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4. Welcome to Wilcox County
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4 Welcome to Wilcox County For some of the dozen or more of us who participated in the SCLC SCOPE orientation in Atlanta and then jammed into three VW vans for an eight- hour drive, Camden was just a stop on the way to another county. For me, this was going to be home for the rest of the summer. On wobbly legs, we crept into Antioch Baptist Church at 2:30 a.m., using as little light as possible . The fragrance of old hymnals, candle wax, mildew, and damp wood combined in a familiar smell that comforted me a bit after our long drive from Atlanta. A back injury I suffered in high school had flared up and I felt a little feverish, too. Major Johns, a short, dark, solidly built thirty- year- old who was one of our two SCLC field directors, greeted and hushed us. On the way down, Bob Block had told me that Major (that was his first name, not a title), who led the walk outs and sit- ins for the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) in Baton Rouge, had been beaten and arrested lots of times and even served his military draft as a conscientious objector. Major’s movement commitment was iron strong and he’d survived some tough times, so we needed to heed his direction. We got so quiet I could hear the cicadas again. Everything about Major said no nonsense. He surveyed us with stern eyes and took a deep breath. “Y’all gonna have to sleep here tonight. A certain local who was gonna take some of you was visited by Sheriff Jenkins and had his mind changed. Now get some sleep.” There was no question and answer period. Apparently our orientation was no longer going to be theoretical. We made ourselves as comfortable as we could on the wooden pews. Major shut out all the lights. I had slept in churches with my youth group when we did service work, but usually we had sleeping bags and pillows. Bob offered to go get my pillow from the van. On the long trip from Atlanta, I enjoyed his stories of outwitting racists and getting folks excited about voter regis- 58 / My Freedom Summer 1965 tration. He had survived the march from Selma to Montgomery and several marches to the Wilcox County Courthouse without getting beaten too badly, which made me think he could keep me safe. Despite being sweaty and unshaven, he was good looking. In a little while I could hear lots of snoring. I whispered to Bob, “You awake?” No, he was leading the snore symphony of lucky good sleepers. As I was wondering where we would sleep tomorrow night and hoping it would be more comfortable, I heard truck doors slam and booted feet outside the church. Major shouted in a low voice, “Get down and stay down till I say.” Bob and I rolled under the same pew and squeezed together. “What’s going on?” “Oh probably some crackers out there trying to scare us.” “It’s working on me,” I said, trying not to think about the men outside. Then there were shots. I clung to Bob who didn’t seem to mind our sudden closeness. He was whispering, “They won’t kill us tonight. Welcome to Wilcox County, that’s all.” I held my breath and prayed. We were here only to ensure that all Ameri cans had the right to vote. How dare they try to scare us away! Well, I’ll show them; I won’t be afraid, that’s what I told myself. After a while the shots stopped, boots retreated to trucks that roared off down the dark tree- lined highway. When Major Johns said it was safe to come out, some of the workers left for another county and others crawled back up onto the pews. I thought the floor was just as comfortable as any old wooden pew so I stayed down there, and Bob did, too. He and some others went back to sleep for a while as I lay thinking about those men with guns and their history of using them on “outside agitators” like us. A few hours later I stood in the hot morning sun on the steps of Antioch Baptist greeting children and ladies coming for service. I hoped I had cleaned up well enough in the church washroom. We SCOPE girls had been told to wear dresses, not pants, all summer...