An excerpt from Newsone -
‘Orangeburg Massacre’ In South Carolina Occurred On This Day In 1968
Written By D.L. Chandler
One of the most stirring tragedies of the civil rights movement during the 1960s took place in the small town of Orangeburg in South Carolina. On this day in 1968, police officers fired in to a crowd of Black students protesting segregation, killing three and wounding 28 others, in what has been called the “Orangeburg Massacre.”
After Black students were denied entry to the Whites-only All Star Bowling Lane alley and began protesting at the establishment’s door, the students — now numbering into the hundreds — gathered on the campus of South Carolina State University to demonstrate against the bowling alley. The students were raucous and sparked a bonfire, with the group throwing firebombs and other objects. As an officer put out a fire, he was hit with an unknown object. Police claimed to hear gunfire and began to fire in to the throng.
The police killed three people that day: Samuel Hammond and Henry Smith, both students at SCSU, and Delano Middleton (all pictured above), a student at nearby Wilkinson High School. 28 others were injured by both gunfire and other weapons, including one pregnant young woman who reported having a miscarriage a week later due to beatings by police.
https://newsone.com/2190700/orangeburg-massacre/
