Seeks to “Pass the Torch” to the Youth Generation
By Nancy Spannaus
June 5, 2025—Approximately 100 teenagers[1] joined Loudoun County Virginia’s traditional civil rights crowd to kick off this year’s celebration of Juneteenth, the day in June 1865 when the enslaved people of Texas finally learned they were free. The event, sponsored by the Loudoun/Douglass Alumni Association and the Loudoun Juneteenth Committee, took place in the amphitheater of the Historic Douglass High School in Leesburg on June 2.
Keynoting the event was Hezekiah Watkins, renowned as the youngest Freedom Rider of the 1960s. Watkins, who currently works as a docent at the Mississippi Civil Rights Museum, held the audience’s rapt attention as he recounted his experience of being arrested and put on death row on July 7, 1961 at the age of 13. He concluded his presentation with an appeal to the youth to “make a difference” by finding ways that they could contribute to the fight for freedom and justice.
As was emphasized by the speakers, young people have historically led movements for dramatic social change, notably including the American Revolution and the Civil Rights movement. To do that effectively, I would add, they have to know their history.
Celebrating Juneteenth
The event began with Steve Williams, president of the National Juneteenth Observance Foundation, directing the raising of the Juneteenth flag. Doing the honors were U.S. Colored Troops re-enactors David Anderton and James Williams.
Leesburg Mayor Kelly Burk then emceed a program of readings of the key documents which led to Juneteenth: Lincoln Emancipation Proclamation (Jan. 1, 1863); the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution (Feb. 1, 1865); and General Order No. 3 (June 19, 1865), the proclamation by Union General Gordon Granger in Galveston, Texas which declared that former slaves now had “absolute equality of personal rights and rights of property” with their former masters.
Dr. John Jones, president of Juneteenth Loudoun, followed with the story of how Juneteenth came about. Although the war was technically over, the U.S. decided to send a military contingent, including a contingent of U.S. Colored Troops, to man the U.S.-Mexican border (to prevent the French occupiers of Mexico from aiding the Confederates), and restore order in the state. A storm diverted the troops from their intended landing spot, so they ended up on the island of Galveston. Once the troops learned that the Blacks there were unaware that they were free, they pressured Col. Granger who then issued General Order No. 3, and posted it on a church door.
Watkins’ Story
Williams then introduced Watkins and urged the youth to pay close attention to how the problems of today compare to the struggles of the past. Watkins’ remarks are available on video; my paraphrase follows here.
I was arrested at the Jackson, Mississippi bus station at the age of 13, Watkins began.[2] I was sent to state prison (the notorious Parchman penitentiary-ed.) and put on death row. I was in a cell with convicted murderers and there for days, which felt like months. It was a living hell.
The only reason I got out, Watkins went on, was that we had a President named John F. Kennedy. He was made aware of my imprisonment by his brother, Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy. President Kennedy then called Mississippi Governor Ross Barnett, accusing him of holding a 13- year-old on death row.
Barnett immediately denied it, but soon after, one of his staffers came to him saying the state might be in trouble. What trouble? Barnett asked. Well, you lied to the President of the United States, the staffer said. Barnett didn’t waste any time; he ordered Watkins released.
Watkins then described his reception at the police station in Jackson, when his mother (who had been told he might be dead) came and found him alive. She was ecstatic he was alive, but enraged that he had disobeyed her and left Church to go to the bus station. She was a “good Christian lady,” Watkins said, and she beat me so hard that I had scars for months.
That fall, when I went to school, Watkins said, I was accosted by leading Civil Rights organizer Rev. James Bevel, who urged me to join the movement. I refused – having in mind the reaction of my mother to my previous efforts to meet the Freedom Riders. But a month later, when Bevel returned, Watkins agreed, and began to participate as a Freedom Rider, the youngest of all. I was arrested 108 more times in Mississippi, Watkins said – more than any one else. And I’m proud of every arrest and to have been part of history.
I am now 77 years old, Watkins said, and it’s time to “pass the torch” to younger people. We all have a choice as to what we will do with our lives. I urge you to use that choice to “make a difference” for good.
Why Celebrate on June 2?
Readers may have noticed that this Juneteenth celebration was held on what may be considered the “wrong date,” June 2 instead of June 19. Williams addressed this in his closing remarks.
We are dedicating this event to B.C. Franklin, he said, the Tulsa, Oklahoma attorney and resident who took up the case of those Tulsans whose lives and property were destroyed in the 1921 race riot known as the Tulsa Massacre. That event, which occurred on May 31 and June 1, was touched off by a rumor (unsubstantiated) that a black man had tried to rape a white woman, and ultimately grew into a full-scale assault by white Tulsans against the Black community known colloquially as “Black Wall Street.” The area was eventually burned to the ground, and hundreds of Black Tulsans were killed.
B.C. Franklin took up the task of documenting the atrocity and sued the city of Tulsa for the right of the community to rebuild. For this effort, he should be honored, Williams said.
Closing Remarks
Concluding remarks were made by both Williams and the chair of the Loudoun County Board of Supervisors, Phyllis Randall.
Williams first announced the winner of the contest that the Juneteenth Observation Foundation had sponsored, which called for high school students to write about what Juneteenth meant to them. The winner was James Wyllie, whose speech I covered in my article on Freedom Day a few months ago.
Then first Randall, followed by Williams, wrapped up the message of Juneteenth for the youth. While most of you here are people of color, you should keep in mind that Juneteenth is a national, not a Black holiday, they stressed. “Black History” is an integral part of U.S. history, because people from all communities contributed to the building of our nation.
A Postscript on the Freedom Riders
Unfortunately, it is likely that some of my readers are not familiar with the Freedom Rides of the 1960s, so I have decided to include a summary here.
Equal civil rights for African Americans in this country had to be achieved step by step, court case by court case, and in many instances, blow by blow. Best known, perhaps, is the 1954 decision of Brown vs. Board of Education, which mandated desegregation of public education. One of the next major cases came in 1960, and addressed the continued segregation of facilities in public transportation establishments.
Ironically, the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887 provided the basis for not segregating interstate travel, as it called for no discrimination against users. (originally freight carriers) The relevant case was brought by Bruce Boynton, son of Alabaman civil rights leader Amelia Boynton Robinson, in 1960. Boynton, a student at Howard University, was travelling by Trailways bus from Washington, D.C. to Alabama. When the bus stopped in Richmond for passengers to take refreshment, Boynton sat down in the “white” section of the restaurant in the station, and refused to move. He was arrested and found guilty of violating the law. His case, eventually taken by attorney Thurgood Marshall, was appealed to the Supreme Court, which ruled in 1960 that facilities which served interstate commerce had to desegregate.
As could be expected, many facilities, especially in the South, refused to follow the decision. In response, student activists led by Diane Nash decided in the spring of 1961 to launch a series of Freedom Rides through the South. Groups of Black and white young people would get on the bus and refuse to obey the restrictions to stay in the sections designated by race.
The results ranged from beatings to mass imprisonment, such as Watkins reported in the case of Jackson, Mississippi. Eventually, the original sponsors, the Congress of Racial Equality, gave up the campaign, which was taken over by the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. It was under SNCC’s auspices that the Rev. James Bevel, later the author of many of Dr. Martin Luther King’s mass actions, approached Watkins to join the movement.
[1] The teens, mostly African American, were AP students of African American history from five Loudoun high schools – Loudoun County, Loudoun Valley, Riverside, Stonebridge, and Tuscarora.
[2] Watkins was not actually a Freedom Rider at that time; he and a friend had gone to the bus station to catch a glimpse of the Riders who had come into town. When officers caught him and he told them he was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, they assumed he was an “outside agitator,” and sent him to prison. For a fuller story, click here.
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Tags: civil rights, freedom rides, Hezekiah Watkins, Juneteenth, Nancy Spannaus, Steve Williams, Tulsa massacre
