On This Day In Alabama History: Civil Rights Activist Was Murdered In Hayneville

Alabama News Center | August 21, 2017 @ 5:00 am

By Graydon Rust
Alabama 200

August 20, 1965

Civil rights activist Jonathan Daniels was murdered by Tom Coleman, an unpaid special deputy, in Hayneville. A white Episcopal seminarian, Daniels took the full impact of a shotgun blast to the chest after pushing 17-year-old African-American Ruby Sales out of the way, saving her life. The activists were stranded in Hayneville without transportation after their release from jail for picketing whites-only stores in Fort Deposit a week earlier. Originally from New Hampshire, Daniels came to Alabama to participate in the Selma to Montgomery March. The Episcopal Church of the United States designated Daniels a martyr in 1991 and honors him annually on Aug. 14, the day of his arrest.

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