id=”1682374489864-2″ tab_id=”1682374489865-9″] [\/page_link][page_link title=”Visit<\/strong>” id=”1682374497820-10″ tab_id=”1682374497822-5″ link_url=”https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/library\/departments\/archives-museum\/visit\/”][\/page_link][page_link title=”Make a Request<\/strong>” id=”1682374498500-0″ tab_id=”1682374498501-2″ link_url=”https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/library\/departments\/archives-museum\/requests\/”][\/page_link][page_link title=”About Us<\/strong>” id=”1682374499083-10″ tab_id=”1682374499084-7″ link_url=”https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/library\/departments-archives-museum-about-us\/”][\/page_link][page_link title=”Yearbooks Online<\/strong>” id=”1682374500375-10″ tab_id=”1682374500376-10″ link_url=”https:\/\/www.deltastate.edu\/library\/departments\/archives-museum\/yearbooks-alumni-magazines-delta-state-histories\/”][\/page_link][\/page_submenu][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row type=”in_container” full_screen_row_position=”middle” column_margin=”default” column_direction=”default” column_direction_tablet=”default” column_direction_phone=”default” scene_position=”center” text_color=”dark” text_align=”left” row_border_radius=”none” row_border_radius_applies=”bg” overlay_strength=”0.3″ gradient_direction=”left_to_right” shape_divider_position=”bottom” bg_image_animation=”none”][vc_column column_padding=”no-extra-padding” column_padding_tablet=”inherit” column_padding_phone=”inherit” column_padding_position=”all” column_element_spacing=”default” background_color_opacity=”1″ background_hover_color_opacity=”1″ column_shadow=”none” column_border_radius=”none” column_link_target=”_self” gradient_direction=”left_to_right” overlay_strength=”0.3″ width=”1\/1″ tablet_width_inherit=”default” tablet_text_alignment=”default” phone_text_alignment=”default” bg_image_animation=”none” border_type=”simple” column_border_width=”none” column_border_style=”solid”][vc_column_text]Oral History Interview of Malcolm Yawn\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 OH #290<\/strong><\/p>\n

June 9, 2005<\/strong><\/p>\n

Interviewed by Dr. Henry Outlaw <\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Transcribed by W. Ray June 12, 2006<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 Today is June 9, 2005.\u00a0 We are here in the home of Malcolm Yawn in Fulton, Mississippi.\u00a0 We are getting ready to do an interview on the Emmett Till case.\u00a0 I tell you, I\u2019ll just sit over here and it picks up very well.<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 Okay.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 So if you would, tell me what we\u2019ve been talking about before.\u00a0 Give me a little bit about your background.\u00a0 You grew up in Fulton and you went off to school.<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 Yeah, I grew up in Fulton. We moved here in 1935, having been born in Lumberton, MS.\u00a0 I grew up in Fulton and went to grammar school here in Fulton; went to high school up in Tennessee up at Columbia Military Academy.\u00a0 Then went to Ole Miss in \u201948; graduated in 1952.\u00a0 Got a commission as Second Lieutenant through ROTC.\u00a0 Went on active duty for about two years.\u00a0 Got out, had the GI bill and I went to law school in \u201954; graduated in \u201956.\u00a0 During all of this time since I got out of service I was active in the Mississippi National Guard and the U.S. Army Reserve.\u00a0 In 1964 I went back on active duty in the Army Judge Advocate General Corps and retired in 1991 in Colorado.\u00a0 I lived in Colorado for awhile, we owned a house there. We moved back to Fulton about four years as I understand. I\u2019m retired, completely retired now.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 If you would, tell me just a little Mr. Yawn, about your trip over there.\u00a0 How did you and your friends make the decision to cut law school and go to this case?\u00a0 What was the motivation?<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 I think there were three of us.\u00a0 We lived at Ole Miss at Oxford and trial was close by and one student there named Whitten was from that county and he was kin to the Whitten\u2019s there in Tallahatchie County?<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 It was Jamie Whitten, is that correct?<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 He was kin to Jamie Whitten.\u00a0 I don\u2019t exactly what.\u00a0 Maybe his nephew or something.\u00a0 But he had connections in that county and he was from that county.\u00a0 And he said let\u2019s go, he knew everybody there and we went.\u00a0 Cut school that day.\u00a0 Because of Whitten\u2019s connections there we had a good seat.\u00a0 We were sitting inside the rail.\u00a0 You know, most courtrooms, at least in Itawamba County and other counties in Mississippi, have a rail there that congregation or visitors sit on one side of the rail inside the rail.\u00a0 Inside the rail the prosecutor, jury, witnesses and so forth.\u00a0 And we had separate seats over there so we were right up close.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 Was there a balcony in that courtroom that you recall?<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 I do not recall.\u00a0 There may have been but I don\u2019t think so.\u00a0 I don\u2019t recall one being there.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 And do you recall which day of the trial it was?<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 I think it was the second day.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 Second day.\u00a0 Okay.<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 We got over there and the trial had not started that day.\u00a0 There was a bunch of people standing outside the courthouse in the courtyard there.\u00a0 A bunch of white folks and a bunch of black folks.\u00a0 They were segregated..\u00a0 There were black folks on one side; not near as many white folks.\u00a0 The white folks were laughing and playing and shaking hands.\u00a0 The black folks over there were quiet.\u00a0 And we walked through and Whitten knew a lot of folks there and he introduced us and everybody was in a good mood.\u00a0 Went on to the courtroom and sat down there and the trial proceeded.\u00a0 It was the second day of the trial, I think, I know, the trial had gone through the jury selection process and the opening statements and so forth.\u00a0 I don\u2019t believe that any witnesses had been called or not.\u00a0\u00a0 But we saw the prosecution case call the witnesses and so forth.\u00a0 The third day of the trial, we weren\u2019t there and the findings and sentence and so forth (inaudible).<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 Do you recall some of the testimony that was given?<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 The most impressive testimony to me was a black man, I don\u2019t know him, he was kin to Till, his uncle or his grandfather or something.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 That would have Mose Wright.<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 Yeah, Mose Wright.\u00a0 He testified and his \u2013 he was there when Till was picked up.\u00a0 His testimony was very good.\u00a0 I remember there was the question, \u201cDo you recognize anybody in the courtroom here that picked him up?\u201d\u00a0 And he stood up in his seat and said, \u201cThere they sit right there.\u201d<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 I\u201dll be dog.<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 And the mother was there and she testified and several other witnesses identified the two men there, the brothers, I forget their names.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 J.W. Milan and Roy Bryant.<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 Yeah, identifying them as the people that picked Emmett Till up.\u00a0 They saw Till with them.\u00a0 The mother testified and it seemed to me that the defense was:\u00a0 Was that really Emmett Till that was killed?\u00a0 It was somebody else and not Till?\u00a0 And so each witness of the defense was cross examined by the Prosecutor \u2013 Defense Attorney.\u00a0 How do you know that was Emmett Till \u2013 his body was all beat up so badly?\u00a0 They were all sure.\u00a0 The mother said he was my son, I know that was him.\u00a0 It seemed to me that the defense was that it was not Emmett Till, and how are you going to prove it was?<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 In those days they didn\u2019t have a lot of physical evidence did they?<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 I think, at least I read somewhere, I don\u2019t recall the testimony, but probably was.\u00a0 He was wearing a ring that belonged to his daddy; his mother said that.\u00a0 One thing that I remember specifically; not about the testimony but the trial. In the trial the blacks of course \u2013 the place was segregated.\u00a0 The blacks were seats in the rear of the courtroom.\u00a0 As I recall, a separate table or something, I don\u2019t know.\u00a0 You know court had recesses and the judge comes back and the sheriff announces, everybody rise, the judge is returning, and everybody quiets down.\u00a0 But there was one time that they came back in, and apparently the blacks in the back were mumbling or something.\u00a0 And the sheriff turned around and said, \u201cAlright you niggers back there sitting in the courtroom, settle down.\u201d\u00a0 Those were his words.\u00a0 And one of the men there as I recall was a congressman from up there in Chicago somewhere.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 That was Congressman Biggs.<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 Yeah.\u00a0 And of course he was sitting there with the rest of them.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 You know I had – someone told me that the sheriff didn\u2019t want to let Congressman Biggs into the courtroom.\u00a0 And the previous sheriff told him that he had better let him in, that there would be real bad publicity in if he didn\u2019t.\u00a0 And so, he did let him in.\u00a0 What was interesting was that the sheriff testified for the defense.\u00a0 Is that usually what happens?<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 I don\u2019t recall in cases I know that the sheriff ever tried to help the defense in any way.\u00a0 I don\u2019t recall the sheriff testifying that day that we were there.\u00a0 Could have.\u00a0 Like I say, that was what fifty years ago?<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 (inaudible)<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 You know the general conversation during the recess and you know, milling around talking to the people there was, the general concensus there was:\u00a0 there is not way that they are going to convict these men for that.\u00a0 It\u2019s no way are they going to do it. That\u2019s what they thought.\u00a0 A black and white thing and it was alright back then to, as they said, kill a nigger if he got out of place some way or another.\u00a0 Especially if he had some movement towards a white woman.\u00a0 You hear on the news all the time that he was killed for whistling at a white woman?\u00a0 The story that I got that it was more than whistle.\u00a0 It was he and several more black boys his age that went to this store, country store, you know to buy a coca cola or whatever.\u00a0 And it was run by the wife of one of the accused murders.\u00a0 And she waited on them.\u00a0 They went back to the front and Till got to mentioning about what a good looking woman that was in there.\u00a0 Boys said well she\u2019s white and your black and you better not fool around.\u00a0 And he got to talking about well, in Chicago there\u2019s no difference.\u00a0 We do it with white women and nobody says anything about it, pays any attention to it.\u00a0 And Till said well, back in Chicago we do that.\u00a0 And so he went back in there and I think made some comment to her, I don\u2019t what it was.\u00a0 And then whistled and she ran him out.\u00a0 So he did whistle and that was part of it but he didn\u2019t touch her or anything like that.\u00a0 Some comment about you\u2019re sure a good looking woman or something like that.\u00a0 She commented back to him.\u00a0 Maybe he whistled again.\u00a0 Now that\u2019s the story I get.\u00a0 There was no testimony to that but you know you hear talk about it.\u00a0 That was the talk.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 I thought it was interesting is that Carolyn Bryant did testify, but not in front of the jury.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know what day of the trial that was when she testified, but the judge would not let her testify to the jury.\u00a0 I have always wondered about, I wondered why?\u00a0 Do you have any light on that?<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 I do not know.\u00a0 I don\u2019t.\u00a0 I do not know.\u00a0 Maybe it was decided the day before we got there.\u00a0 I don\u2019t remember.\u00a0 Usually things like that said outside the court are handled on the first day or something like that.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 What would you perceive was the mood in the courtroom?<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 The mood was that there was no way these fellows were going to get convicted.\u00a0 It was sort of already decided and all the white folks in that county just seeing a show.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 What about the blacks in there, what was their mood?<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 Well they were quiet back there.\u00a0 Course I didn\u2019t mix with them, nobody did.\u00a0 They were quiet.\u00a0 Wasn\u2019t saying much as far as I knew.\u00a0 They were away from where I was sitting.\u00a0 During the break they were away from everybody.\u00a0 I expect they didn\u2019t appreciate what was going on.\u00a0 But back then, they couldn\u2019t say anything about it.\u00a0 My recollection of Mississippi back then, it was completely segregated.\u00a0 Over there close to the Delta where Tallahatchie County is there is a whole lot more blacks than other counties.\u00a0 I was raised in Itawamba County and back then the black population was about five or six percent of the county.\u00a0 So there really wasn\u2019t no problems.\u00a0 Over there in the Delta counties as many blacks as there was, the white people had to get the Ku Klux Klan to keep the blacks in their place I suppose.\u00a0 Some counties there had a heap of blacks. I think Tunica County back then had maybe eighty percent blacks.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 Well they had those big farms so they worked on the farms, sharecropped.<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 Sure.\u00a0 So in Itawamba County there were no big racial problems.\u00a0 The blacks, as we said back then, they stayed in their place and they didn\u2019t bother anybody, and very few people bothered them.\u00a0 What happened over in the Delta was a little bit strange, but I knew what it was like.\u00a0 I had no doubt that they were going to be found innocent.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 Yeah.\u00a0 What is your feeling about the fact that the trial has been reopened \u2013 case has been reopened?<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 I\u2019m going to guess that they probably have enough evidence to reopen it \u00a0They got the body out \u2013 got Till\u2019s body out to run DNA I suppose and would stop the defense that that wasn\u2019t really Emmett Till.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know what the evidence they got, or I presume they have sufficient evidence.\u00a0 You know they just opened up that trial \u2013 they are trying somebody in the killing down there in Philadelphia.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 That\u2019s right, yeah.<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 I saw in the paper today that the trial is about to start.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 Yeah, I just saw the headlines, I didn\u2019t get to read it.\u00a0 I\u2019ve been keeping up with that.<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 Several – Some time ago he was going to be tried and he fell and broke his leg or something.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 That\u2019s right.\u00a0 Yeah.<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 And they delayed it.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 He tried to get it continued didn\u2019t they?<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 Um hmm.\u00a0 I think they got it continued until today.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 So it starts today is that it?<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 Well right away, I don\u2019t know if it is today.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 I\u2019ll have to read about that.<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 That was a big trial in Mississippi.\u00a0 That happened after \u2013 I think it was before the Till trial, but it was after I left to go back into the Army.\u00a0 And the big thing about that \u2013 it had nothing to do with the Till case but, when I was in the Army I was in Fort Bliss Texas and there\u2019s a place where there was a missile base that had plenty of room to fire missiles as part of training, and there was no such place in Germany to do that.\u00a0 So the German Army came to Fort Bliss to train.\u00a0 And one time I was talking to this German officer at happy hour at the club.\u00a0 And talking he asked me where I was from.\u00a0 I said Mississippi.\u00a0 He said I have read a lot of news lately about Mississippi over there about the trial in Philadelphia about this black fellow.\u00a0 I said yeah.\u00a0 He said yeah, he said, \u201cIn Germany we had a problem like that in Germany.\u00a0 Had it lasted a little longer, had World War II lasted a little longer we would have completely solved it.\u201d\u00a0 I thought then, good Lord, I don\u2019t think even Ross Barnett wanted to take all the blacks and gas them and burn them in a oven.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 That\u2019s right.<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 That\u2019s what his thought was.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 Yeah right.<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 So, a lot of black and white situations in other countries are in some process of discriminating against certain people.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 Yeah.\u00a0 Right.\u00a0 Well, I think it is always going to be with us.\u00a0 It\u2019s is just hard to (inaudible).<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 Well I think it is a whole lot less than it used to be.\u00a0 My observation is race relations in the south now are a whole lot better than they are \u2026.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 Oh yeah.\u00a0 Oh, I think so too.<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 a lot better than they are in northern states.\u00a0 Like I said I spent a lot of time in the Army.\u00a0 By then the Army was integrated and I saw a lot of Army officers and soldiers and they were just like white folks.\u00a0 No difference in them.\u00a0 One of the first things I knew at Fort Bliss \u2013 we moved to Fort Bliss right after we went in to the Army.\u00a0 Lived on the post in the quarters there was this officer and his family was black that lived right down the street.\u00a0 He was black, had a black wife, and two or three black kids.\u00a0 He was just as good a daddy as any white person then, playing with his kids and looking after then.\u00a0 To me that impressed me back then, because I had just left Mississippi, didn\u2019t know much about that.\u00a0 But, things got okay and back when we lived in Denver, before, well when I retired, and after I retired.\u00a0 Belonged to Parkview Methodist Church which was integrated.\u00a0 We had black members and white members and it was just no problem.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 Well, let me see if I can think of something else.\u00a0 I think that\u2019s pretty much it.\u00a0 Let me ask you something you may or may not remember.\u00a0 A friend of mine told me that the 1955 or maybe it was \u201956 Ole Miss annual had a picture of Emmett Till in the annual.\u00a0 Do you remember anything about that?<\/p>\n

MY:\u00a0 I don\u2019t recall, I don\u2019t remember seeing one.\u00a0 But I think I\u2019ve got a 1956 annual over here.<\/p>\n

Yeah, that\u2019s the year I graduated from high school.\u00a0 Here is a 1956 annual.\u00a0 You can thumb through here.<\/p>\n

HO:\u00a0 Okay<\/p>\n

(Tape cuts off)<\/p>\n

Side B<\/p>\n

Side B Blank.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

END OF DOCUMENT<\/strong><\/p>\n

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