Blacks Mark Anniversary of King’s Death

About 450 blacks marking the 19th anniversary of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. marched under police protection to the town courthouse Saturday, past dozens of jeering whites waving Confederate flags.

“Although we are marching in Colonial Heights, our intention and purpose is to say to the country all over, we’re fed up and we’re not going to take it anymore,” said the Rev. Curtis Harris, march leader.

Harris, wearing the same blue denim jacket he wore in the 1965 civil rights march in Selma, Ala., said the rally was aimed at calling attention to “fear and intimidation that (black) people confront when they even think about living in Colonial Heights.”

March in Memphis

Another march commemorating King’s assassination was held Saturday in Memphis, Tenn., where the civil rights leader was gunned down by sniper James Earl Ray on April 4, 1968.

Among the marchers was Jesse Jackson, civil rights activist, who was standing a few feet from King when the fatal bullet was fired.

At the end of the two-mile march in Colonial Heights, Harris, president of the Virginia branch of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, nailed a list of demands to the door of the town courthouse.

The list called for an end to discrimination in housing, employment and business opportunities in the nearly all-white city, which has often been dubbed “Colonial Whites.”

The 1980 U.S. Census showed 37 blacks residing in the city of 16,500.

Harris said the rally was inspired by a massive demonstration staged in Forsyth County, Ga., in January.

But a leader of a white supremacist group said his organization will hold a countermarch in Colonial Heights on Saturday.