Cleveland Sellers
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Cleveland Sellers was the only individual to be imprisoned as a result of the Orangeburg Massacre for his supposed incitement of the riot that preceded the shootings.
Sellers is now the director of the African-American Studies program at the University of South Carolina.
On February 8, 1968, around 200 protesters had gathered on the campus of South Carolina State University (located in the city of Orangeburg) to protest the segregation of All Star Bowling Lane (now called All-Star Triangle Bowl), a bowling alley on Russell Street (then US 301, now SC 33), owned by local businessman, the late Harry K. Floyd. Students set grass fires and tried to burn down a vacant house. A highway patrolman was hit in the face by a banister from the house, and an altercation ensued in which several South Carolina Highway Patrol officers were struck with thrown objects. The officers also stated that they believed they were receiving small arms fire during the incident. However, evidence that they were being fired on was inconclusive, and there would appear to be no evidence that the protesters were armed or had fired on officers.
The officers responded by firing into the crowd, killing three young men, Samuel Hammond, Delano Middleton, and Henry Smith, and wounding 27 others.
Governor McNair immediately blamed outside Black Power agitators, but subsequent investigations showed this to be untrue.
The ensuing trial, billed as the first federal trial of police officers for using excessive force at a campus protest, led to the acquittal of all nine defendants. The only individual to be imprisoned as a result of the incident was Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) representative Cleveland Sellers, for his supposed incitement of the riot that preceded the shootings. Sellers is now the director of the African-American Studies program at the University of South Carolina.
Though this predated the Kent State shootings and Jackson State killings, and was the first incident of its kind on an American university campus, the Orangeburg Massacre received relatively little media coverage. Jack Bass, a historian who wrote about the incident, has attributed this discrepancy to the fact that the victims at Orangeburg were young black men protesting segregation, and that the victims at Kent State were young whites protesting an increasingly unpopular war. Others cite the fact that the incident took place at the height of the Tet Offensive as reason for the limited media coverage.
The university's gymnasium is named in memory of the three men, and a memorial square was erected on campus in their honor. All-Star Triangle Bowl was integrated, and to this day the Floyd family has maintained ownership and operation of the business.
