Selma Bloody Sunday

On the afternoon of March 7, 1965, approximately 600 Black men, women, and children alongside a handful of white supporters marched through the streets of Selma, Alabama, and across the Edmund Pettus Bridge headed for the state capital in Montgomery where they planned to petition staunch segregationist, Governor George Wallace, for the right to vote.

Dozens of heavily armed Alabama State Troopers and Dallas County Sheriff’s deputies and mounted posse men blocked the westbound lane of US Highway 80 in front of the Lehman Pontiac dealership about 300 yards south of the bridge. Major John Cloud warned the marchers to disperse but the peaceful demonstrators stood their ground determined to not be turned around.

After a brief pause, Alabama State Troopers, wearing gas masks and armed with clubs, pushed into the front line of the marchers knocking several to the ground. Within seconds, the armed policemen began striking demonstrators with clubs knocking several unconscious and inflicting many injuries. Despite the assault, the marchers regrouped along the highway 100 yards from the initial attack and closer to the bridge and braced for a resumption of the violence. Meanwhile, the police also reformed their ranks.

When the marchers refused to flee across the Edmund Pettus Bridge, the police launched a second round of violence deploying tear gas, mounted posse men, and clubs upon the unarmed protestors. For several minutes, clouds of tear gas obstructed Highway 80 as the police unleashed an assault that inflicted physical and psychological wounds upon the marchers.

As the marchers fled across the bridge and into nearby fields. As they rushed toward their homes and churches, the police continued their assault for hours even as they sought refuge at the First Baptist Church near George Washington Carver Homes. Meanwhile, media outlets across the nation began showing images and video of what became known as “Bloody Sunday.” In the days and weeks that followed, national support for the voting rights movement poured into Selma and set the stage for one of the civil rights movement’s greatest victories, the passage of the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

Use the color tabs to experience how the day unfolded