Both Cowling and Sims sat in the back of the bus, several rows behind the scattered Freedom Riders, who had no inkling of who these two seemingly innocuous white men actually were. Among the 'regular' passengers were Roy Robinson, the manager f the Atlanta Greyhound station, and two undercover plainclothes agents of the Alabama Highway Patrol, Corporals Ell Cowling and Harry Sims. Fourteen passengers were on board: five regular passengers, seven Freedom Riders - Genevieve Hughes, Bert Bigelow, Hank Thomas, Jimmy McDonald, Mae Frances Moultrie, Joe Perkins, Ed Blankenheim - and two journalists, Charlotte Devree and Moses Newson. The bus was more than half empty, unusual for the Atlanta-to-Birmingham run. The Greyhound group, with Joe Perkins in charge, was the first to leave, at 11:00 A.M.

Barring any unforeseen problems, the four-hour ride would give them plenty of time to prepare a properly nonviolent response to the waiting mob - if, in fact, the mob existed.įaced with staggered bus schedules, the two groups of Freedom Riders left Atlanta an hour apart. But he quickly added that he had no reason to believe the Riders would encounter any serious trouble prior to their arrival in downtown Birmingham. He also repeated Tom Gaither's warning about Anniston, a rest stop on the bus route to Birmingham. Peck, trying to avoid a last-minute panic, relayed Shuttlesworth's warning to the group in a calm and matter-of-fact fashion. Shuttlesworth was not privy to FBI surveillance and did not know any of the details, but he urged Peck to be careful. The city was alive with rumors that a white mob planned to greet the Riders at the downtown bus stations. When Peck phoned Fred Shuttlesworth, the outspoken pastor of Birmingham's Bethel Baptist Church and the leader of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights, to give him the exact arrival times of the two 'Freedom Buses,' the normally unflappable minister offered an alarming picture of what the Freedom Riders could expect once they reached Birmingham. Now Peck had to go on alone, perhaps to glory, but more likely to an untimely rendezvous with violence, or even death. They had been through a lot together - surviving the depths of the Cold War and CORE's lean years, not to mention the first ten days of the Freedom Ride. As Farmer left for the Atlanta airport, Peck could not help wondering if he would ever see his old friend again.

Jim Farmer's unexpected departure placed a heavy burden on Jim Peck, who suddenly found himself in charge of the Freedom Ride. We had most trouble, it turned into a struggle,Īnd that 'hound broke down, and left us all stranded, His previous writing includes Land of Sunshine,State of Dreams: A Social History of Modern Florida and Crucible of Liberty: 200 Years of the Bill of Rights, which he edited. His narrative touches on elements from the jails of Alabama to the Kennedy White House.Īrsenault is the John Hope Franklin Professor of Southern History and co-director of the Florida Studies Program at the University of South Florida in St. In Freedom Riders, Arsenault details how the first Freedom Rides developed, from the personal level to the legal maneuvering involved. The book details how volunteers - both black and white - traveled to Mississippi and Alabama to fight segregation in transit systems.ĭespite being backed by recent federal rulings that it was unconstitutional to segregate bus riders, the Freedom Riders met with obstinate resistance - as in Birmingham and Montgomery, where white supremacists attacked bus depots themselves. Raymond Arsenault is the author of Freedom Riders: 1961 and the Struggle for Racial Justice. But the Riders' efforts transformed the civil rights movement.

They were met by hatred and violence - and local police often refused to intervene. In 1961, the Freedom Riders set out for the Deep South to defy Jim Crow laws and call for change.

representative and Ben Cox on the 'freedom plane' to New Orleans, May 15, 1961. Jim Peck, seated, talks with a Justice Dept.

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