Today we commemorate Black Panther member Bobby Hutton, who was murdered in cold blood on 6 April 1968. Born Robert James Hutton in Jefferson County, Arkansas, on 21 April 1950, his family moved to California during the Great Migration, during which six million Black people moved from the US south to the North, fleeing racist acts of t*rrorism and legal discrimination. He became known as Lil’ Bobby after he became the very first recruit for the Black Panther Party for Self Defense (BPP) in Oakland, California. At the young age of 16, he served as the first treasurer of the revolutionary socialist Black Power organisation. He was murdered by Oakland Police officers just two days after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King. He was just 17-years old when he was shot over twelve times by the officers. He had already stripped himself naked before them to prove that he was unarmed at the time of his murder.
Hutton joined the Black Panther Party because he was committed to its 10-Point Programme which included demands such as,
“We Want Freedom. We Want Power to Determine the Destiny of Our Black Community,” ” We Want An End to the Robbery By the Capitalists of Our Black Community” and “We Want An Immediate End to Police Brutality and the Murder of Black People.”
Today, “Lil’ Bobby Hutton Day” has been commemorated every year in DeFremery Park, Oakland since 1998.
Did you know about the history of this young freedom fighter?
Sources
https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/hutton-bobby-1950-1968/
https://www.zinnedproject.org/news/tdih/murder-of-bobby-hutton/
https://www.archives.gov/research/african-americans/migrations/great-migration
https://www.pbs.org/hueypnewton/people/people_hutton.html
https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/black-panther-party-ten-point-program-1966/