Who was Carolyn Bryant Donham and what happened with Emmett Till?

CAROLYN Bryant Donham was the woman whose accusation led to the lynching of 14-year-old Emmett Till in 1955.

The African American teen was murdered for allegedly flirting with Carolyn. But who was she and what happened? Here's everything you need to know.

Who was Carolyn Bryant?

Hailing from Indianola, Mississippi, Carolyn was a high school drop out who married Roy Bryant, an ex-soldier.

During the 1950s, the couple ran a small grocery, Bryant's Grocery & Meat Market, that sold provisions to black sharecroppers and their children.

They had two sons and lived in two small rooms in the back of the store.

What happened with Emmett Till?

On the evening of August 24, 1955, Carolyn was on shift when young Emmett Till entered the shop with his friends for refreshments.

Known as a prankster, Emmett had previously bragged to his cousins that he had a white girlfriend back home and was dared to ask Carolyn, a white woman, out on a date.

Though exactly what happened next is uncertain, Carolyn later claimed that the teen grabbed her, made lewd advances, and whistled at her as he left.

When Bryant's husband, Roy returned to town a few days later he rushed over to Till's family house with his half-brother J.W. Milam and forced Till into their car.

After beating him, they drove him down to the Tallahatchie River where they made him carry a 75-pound cotton gin fan to the bank and then ordered him to take off his clothes.

The two men beat him nearly to death, gouged out his eye, shot him in the head, and then threw his body, tied to the cotton gin fan with barbed wire, into the river where his body was discovered three days later.

They were acquitted of murder by a local, all-white jury but confessed to murdering Till a year later to a journalist at .

The pair never served any jail time.

What happened to Carolyn Bryant Donham?

After making the accusation that led to Till’s brutal murder, Carolyn stepped away from the spotlight.