Natchez church to present play on Natchez Deacons for Defense

Cast will feature writer and director Jamal McCullen and 11 local students

Jamal McCullen, fourth grade English teacher at Susie B. West Elementary School, is the writer and director of “The Natchez Deacons for Defense: A Dramatization.” The play will premiere at 2 p.m., Saturday, Feb. 11, at Rose Hill Missionary Baptist Church, 607 Madison St.

NATCHEZ, Miss. – A local teacher and 11 students are combining their talents to tell the story of the Natchez Deacons for Defense and Justice, a group that provided armed protection for the Black community during the civil rights movement in the 1960s.

 
Jamal McCullen, a fourth grade English teacher at Susie B. West Elementary School, is the writer and director of “The Natchez Deacons for Defense: A dramatization.” The play will premiere at 2 p.m., Saturday, Feb. 11, at Rose Hill Missionary Baptist Church, 607 Madison St. It is free and open to the public.
 
The play is presented by the church in concert with the Dr. John Bowman Banks Museum.
“This play is about education,” said McCullen. “It’s an opportunity to learn about an era in our community history where some amazing men stood up and had the courage to do something different than what was being done to move our people forward -- and closer to equality and fair treatment.”

Writer and director Jamal McCullen with the cast of “The Natchez Deacons for Defense: A Dramatization.” Standing from left are Darius Williams, Malachi White, Anthony West, Jamal McCullen, Ashton Williams and Kaimon Shaw.

Cast of students

 
The cast will feature students Anthony West of Cathedral School, Malachi White, who attends Natchez Early College at Co-Lin; and Ashton Williams, Kaimon Shaw, Darius Williams, and Tyler Lyles, who attend Natchez High School. Other cast members include Emmanuel Wilcox of Delta Charter, Kameron Bates of Natchez Freshman Academy, Kortland Harris of Jefferson High School, and Casen Campbell and Ryan Smith of Natchez Middle school.
 
“It is truly an honor to be surrounded by these amazing men and to learn something from them through this program,” said West, 13.
 
Ashton Williams, 18, said the play will be a “good program for young black males and other brothers in the community.”
 
“It’s a great opportunity for people to learn about Natchez history,” added Darius Williams.
 
McCullen said the students are members of Omega Pathfinders, a mentorship program of the Nu Xi chapter of Omega Psi Phi Fraternity Inc.
 
The students will portray the Deacons and some of the key figures in the movement, including Clifford M. Boxley, James “Big Jack” Jackson, Leon Donnan, James Stokes, Otis Mazique, Richard “Dip” Lewis, and John Monroe Fitzgerald.
 
The Deacons for Defense organization was first organized in 1964 in Jonesboro, La., in response to the terror and violent acts of the Ku Klux Klans against civil rights activists. The Deacons, many of whom were actual deacons in the church, carried firearms for the protection of the activists, as well as for themselves.
 
The Deacons were portrayed in the 2003 film, Deacons for Defense, which featured actor Forest Whitaker. The Natchez Deacons were featured in the film, Black Natchez (1967) and in PBS Frontline’s “American Reckoning (February 2022). This local branch formed in 1965 following the bombing of NAACP President George Metcalfe's vehicle on Aug. 27, 1965.

Pictured on this flyer is James “Big Jack” Jackson, leader of the Natchez Deacons for Defense. He was a barber at Donnan’s Barbershop, which was used as a command center for the Deacons.

‘Show and tell’

 
Local historian Ser Seshsh Ab Heter-Clifford M. Boxley was a civil rights activist who helped the Natchez Deacons. He supports the dramatization by McCullen. He said it is “wonderful” that McCullen is using a “living history format to show and tell” the history of the Natchez Deacons.
 
“Jamal has been a regular actor in my annual Black and Blue Civil War Living History Programs,” Boxley said. “He is a natural and outstanding actor and working up young students to portray living history of the Natchez Deacons is a chip off of what we been doing for the young Afrikan descent U. S. Colored Troops freedom fighters of the 19th century, who helped make the first mass civil rights gains of the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments possible!”
 
McCullen said that in addition to consulting with Boxley, his research for the project was informed by family connections. “I was familiar with the story through family relationships, family folklore, and things I grew up seeing and hearing,” he said. “At the time, I did not know about certain things, but I was later able to connect the dots.”
 
The play is 45 minutes in length. It will include music and freedom songs from the 1960s. McCullen said the song, “In the Mississippi River,” is sure to have an impact on the audience. The song mentions lynchings in Mississippi, including the brutal 1964 murders of James Chaney, Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman in Philadelphia, Miss.
 
According to McCullen, the idea for the play grew out of a discussion he had with the church volunteers, which included Dora Hawkins, Jacqulyn Williams, and Thelma Newsome, all of whom manage the Dr. John Bowman Banks Museum on St. Catherine St., the former headquarters of the local NAACP.
 
“The ladies at the Dr. John Banks House asked me in August 2022 if I can do something for them on Black History dealing with the Deacons for Defense, and I said yes, I can make that work,” McCullen recalled.
 
McCullen said he was honored by their request. Inspired, he began brainstorming. He started writing the script over Thanksgiving and finished it during the Christmas break.
 

James “Big Jack” Jackson, leader of the Natchez Deacons for Defense, is featured prominently in the film, “Black Natchez” (1967). His character will be portrayed by Natchez High School student Darius Williams in “The Natchez Deacons for Defense: A Dramatization.”

Remembering the Deacons

 
According to Boxley, the story of the Deacons holds an important place in Natchez history. He said it is a story of “Black men and women supporters who organized themselves into an armed action defender organization to defend the modern civil rights movement participants and the Negro community from the continued, wanton, unbridled, murder and terrorists’ violence heaped upon Blacks by Whites of the Ku Klux Klan, Citizens Councils, police, gangs and individuals in general.”
 
The Deacons, he said, must be remembered as they were: “They were a 20th century or modern civil rights movement organization that grew out of the membership of the local NAACP branch, Voters League, Churches, U. S. Army veterans, social clubs and Negro Communities in general, who wanted to regain in the 20th century, the 19th century civil rights to vote (based upon the 14th amendment).”
 
With the help of the Deacons, the civil rights workers in Natchez implemented a three-pronged approach that led to success in the struggle. Boxley said that in addition to armed defense, they used economic boycott of businesses owned by whites and enforcement of adherence to the boycott in the black community. This led to the defeat of the “Jim Crow white supremacy segregation domination” in Natchez, Boxley said.

Writer and director Jamal McCullen with the cast of “The Natchez Deacons for Defense: A Dramatization.” Seated from left are Darius Williams, Anthony West, Malachi White, and Ashton Williams. Standing from left are Jamal McCullen and Kaimon Shaw.