Communist agitators

Jewel Rush-McDonald tells of her parents' beating by the Ku Klux Klan after a Finance meeting at the church

Mrs. Emily Cole Calloway's parents also attended the Finance meeting and were confronted by the Klan upon leaving the church

Today, at the Mt. Zion Methodist Church northeast of Philadelphia in Neshoba County, Mississippi, I was overwhelmed by the resilience of Jewel Rush-McDonald and Emily Cole Calloway. The parents of each of these remarkable women had been victims of Klan violence at that church in June 1964. The Klan had been searching for participants in the Freedom Summer of 1964, and specifically for white participants, whom they regarded as “outside agitators” and “communists.” Convinced that the congregants of the Mt. Zion Church would have knowledge of their whereabouts, Klan members invaded a finance meeting that was occurring at the church on Tuesday, June 16. They severely beat meeting attendees, including Ms. Cole’s father, Fred Cole, who received a broken jaw, broken ribs, and permanent damage to the nerves of one his legs. Ms. Rush-McDonald’s parents were also brutally beaten. Angered that the beatings had produced no useful information, the Klan then torched the wooden church, which was totally destroyed. (On June 20, James Chaney (who was black) and Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner (who were white), visited and investigated the ruins of the church. The next day, with the collusion of the sheriff’s office, the three were brutally murdered and buried by the Klan.

Ms. Cole related that some years later, her father, Fred, had said that he had already forgiven his assailants, but would never forget. Ms. Rush-McDonald’s parents were equally resilient—her mother went to work the day after the attack! Their courage is an inspiration to all of us.

-- by David Hurdis

More about what happened at Mt Zion United Methodist Church in Philadelphia, MS