Closed Ranks: The Whitehurst Case in Post-Civil Rights Montgomery

by Foster Dickson

Overview

On a chilly December afternoon in 1975, Bernard Whitehurst Jr., a 33-year-old father of four, was mistaken for a robbery suspect by Montgomery, Alabama, police officers. A brief foot chase ensued, and it ended with one of the pursuing officers shooting and killing Whitehurst in the backyard of an abandoned house. The officer claimed the fleeing man had fired at him; police produced a gun they said had been found near the body. In the months that followed, new information showed that Whitehurst, who was black, was not only the wrong man but had been unarmed, a direct contradiction of the white officer's statement. What became known as the Whitehurst Case erupted when the local district attorney and the family's attorney each began to uncover facts that pointed to wrongdoing by the police, igniting a year-long controversy that resulted in the resignation or firing of police officers, the police chief, and the city's popular New South mayor. However, no one was ever convicted in Whitehurst's death, and his family's civil lawsuit against the City of Montgomery failed. Now, more than four decades later, Whitehurst's widow and children are waging a 21st-century effort to gain justice for the husband and father they lost. The question that remains is: who decides what justice looks like?

In this latter-day exploration of the Whitehurst Case, author Foster Dickson reviews one of Montgomery’s never-before-told stories, one which is riddled with incompatible narratives. Closed Ranks brings together interviews, police reports, news stories, and other records to carry the reader through the fraught post-civil rights movement period when the "unnecessary" shooting of Bernard Whitehurst Jr. occurred.

In our current time, as police shootings regularly dominate news cycles, this book shows how essential it is to find and face the truth in such deeply troubling matters.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781588383631
Publisher:	NewSouth Books
Publication date:	11/01/2018
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	272
File size:	546 KB

About the Author

FOSTER DICKSON is a writer, editor, and teacher in Montgomery, Alabama. He is the author of Closed Ranks, the editor of Nobody’s Home and level:deepsouth, and the coordinator of the Fitzgerald Museum’s annual Literary Contest.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments viii

Note on Quoted Matter 2

1 Post-Civil Rights Montgomery 3

2 Who Was Bernard Whitehurst Jr.? 16

3 The Death of Bernard Whitehurst Jr. 37

4 Family Complications 65

5 The Immediate Political Aftermath 75

6 The Closing of the Ranks 96

7 Rabbit Trails in the Records 117

8 The Fever Pitch 135

9 The New Normal 154

10 In Emory Folmar's Montgomery 166

11 Time Marched On 178

12 An Incomplete Narrative 193

13 Latter-Day Debate 205

14 Epilogue-A Changed City? 217

Notes 228

Editorial Reviews

Closed Ranks is a powerful account that captures the wrongful history of the murder of Bernard Whitehurst Jr. and a brilliant presentation of the institutional corruption of the South at that time. A fascinating read.

Alabama Writers’ Forum

Foster J. Dickson has pulled together every possible resource to afford Bernard Whitehurst Jr. the sense of justice surrounding his death that he never received in life. His powerful yet objective profile of an otherwise enigmatic personality signals an urgent need to change the perception of African American life.

author of Neither Carpetbaggers nor Scalawags: Black Officeholders During the Reconstruction of Alabama, 1867-1878 - Richard Bailey

Foster J. Dickson has pulled together every possible resource to afford Bernard Whitehurst Jr. the sense of justice surrounding his death that he never received in life. His powerful yet objective profile of an otherwise enigmatic personality signals an urgent need to change the perception of African American life.

1867-1878 author of Neither Carpetbaggers nor Scalawags: Black Officeholders During the Reconstruction of

Foster J. Dickson has pulled together every possible resource to afford Bernard Whitehurst Jr. the sense of justice surrounding his death that he never received in life. His powerful yet objective profile of an otherwise enigmatic personality signals an urgent need to change the perception of African American life. — Richard Bailey, author of Neither Carpetbaggers nor Scalawags: Black Officeholders During the Reconstruction of Alabama, 1867-1878

Closed Ranks is a powerful account that captures the wrongful history of the murder of Bernard Whitehurst Jr. and a brilliant presentation of the institutional corruption of the South at that time. A fascinating read. — Alabama Writers’ Forum

From the Publisher

Foster J. Dickson has pulled together every possible resource to afford Bernard Whitehurst Jr. the sense of justice surrounding his death that he never received in life. His powerful yet objective profile of an otherwise enigmatic personality signals an urgent need to change the perception of African American life. — Richard Bailey, author of Neither Carpetbaggers nor Scalawags: Black Officeholders During the Reconstruction of Alabama, 1867-1878

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