South Carolina has a long, violent, and racist history, effectively setting a morbid backdrop for the events that unfolded on June 17, 2015. The Charleston shooting occurred in a church named the Emanuel African Methodist Episocopal Church (A.M.E.) The church had become somewhat of a hub for social justice and political activism. Denmark Vesey was one of the founders of the church and used it as a homebase for what the National Park Service describes as, “an enslaved insurrection” against slave-owners and both city and state officials. Douglas R. Egerton continues the story by describing how the city eventually destroyed the church, only for it to be rebuilt by Vesey’s son Robert. Then, when an earthquake struck Charleston in the 1880s, members of the church helped to rebuild and repair damages to it (“Before Charleston’s Shooting, a Long History of Attacks”). 

In more recent times, the church community was active in preserving and sharing their history. A major discussion point of 2015 was the act of removing Confederate statues and monuments, and the Emanuel A.M.E. Church group was very involved with that movement. One of the victims, Clementa Pinckney, was a former Senator and pastor of the church. Egerton describes Pinckney as, “...instrumental in funding the statue of Vesey that was finally erected in February 2014” (“Before Charleston’s Shooting, a Long History of Attacks”). When Dylann Roof decided to attack this particular church, he was not just attacking those 9 victims. He attacked the entire Black community, every congregate of that church, and its founders. As Egerton so eloquently put it, “...the world will find out more about Dylann Storm Roof and his state of mind. But to dismiss him as simply a troubled young man is to disregard history” (“Before Charleston’s Shooting, a Long History of Attacks”). 

Works Cited

“Denmark Vesey (U.S. National Park Service).” National Parks Service, U.S. Department of the Interior, https://www.nps.gov/people/denmark-vesey.htm. Web.

Egerton, Douglas R. "Before Charleston's Church Shooting, a Long History of Attacks."ProQuest, Jun 18, 2015, https://www.proquest.com/blogs-podcasts-websites/before-charlestons-chur.... Web.