A significant development emerged on Friday as Mayor G.T. Bynum announced the identification of the first person from graves holding over a hundred victims of the 1921 Tulsa massacre. Using DNA from descendants of his brothers, Intermountain Forensics identified C.L. Daniel, a World War I veteran from Georgia who was in his twenties when he was killed.
“This marks a poignant moment for this family, finally providing closure with a proper burial after more than a century of uncertainty,” stated Mayor Bynum.
The Tulsa massacre, where a white mob killed up to 300 Black residents over two days, remains a deeply suppressed chapter of racial violence. It devastated the thriving community known as Black Wall Street, forcing thousands into internment camps overseen by the National Guard.
Brenda Nails-Alford, a descendant of massacre survivors and a member of the oversight committee for victim identification, expressed emotional relief at the identification: “This day, which has been a long time coming, brings tears to my eyes.”
Since 2020, efforts to locate victims’ graves have uncovered more than 120 burial sites, with forensic analysis and DNA collected from about 30 sets of remains. Daniel’s identification is the first direct link to the massacre among these graves.
The breakthrough in identifying Daniel came when investigators discovered a 1936 letter from his mother’s attorney seeking veterans’ benefits, archived at the National Archives. Alison Wilde, a forensic scientist at Intermountain Forensics, noted that this letter was crucial in establishing Daniel’s fate in the massacre.
At the news conference announcing the identification earlier this week, Wilde mentioned that no members of Daniel’s family were present, as many were unaware of each other’s existence.
Phoebe Stubblefield, a forensic anthropologist, described Daniel’s fragmented remains, noting the challenges in determining a cause of death without clear signs like gunshot wounds that may not have been detectable due to the nature of the remains.
Oklahoma state archaeologist Kary Stackelbeck described the conditions in which the remains were found, including Daniel’s small wooden casket that necessitated bending his legs to fit inside.
Mayor Bynum emphasized that the search for victims will resume on July 22, underscoring the commitment to identifying as many victims as possible.
Meanwhile, a legal effort by the only two known living survivors of the massacre, Viola Fletcher and Lessie Benningfield Randle, seeking justice through the courts and the Department of Justice under the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act of 2007, continues despite recent setbacks in the Oklahoma Supreme Court.
