Photo of Fred Hampton speaking to reporters at a rally protesting the trial of anti-Vietnam War activists; Chicago, 1969, retrieved from https://www.britannica.com/facts/Fred-Hampton.
by Kyle DeVinney
The assassination of Fredrick Allen Hampton, better known as Fred Hampton, aimed to both kill a young prominent revolutionary of social change, while also aiming to kill the revolution itself. One could argue that Hampton was killed by the Cook County Chicago police, the Federal Bureau of Intelligence (FBI), or William O’Neal, but the death of Hampton was the outcome of government corruption and prejudice. Hampton’s death was also the outcome of his political associations, image, and efforts to assist the American people. The history of the Civil Rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s as well as the nature of race relations in the United States explain Fred Hampton’s involvement with the Black Panthers Party. Hampton’s position as chairman of the Illinois Black Panther Party (BPP), as well as his large presence in the media coverage of the BPP, underscore his political influence. His death was meant to undermine a Civil Rights organization, while it also provided political or personal gain for the FBI informants, FBI agents, and police officers involved in Hampton’s killing. Hampton’s views and image may have also added a sense of revenge for certain individuals involved in his death. Finally, this assassination involved coercion, as documented in FBI memos, documentaries, and legal documents, specifically on the relationship between William O’Neal, the FBI, and the Black Panther Party.
Hampton’s altruism from a young age explains his active interest and later involvement in the Civil Rights movement. Frederick Allen Hampton was born on August 30, 1948, in Chicago, Illinois in Cook County Hospital.[1] Growing up in his hometown of Marbury, Illinois, Fred was known to be sensitive and caring for the well-being of his older brother and sister. Fred’s mother, Iberia, always recognized that Fred was a compassionate and hardworking kid. She recalls a young Fred as being athletic and in love with the sport of baseball.[2] As a young teen, Fred told his mother that he aspired to be a lawyer. His mother reportedly said, “That was his strongest aspiration in life. He always talked about being a lawyer to help his clients.”[3] Although Fred did not grow up to become a lawyer, he did find himself defending the rights of others for the remainder of his life.
Fred Hampton’s pathway and connection to Civil Rights began at the early age of seven. It was a hot summer day in Drew, Mississippi on August 28, 1955. A white mob lynched and killed a young black boy named Emmet Till after he allegedly talked to a white woman in front of her family’s grocery store. The brutal nature of Till’s death was a major shock to his community, resulting in public outcry and backlash towards white supremacy. Emmet Till’s death has been labeled as the “big bang” of the Civil Rights movement due to its immediate impact on national media coverage of Black oppression.[4] Coincidentally, Fred Hampton’s family had not only known this young boy, but Fred’s mother Iberia had occasionally babysat Emmet for years. Emmet had eaten, slept, and spoken with Fred’s family long before Fred’s rise to influence, and his death may have possibly been one of the early catalysts for Fred’s destiny. The extent of this relationship between the two families is not known, but the tragic deaths of Emmet and Fred both highlight how white supremacy and Black oppression have been accepted into American society. When considering Emmet’s killers were not found guilty of their appalling act, as well as Hampton’s death being at the hands of multiple “justice” agencies, both tragedies revealed the lack of respect for the basic human rights of Black Americans.
Racial disparities, white supremacy, and police brutality have been significant issues in cities across the United States for decades. Hampton witnessed the ongoing struggle for Civil Rights as a young boy in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The activism of the 1950s, including the Montgomery Bus Boycott, led to the emergence of major sit-in protests in the 1960s. The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) founded in 1960, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) founded in 1957, and the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) founded in 1942, had become influential organizations by the mid-1960s. Each organization played a crucial role in advocating for representation, equality, and desegregation during these decades. Utilizing and practicing the philosophy of nonviolent protests, each organization exposed the oppression Black Americans experienced.
Many members of several nonviolent organizations experienced racial violence and prejudice. These members were often harshly beaten and arrested by prejudiced police officers and white supremacists. Despite the harsh realities these brave protesters endured, many continued to suffer for the cause. The empowering words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. were a factor in providing hope for many of these courageous protestors. King was a prominent figure throughout the 1950s and 1960s for his endorsement of nonviolence and civil disobedience. King was a Baptist minister who helped lead multiple major protests and acts of civil disobedience. After becoming the first president of the SCLC, his influence grew to immense proportions. King and the SCLC played a major role in the acknowledgment of Civil Rights by the White House and King helped lead the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in 1963. During the march, King delivered his famous “I Have a Dream” speech, envisioning the United States as having voting rights for Black Americans, the end of Jim Crow society, and further attempts by the federal government to provide equality.[5] Although King’s approach was gaining success, some figures began to lose hope in the nonviolent approach as progress slowed after 1964. Despite the efforts of Martin Luther King Jr. to continue to promote non-violent protests, the beginnings of the “Black Power” movement were on the cusp of creation.
Malcolm X, who had also been an influential voice during the Civil Rights Movement, rose to fame during the late 1950s as a prominent speaker. Malcolm X grew up in a harsh environment where racism surrounded him constantly. Malcolm’s parents had been supporters of Marcus Garvey’s Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA), formed in 1914. Malcolm’s family repeatedly received threats from white supremacists and even had one of their family homes burned down due to their public support of Garvey. Following the attack on his childhood home, Malcolm X experienced the premature death of his father at age six and witnessed his mother be declared mentally ill in 1938. Malcolm was then put into the foster care program where he was placed in a home in a white neighborhood with white foster parents in Michigan.[6] Growing up in Michigan, Malcolm excelled in his classwork, however, turned to a life of crime as he reached adulthood. After being sentenced to prison, Malcolm read the Quran and decided to practice Islam. “Malcolm joined the Nation of Islam (NOI) while serving a prison term in Massachusetts on burglary charges. Shortly after his release in 1952, he moved to Chicago and became a minister under Elijah Muhammad… By the late 1950s, Malcolm had become the NOI’s leading spokesman.”[7]
The Nation of Islam (NOI), founded in 1930, was a Muslim organization that endorsed Black nationalism. The NOI promoted a nonviolent approach to achieving civil rights which later caused an issue between Malcolm X and Elijah Muhammad. As police brutality across the United States continued to occur during the 1950s and 1960s, Malcolm X went against the NOI and began to encourage revolutionary violence. Malcolm X emphasized that self-defense was a human right and necessary to protect oneself from corrupt and violent oppressors. “Malcolm viewed retaliatory violence as a necessary response to criminal acts.”[8] After Malcolm’s change in rhetoric, he split from the NOI and utilized his fame to spread his ideas of revolutionary violence and Black separatism.
In 1963, a church bombing in Birmingham, Alabama led to the death of four young black girls which created real frustrations among various Civil Rights organizations. This event prompted Malcolm X to expand his critical remarks on King and the nonviolent approach. In his “Message to the Grassroots” speech, Malcolm explains that the nonviolent approach has led to the death of a true revolution. Malcolm also explains that the integration of white people in the struggle for Civil Rights is just a tactic to slow their progress, which King and other figures were too blind to see: “It became a picnic, a circus. Nothing but a circus, with clowns and all. You had one right here in Detroit — I saw it on television — with clowns leading it, white clowns and black clowns.”[9] Although Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr.’s philosophies juxtaposed each other, their goals were extremely similar. Both men utilized similar skills that inspired future Civil Rights advocates, such as Hampton, with their charismatic and articulate speaking skills to inspire their followers. Despite Malcolm’s growth in popularity, Malcolm X was not untouchable. On February 21, 1965, Malcolm X led a mass rally in Harlem where rival Black Muslims gunned him down.
Following the assassination of Malcolm X in 1965, Martin Luther King Jr. and the SCLC’s non-violent approach lost even more support when SNCC member Stokely Carmichael replaced SNCC leader John Lewis in 1966. Floyd McKissick then replaced CORE leader James Farmer in 1966.[10] Both organizations transitioned from non-violent philosophies to Black militancy with these leadership changes. As organizations transitioned their philosophies in response to Malcolm X’s death, King acknowledged Malcolm’s death in a telegram to Malcolm’s widow, Betty Shabazz. King acknowledged that “while we did not always see eye to eye on methods to solve the race problem, I always had a deep affection for Malcolm and felt that he had a great ability to put his finger on the existence and root of the problem.”[11] Malcolm’s death created a major shift in the Civil Rights movement where Black militancy began to be considered more often by both pre-existing and emerging Civil Rights organizations. King continued his work in spreading a message of nonviolence, however, when King was assassinated in 1968, riots and protests broke out across the country. At this point, CORE leader McKissick declared that nonviolence was “a dead philosophy” once King had died.[12]
In California, one group of Black activists had already begun to develop a new vision of self-defense, Black militancy, and “Black Power” in the mid-1960s. A new organization called the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense (BPPSD) emerged in Oakland, California following the San Francisco police killing of a Black 16-year-old, named Matthew Johnson. BPPSD founders Huey Newton and Bobby Seale formed this new political party on October 15, 1966. Newton and Seale, who were inspired by the ideas of Malcolm X, argued that Black Americans were essentially living as a subjugated colony within the United States, with their labor and resources exploited by the dominant society. They believed that achieving self-determination for the Black community was crucial not only for its liberation but also as part of a broader effort to transform American society and the global community. Drawing inspiration from Marxist theory and anti-colonial struggles, they advocated for the use of guerilla warfare to bring about social change.[13]
Early programs of the Panthers were based on third-world Marxism and centered to help the lives of Black Americans. Some of these programs included armed “cop-watching” patrols, a visionary network of health and nutrition programs, armed protests, and an unequivocal Ten-Point Program.”[14] This Ten-Point Program, also known as the Ten-Point Manifesto, outlined the Panthers’ ideologies and goals. The manifesto highlights their critiques of capitalism, police brutality, the Vietnam War, the economic conditions of Black communities, and the need for structural change. Many of the goals and ideas set in place by the Ten-Point Manifesto were outcomes of, “the appeal of ‘third-world Marxism’ – of figures like Che, Mao, and Fanon – lay in the way that it critiqued and challenged America’s violence… as the product of three mutually reinforcing forces: capitalism, racism, and imperialism. Crucial here was a growing sense among disaffected youth, aided by the recent invention of television, that everything is connected. That those same systemic forces were the cause of violence both at home and abroad.”[15] This outlook established that capitalism and the structure of the United States needed to change to ensure the freedom, safety, and flourishing of Black Americans. Although Newton and Seale “agreed that neither communism nor socialism was appropriate for African Americans,”[16] they recognized that each of these ideologies held aspects that would benefit their cause, thus establishing themselves as radical.
The Black Panthers created a massive target for the Department of Justice. This organization established itself on foreign ideologies during the Cold War and displayed its right to bear arms publicly, thus posing an internal security threat for the Department of Justice. By the 1960s, the FBI had utilized its power to monitor radicals for decades. Director J. Edgar Hoover, who officially led the FBI from 1924-1972, was a major opponent of anarchy, communism, and radicalism in the United States.[17] Seeing as the Panther’s goals were rooted in foreign ideologies, such as communism and socialism, it was no surprise that Hoover and the FBI deemed them as threats. Before the Panthers’ inception, the FBI had also deemed Civil Rights organizations and figures like Stokely Carmichael, Martin Luther King Jr., and Malcolm X as dangerous radicals that needed to be surveilled.
Under Hoover’s direction, the FBI established the counterintelligence program known as COINTELPRO in 1956. The first target of this program was the American Communist Party due to their denouncement of capitalism and their critiques of the federal government during the Cold War. As time progressed, COINTELPRO expanded its targets to groups that either critiqued capitalism or presented ideas that were radical to Hoover and agents. The main targets included the Socialist Workers’ Party, White hate groups, Black nationalists/hate groups, and the New Left.[18] According to leaked FBI memos, the targeting of these groups also included each group’s key figures and associates, intending to “expose, disrupt, and otherwise neutralize” those involved.[19] Financial backers of these organizations, key speakers, and even politicians were all at risk of being targeted by the FBI during their various COINTELPRO operations.
Although the FBI and local police departments targeted many Civil Rights organizations they deemed radical, the BPP became a large target and national name as they directly challenged various institutions and political figures. The Panthers utilized the Second Amendment and local gun laws to organize legally armed protests. One example is when Bobby Seale and his fellow Panthers stormed the Sacramento Capitol Building on May 2, 1967. The Party openly displayed their weapons, dressed in all black, and waited as the family of a victim of police brutality arrived at the Sacramento Capitol Building.[20] Seale openly spoke to the media and explained the ideologies of the Party set by Seale and Newton. The Panthers contended that the eradication of force and brutality would require a counterforce through self-defense. Drawing inspiration from revolutionary figures and ideas, Newton and Seale established the Panthers as potential leaders of a revolution in the United States.
The armed protests in Sacramento, California were in response to California State Governor Ronald Reagan’s public support of the Mulford Act. The Mulford Act aimed to restrict the carrying of loaded firearms in public places, which would prevent the Black Panther Party’s further public display of firearms.[21] As Panthers carried loaded rifles and shotguns and entered the State Capitol building, members read aloud Executive Mandate Number 1, arguing that the Mulford Bill violated the Second Amendment.[22] The BPP gained national attention for this event, as well as the opportunity to spread its messages to a more mainstream audience. New members were challenged to memorize the Ten-Point Manifesto and familiarize themselves with the ideologies and strategies of revolutionary figures, such as Fanon, Malcolm X, Che Guevara, and Mao.[23] Following the event in Sacramento, BPP offices across the country rapidly popped up and the BPP began to send representatives to various cities to speak about their cause, catching the attention of Fred Hampton.
Before becoming a member of the BPP, Fred Hampton spent his teenage years advocating in his local community. Hampton’s charismatic ability to inspire community support enabled him, with the help of Donald Williams, to organize a chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), in his high school. Through his position in the NAACP chapter, Hampton advocated for his neighborhood, encouraged his fellow students to become involved in school politics, protests, to celebrate Black representation, and called for the improvement of education standards.[24] Hampton prioritized having his first major campaign in the NAACP Youth Division to focus on advocating for Black students and staff members in his high school. One of Hampton’s more notable achievements before becoming a member of the Panthers resulted from a student protest outside Maywood County’s police station where there was an unjust arrest of a classmate. Both adults and peers recognized Hampton’s ability to inspire, unite, and strengthen the community, which likely helped achieve the release of his classmate following a unified protest outside the jailhouse.
Continued police brutality and racial disparities in Chicago caused Fred Hampton to join the Panthers. By 1968, Hampton’s optimistic and persistent efforts as President of the Maywood Youth Division of the NAACP saw a dramatic rise in members to the local NAACP chapter. In one year alone, membership had risen from 125 to over 700.[25] Utilizing many members, Hampton used his influence to criticize local politicians, police brutality, institutional racism, and inequalities within different sectors of daily life.[26] Although Hampton’s advocacy had a major impact on the culture of his high school and community, the oppressive and violent atmosphere surrounding these forms of advocacy still hovered over Chicago. The 1960s saw the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Economic Opportunity Act (1964), and the Civil Rights Act of 1968, however, police brutality and racial disparities remained within Chicago, and many other cities across the nation.[27] Following the 1967 race riots within Chicago, as well as the frustrations of Fred Hampton to fight systemic racism, a BPP member convinced Hampton to join the Panthers.
The Black Panther Party’s message and objectives made it across the country to various communities through the publication of “The Black Panther” newspaper. Speaking tours by BPP members also contributed to the establishment of new branches in numerous cities. Fred Hampton’s introduction to BPP ideology occurred during a speaking tour stop in Chicago, where Lennie Eggleston, a Panther affiliated with the Los Angeles chapter, played a pivotal role in influencing Hampton’s alignment with the BPP principles. Joan Elbert, president of the Lutheran Human Relations Association, recalls Eggleston’s stay at her home, where Hampton attempted to understand BPP goals and ideologies through dialogue. During these discussions, Eggleston’s advocacy of class solidarity challenged Hampton’s previously held beliefs as a member of the NAACP.[28] During Hampton’s time in the NAACP, he considered racial unity as a fundamental factor in revolutionizing the United States, however, Eggleston began to change his mindset. Following this conversation, Hampton viewed poor whites as potential allies in a revolutionary movement against the U.S. power structure. The concept of a movement transcending racial boundaries resonated strongly with Hampton’s experiences in Maywood, where he recognized the alienation of various poor communities, including those in Chicago’s slums.[29]
Due to the lack of an official chapter of the BPP being established in Chicago, Hampton was unable to join the BPP until a chapter in Chicago had been established. Unbeknownst to Hampton, two political factions in Chicago had been attempting to establish a BPP office in the city. The South Side faction, led by former SNCC members Bobby Rush and Bob Brown, sought legitimacy. However, they were informed that the West Side faction had already been recognized as an unofficial BPP office. After being rejected, Rush’s group received a phone call from the official BPP national headquarters in Oakland describing an issue with two of its members:
“Two Oakland Panthers who were on a flight from New York to California had gotten into an argument about whether the flight’s distance from New York to California was the same as the flight distance from California to Cuba. One of the men decided to ask the stewardess for her input to settle the debate. During this period, hijacking a plane was not an unlikely occurrence. Thus, the stewardess rationalized that the two Panthers wanted to hijack the plane to Cuba. She contacted the flight’s captain, who made an emergency landing in Chicago, where the two men were arrested.”[30]
The West Side faction in Chicago did not have a working phone, which resulted in Rush’s faction receiving the call. After the South Side faction succeeded in securing the release of the two Oakland Panthers, the South Side faction was “awarded an official charter and thus became the Illinois chapter of the BPP in 1968.”[31]
The merging of the South and West Side factions allowed Fred Hampton to become more influential in Chicago. When the West Side faction received notice of the South Side’s official charter, the two factions decided to merge: “On November 1, 1968, the group officially opened its headquarters at 2350 West Madison Street. The founding members included Fred Hampton, Bobby Rush, Bob Brown, Bob Clay, Rufus “Chaka” Walls, Jewel Cook, Drew Ferguson, and Henry English, among others.”[32] Recognizing they needed a charismatic speaker who was involved in local communities of Chicago, members agreed to appoint Fred Hampton as the main spokesperson. Hampton’s association with the BPP, Rush, and Brown became undeniable after his impactful speech at a leadership conference organized by former Chicago Freedom Movement (CFM) leader Phil Cohran. Transitioning from the NAACP to the Illinois Black Panther Party, Hampton attracted NAACP associates and members to follow him. Joann Lombard, being among those who joined Hampton, explained that she followed Hampton because “he knew about problems facing the community and the world,” and that Hampton’s belief in the BPP encouraged her to also believe that the BPP may have been the “solution to the issues that plagued poor African American communities.”[33] As Hampton’s fame and influence rose among the ranks of the Chicago Panthers in 1968 and 1969, a man named William O’Neal, also known as “Bill”, joined the BPP in 1969.
William O’Neal’s upbringing explains his desire to become an FBI informant on the Panthers. O’Neal was born in Chicago, Illinois on April 9, 1949. Although little is known about O’Neal’s upbringing, an interview with him in 1989 revealed that he grew up in a “middle-class neighborhood” and knew very little about politics, claiming he was “apolitical.”[34] Unlike Hampton and the BPP, O’Neal grew up reportedly “admiring and respecting policemen,” even considering the career path for himself.[35] O’Neal became a key instrument of the FBI to assist Cook County Police in the assassination of Fred Hampton. O’Neal’s admiration of police, however, did not prevent him from committing petty crimes. One of the juvenile activities that had led O’Neal to become an informant for what he called “the finest police organization in America,” occurred when O’Neal had stolen a car with a friend.[36] “My recruitment by the FBI was very efficient, very simple, really. I’d stolen a car and went joy-riding over the state limit, and they had a potential case against me, and I was looking for an opportunity to work it off.”[37] O’Neal’s willingness to become an FBI informant and infiltrate the Panthers likely stemmed from both his early admiration of authority and his desire to avoid jail time.
The FBI’s COINTELPRO program aimed to weaken the Black Panther Party’s influence. In 1968, the FBI initiated the Counterintelligence Program (COINTELPRO) against the BPP, driven by Director J. Edgar Hoover’s perception of the Panthers as the preeminent revolutionary entity in the United States. Hoover, deeming the BPP the “most influential” revolutionary organization, intensified efforts in 1969 by characterizing them as the “greatest threat to internal security” within the nation. Consequently, the FBI directed 233 out of 295 COINTELPRO initiatives specifically aimed at dismantling the Black Panther Party.[38] According to multiple FBI documents obtained by Aaron J. Leonard, a writer and historian, and Conor A. Gallagher, a researcher and educator, O’Neal infiltrated the Illinois BPP as a part of COINTELPRO efforts to dismantle the branch. O’Neal was recruited by FBI Special Agent Roy Martin Mitchell to join the Chicago Panthers before Hampton became the Illinois BPP branch Chairman. Directions given to O’Neal did not initially focus on Hampton. According to a 1970 COINTELPRO memo obtained by Leonard, O’Neal and other informants were meant to weaken support within and outside of the BPP. The FBI also used its operators to try and dismantle the BPP, for example “the bureau anonymously mailed the BPP’s holiday greeting cards to “newspaper editors, public officials, responsible businessmen, and clergy.” The aim was to make the recipients “aware of the vicious nature of the BPP.”[39]
Despite the initial efforts of the FBI, the Illinois BPP continued to expand its influence by forming alliances with other organizations and street gangs. The FBI utilized O’Neal by informing Special Agent Mitchell of this information. Following the direction of the FBI, O’Neal used his security position to gain proximity to Hampton and other influential Panthers. One FBI document stated: “The Chicago Police Department Gang Intelligence Unit, headed by Captain William Buckney, has many sources in such gangs, possibly even young Black police officers. The source (CG 7251-R PROB) [O’Neal] has been instructed to play upon this fear of youth gangs, in that in recruiting gang members the BPP may well be recruiting police spies.”[40] O’Neal also helped provide information to the FBI to arrest BPP members. O’Neal provided descriptions of automobiles of Panthers and indicated whether traveling Panthers were armed, which would then be given to the Chicago Police Department.[41]
Despite the setbacks the Illinois Black Panthers faced, Fred Hampton, who had risen to Deputy Chairman of the Illinois BPP, became Chicago’s leading voice of revolution. Chairman Fred helped organize social welfare programs that the Panthers called “survival programs.” The Free Breakfast for Children program and free medical research health clinics were the most popular of the programs while Hampton was Chairman.[42] Although the intentions behind these initiatives were clear, the FBI even tried to criticize these programs. When speaking about the breakfast program, FBI director, J. Edgar Hoover claimed that “this program was formed by the BPP for obvious reasons, including their efforts to create an image of civility, assume community control of Negroes, and to fill adolescent children with their insidious poison.”[43] Chairman Hampton emphasized in his fiery speeches how ironic it was that the government was attempting to discredit and silence their organization for doing work that the government should be responsible for. Publicly challenging local and federal government became associated with the “Rainbow Coalition,” which was formed on April 6, 1969. The Rainbow Coalition opposed the then Mayor of Chicago, Richard M. Daley, for his “destructive urban renewal programs and the police brutality that so often plagued Chicago’s poor neighborhoods by making efforts to eradicate political divisiveness centered in racism.”[44] This public unification of various groups representing different causes and races became a major achievement for the legacy of Chairman Hampton. However, it also made it abundantly clear to Mayor Richard Daley, the FBI, and the police that Hampton was a figure that threatened the oppressive United States institution and those that benefited from it.
Standing outside in the severe cold, handcuffed, and in her third trimester of pregnancy, Akua Njeri, who was Hampton’s fiancé, remembers shivering on December 4, 1969. The bitter cold mirrored the calculated attack that had occurred just moments before. Fred Hampton was killed by Cook County Police while he lay asleep in his bed. Mark Clark also lost his life, found dead by the front door of the apartment which served as a Black Panther Headquarters. The apartment bore witness to the aftermath of the violent attack, with bullet holes, blood, and police officers laughing callously. The remaining Panthers were arrested and escorted out of the house as the smiling officers took pride in their actions.[45] Each of the remaining Panthers’ arrests was justified as attempted murder by State Attorney Edward Hanrahan and Cook County Police.[46]
The BPP contended that the raid on Hampton’s apartment by the Chicago Police Department, in collaboration with the FBI, was a premeditated assassination. They argued that the authorities had deliberately targeted Hampton due to his influential leadership within the Black Panther Party and his efforts to unite various marginalized groups in Chicago. The filming of the documentary, The Murder of Fred Hampton, took place both before and after Chairman Hampton’s death. The investigators featured in the documentary concluded that the Cook County police had lied and attempted to cover up this assassination. For instance, the analysis of bullet trajectories and entry points indicated that the shots had been fired from outside Hampton’s apartment towards his bedroom first, which contradicted claims that law enforcement officers had only returned fire after being initially shot at by occupants of the apartment. The documentary also contained a moment with Hampton’s fiancée, who recalled hearing two shots ring out after policemen entered the bedroom of a wounded Hampton. She allegedly heard them say the phrase, “He’s good and dead now!”[47]
Eyewitness testimonies played a crucial role in establishing the targeted nature of Fred Hampton’s death. Survivors of the raid provided accounts of the events that unfolded on the night of December 4, 1969. Statements in the Murder of Fred Hampton documentary suggested that law enforcement officers had entered Hampton’s apartment with the intent to kill, rather than to serve a warrant or make an arrest.[48] These testimonies highlighted discrepancies between the official police narrative and the actual sequence of events as witnessed by individuals present at the scene. Additionally, government documents obtained through legal processes such as Freedom of Information Act requests revealed a covert and coordinated effort by law enforcement agencies to surveil and neutralize Fred Hampton. These documents revealed that the layout of the headquarters was provided to law enforcement by the FBI. Informant William O’Neal confirmed that he had provided multiple sketches of the BPP headquarters, serving this purpose.[49]
Although it is unclear whether William O’Neal carried out the act, Hampton’s autopsy revealed he had a large amount of fentanyl in his system the night he died. According to William O’Neal: “I’ve never known Fred to take drugs. And, to take it a step further, Fred would not tolerate anyone even smoking marijuana around him,” unintentionally confirming that the drugs in Hampton’s system were not knowingly taken intentionally.[50] Although O’Neal’s drugging of Hampton cannot be verified, FBI memos from Director Hoover confirm that O’Neal’s information directly contributed to the assassination. In a memo to the Chicago FBI office, Hoover wrote a message of praise alluding to the assistance in the assassination of Hampton: “I want to commend those agents in the Chicago Office who participated so competently in a matter of substantial interest to the Bureau in the security field.”[51] Special Agent Mitchell’s name also is found on top of the document, somewhat confirming what the message referred to.
As the Panthers arrested in the raid compiled evidence to fight for the truth, their legal battles were thrown out. Despite ballistic evidence concluding that “all but one of the shots were probably fired by the police and its findings that the police may have falsified reports on the raid, the first special Federal grand jury that investigated the incident returned no indictments.”[52] Lawyers G. Flint Taylor and Jeffery Haas, working from the People’s Law Office in Chicago, continued to fight the uphill battle for the survivors of the raid, Iberia Hampton, and Mark Clark’s family. One piece of evidence, which became a major talking point for both lawyers, was an FBI memo authorizing the payment of a “bonus” to informant William O’Neal.[53] Another vital piece of evidence came from a whistleblower in 1977. Mr. Swearingen, who was a former agent for the FBI, claimed that an FBI supervisor in Chicago informed him that the bureau had “deliberately set up” the situation in which Fred Hampton was killed nine years beforehand.[54] In 1982, the federal government agreed to a settlement, which resulted in the survivors of the raid, as well as Hampton and Clark’s family receiving $1.85 million. Although neither the FBI nor Cook County police were ever legally proven by a judge to be involved in the assassination, G. Flint Taylor told reporters: ”The settlement is an admission of the conspiracy that existed between the F.B.I. and Hanrahan’s men to murder Fred Hampton.”[55] Following the airing of O’Neal’s interview in the 1990 docuseries, Eyes on the Prize II: America at the Racial Crossroads 1965–1985, O’Neal was found dead after being struck by a car on a highway. His death was ruled a suicide and is popularly believed to be due to his guilt regarding Hampton’s death.[56]
The death of Fred Hampton was a tragic event that resulted in the death of a young revolutionary leader and the weakening of a revolutionary organization, the Black Panther Party. The cooperation between the FBI and police to target Hampton, who envisioned a unified revolution focused on the betterment of society, displays how institutionalized racism has been protected and strengthened by prejudice-filled government agencies. FBI documents reveal that COINTELPRO initiatives were meant to disrupt and discredit the positive messages behind organizations like the Black Panther Party. Like Malcolm X, Fred Hampton has often been mischaracterized and oversimplified as a radical, violent, and dangerous individual. While Hampton did advocate for followers to be armed, he was not advocating for anarchism. Hampton’s support of violence encapsulated the need for Black people to protect themselves from unconstitutional and violent oppressors in the United States.
The context behind Hampton’s rise to fame and his eventual assassination is imperative to understand what he and the BPP stood for. Class solidarity, self-defense, unity, welfare capitalism, and being the catalysts of societal change were the real intentions of the BPP. Due to the FBI, racist political figures, and Cook County police, these ideas were discredited and written off by media outlets. As a consequence of these unfortunate realities, the Black Panther Party’s impact has been overlooked. Without the Black Panther Party and Fred Hampton, more families would have been underrepresented and possibly suffered more police brutality, poor economic conditions, and lack of needed medical treatment.
Hampton’s death has been widely publicized; however, his unfortunate assassination has overshadowed the movement he stood for. From his time spent in the NAACP to his time as Chairman of the Illinois BPP, Hampton was able to use his impressive oratorical skills to inspire people to be revolutionaries. Revolutionaries like Hampton advocate for much-needed change in society, rather than the chaotic violent image they are presented to be by oppressors. Despite the Cook County police and the FBI’s success in assassinating Hampton, Hampton’s death shed light on the oppressive actions of police officers and COINTELPRO. The government’s direct involvement in Hampton’s assassination caused Americans across the country to question the morality of our federal government. The Panthers’ message continues to shape modern-day movements nationwide as improvements in welfare programs, increased funding for underprivileged communities, and the fight against police brutality are key causes of today’s Civil Rights organizations. Hampton’s obituary read a phrase he was often known for saying in his speeches, “You can kill the revolutionary, but you can’t kill the revolution.”[57] Despite his unfortunate death, his life truly became an example of how a revolution for the people cannot be killed.
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[1] Craig McPherson, “Fred Ain’t Dead: The Impact of the Life and Legacy of Fred Hampton,” Master’s thesis(Georgia State University, 2015), 4.
[2] Jakobi Williams, From the Bullet to the Ballot: The Illinois Chapter of the Black Panther Party and Racial Coalition Politics in Chicago (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2015), 54.
[3] William Hampton, The Essence of Fred Hampton: An Attempt to Capture the Spirit of a Young Man Who Influenced So Many and to Pass It On to Those Who Didn’t Have the Opportunity to Meet Him (Chicago: Salsedo Press, 1989), 50.
[4] Craig Chamberlain, “60 Years Ago This Month, Emmett Till’s Death Sparked a Movement,” University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign News Bureau, August 17, 2015, https://news.illinois.edu/view/6367/232501.
[5] U.S. Mission Korea, “Martin Luther King, Jr. : I Have a Dream Speech (1963),” U.S. Embassy & Consulate in the Republic of Korea, March 7, 2023, https://kr.usembassy.gov/martin-luther-king-jr-dream-speech-1963/.
[6] John L. Puckett, “Malcolm X, Part I: Malcolm Little’s Coming of Age,” West Philadelphia Collaborative History, https://collaborativehistory.gse.upenn.edu/stories/malcolm-x-part-i-malcolm-little%E2%80%99s-coming-age.
[7] “Malcolm X,” The Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute, https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/malcolm-x#:~:text=By%20the%20end%20of%20the,reform%20schools%20and%20foster%20homes.
[8] James H. Cone, “Martin and Malcolm on Nonviolence and Violence,” Phylon (1960-) 49, no. 3/4 (2001): 173-179.
[9] BlackPast, “(1963) Malcolm X, ‘Message to the Grassroots,’” BlackPast, September 23, 2019, https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/speeches-african-american-history/1963-malcolm-x-message-grassroots/.
[10] “Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC),” The Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute, https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/student-nonviolent-coordinating-committee-sncc.
[11] Clayborne Carson, “The Unfinished Dialogue of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X,” Souls 7, no. 1 (2005): 17.
[12] “Congress of Racial Equality (CORE),” The Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute, https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/congress-racial-equality-core.
[13] Robyn C. Spencer, The Revolution Has Come (Durham: Duke University Press: 2016), 35–60.
[14] CAAM Web staff, “#blackhistory: On October 15, 1966, Bobby Seale and Huey P. Newton Form the Black Panther Party in Oakland, California,” CAAM, October 15th, 2019, https://caamuseum.org/learn/600state/black-history/blackhistory-on-october-15-1966-bobby-seale-and-huey-p-newton-form-the-black-panther-party-in-oakland-california.
[15] Alexander Blanchard, “Understanding Context and Contradiction in the Concept of Violence: Frantz Fanon, Stokely Carmichael and the Long 1960s,” Political Studies 71, no. 4 (2021): 1057.
[16] Williams, From the Bullet to the Ballot, 107.
[17] “J. Edgar Hoover, May 10, 1924 – May 2, 1972,” FBI, May 3, 2016, https://www.fbi.gov/history/directors/j-edgar-hoover.
[18] David Cunningham, “The Patterning of Repression: FBI Counterintelligence and the New Left,” Social Forces 82, no. 1 (2003): 209–40.
[19] “The Memorandum of May 14th, 1968,”Chicago 68, https://www.chicago68.com/fbi51468.html.
[20] Joshua Aiken, “What the Panthers Meant by Self-Defense: Race, Violence, and Gun Control,” Duke Center for Firearms Law, August 9, 2022, https://firearmslaw.duke.edu/2022/08/what-the-panthers-meant-by-self-defense-race-violence-and-gun-control.
[21] Joshua Aiken, “What the Panthers Meant by Self-Defense.”
[22] Huey P. Newton, “Executive Mandate No. 1,” May 2, 1967, in Essays From the Minister of Defense(Oakland: Black Panther Party, 1968).
[23] Spencer, The Revolution Has Come, 50-52.
[24] Williams, From the Bullet to the Ballot, 56.
[25] Williams, From the Bullet to the Ballot, 58.
[26] Williams, From the Bullet to the Ballot, 56-57.
[27] Warren K. Leffler, “The Civil Rights Act of 1964: A Long Struggle for Freedom Epilogue,” Library of Congress, October 10, 2014, https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/civil-rights-act/epilogue.html.
[28] Williams, From the Bullet to the Ballot, 63
[29] Williams, From the Bullet to the Ballot, 61-62.
[30] Williams, From the Bullet to the Ballot, 63.
[31] Williams, From the Bullet to the Ballot, 63
[32] Williams, From the Bullet to the Ballot, 63
[33] Williams, From the Bullet to the Ballot, 63.
[34] William O’Neal, interview by Blackside, Inc., Eyes on the Prize II: America at the Racial Crossroads 1965 to 1985, April 13, 1989, in Washington University Libraries, Film and Media Archive, Henry Hampton Collection, question 4.
[35] O’Neal, interview by Blackside, Inc., Eyes on the Prize II: America at the Racial Crossroads 1965 to 1985, question 7.
[36] O’Neal, interview by Blackside, Inc., Eyes on the Prize II: America at the Racial Crossroads 1965 to 1985, question 7.
[37] O’Neal, interview by Blackside, Inc., Eyes on the Prize II: America at the Racial Crossroads 1965 to 1985, question 28.
[38] Williams, From the Bullet to the Ballot, 173.
[39] Aaron J. Leonard and Conor A. Gallagher, “We Obtained New FBI Documents on How and Why Fred Hampton Was Murdered,” Jacobin, March 31, 2021, https://jacobin.com/2021/03/fred-hampton-black-panther-party-fbi-documents.
[40] Leonard and Gallagher, “We Obtained New FBI Documents on How and Why Fred Hampton Was Murdered,” The Informant paragraph 4.
[41] Leonard and Gallagher, “We Obtained New FBI Documents on How and Why Fred Hampton Was Murdered,” The Informant paragraph 7.
[42] Williams, From the Bullet to the Ballot, 93.
[43] Ward Churchill and Jim Vander Wall, The COINTELPRO Papers: Documents from the FBI’s Secret Wars against Domestic Dissent (Boston, MA: South End Press, 2002), 145.
[44] Williams, From the Bullet to the Ballot, 126.
[45] The Murder of Fred Hampton, directed by Howard Alk (1971; Chicago; Chicago Film Group Inc. & Facets Multi-Media, 1971), film, 52:48.
[46] Ronald Koziol and Edward Lee, “Attempted Murder Charge Eyed in Panthers Gun Fight,” Chicago Tribune (1963-1996), Dec 05, 1969.
[47] The Murder of Fred Hampton, 1:12:02.
[48]The Murder of Fred Hampton, 1:09:42.
[49] O’Neal, interview by Blackside, Inc., Eyes on the Prize II: America at the Racial Crossroads 1965 to 1985, question 17.
[50] O’Neal, interview by Blackside, Inc., Eyes on the Prize II: America at the Racial Crossroads 1965 to 1985, questions 23 and 39.
[51] Leonard and Gallagher, “We Obtained New FBI Documents on How and Why Fred Hampton Was Murdered,” Jacobin, March 31, 2021, https://jacobin.com/2021/03/fred-hampton-black-panther-party-fbi-documents, BPP’s Publications paragraph 31.
[52] Nathaniel Sheppard, “PLAINTIFFS IN PANTHER SUIT ‘KNEW WE WERE RIGHT,’” The New York Times, November 14, 1982, sec. 1.
[53] John Kifner, “F.B.I. Files Say Informer Got Data for Panther Raid,” The New York Times, May 7, 1976.
[54] John M. Crewdson, “Former F.B.I. Agent Tells Investigators of Widespread Abuse and Corruption,” The New York Times, January 20, 1979.
[55] Sheppard, “PLAINTIFFS IN PANTHER SUIT”, sec. 1.
[56] Robert Blau, “Panther informant death ruled suicide,” Chicago Tribune, January 18, 1990.
[57] Craig McPherson, “You Can’t Kill Chairman Fred: Examining the Life and Legacy of a Revolutionary,” Journal of African American Studies 23, no. 4 (2019): 276–98, 14.