| Fox News | - |
July
1, 2015: Smoke rises from Mount Zion African Methodist Episcopal
church. (Veasey Conway/The Morning News via AP). A historic
African-American church in South Carolina that was burned down by the Ku
Klux Klan in 1995 caught fire again Tuesday ...
List of attacks against African-American churches
A historic African-American church in South Carolina that was
burned down by the Ku Klux Klan in 1995 caught fire again Tuesday night,
though authorities say it is too soon to say what had caused the blaze.
No is believed to have been in the church at the time.
The fire at the Mount Zion African Methodist Episcopal church in Greeleyville broke out at a time when federal authorities are investigating other fires at other predominantly black churches – including one near Aiken – but so far the fires don’t appear to be related.
Greelyville is a town of 400 people, about 50 miles from Charleston, where the deadly shooting of a pastor and nine members of a historic black church occurred June 17 in what authorities are investigating as a hate crime.
State Law Enforcement Division agents were on their way to the church before the fire was extinguished, Division Chief Mark Keel said. But he said they will have to wait until the hot spots are put out before using dogs and other investigative tools to figure out what started it. He said investigators will be on the scene first thing Wednesday morning.
"We do know they apparently had some strong storms," Keel said. "Talked to a guy who said they had a lot of lightning down there tonight. I don't know whether that had anything to do with it at all."
The image of orange flames coming from the same church the KKK burned down 20 years ago brought up painful memories, said Williamsburg County Councilman Eddie Woods Jr., who got out of bed to drive to the church after hearing about the fire.
"That was a tough thing to see," Woods said. "It is hurting those people again. But we're going to rebuild. If this was someone, they need to know that hate won't stop us again," Woods said.
All of the fires currently under investigation broke out says after the killings in Charleston at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church. Dylan Roof has been charged with nine counts of murder in the shootings, and the FBI is investigating links between the 21-year-old white man and a hate manifesto that showed up online along with photos of him.
Mount Zion AME Church burned down June 20, 1995. Two Ku Klux Klan members pleaded guilty to starting the fire and a second at another predominantly black curch. They were each sentenced to nearly 20 years in prison.
Speaking at the church in 1996, President Bill Clinton implored people not to respond to what was a string of nearly three dozen church fires — many of them racially motivated — with the same hatred that drove the people who started the blazes. He gave the church a plaque to commemorate his visit, and noticed membership had grown four times over since the fire.
"The American people are the most religious, church-going people of any great democracy," Clinton said. "We cannot let someone come into our democratic home, the home of our faith, and start torching our houses of worship."
The Associated Press contributed to this report
end quote from:
Another historic black church burns in South Carolina
July 1, 2015: Smoke rises from Mount Zion African Methodist Episcopal church. (Veasey Conway/The Morning News via AP)
The fire at the Mount Zion African Methodist Episcopal church in Greeleyville broke out at a time when federal authorities are investigating other fires at other predominantly black churches – including one near Aiken – but so far the fires don’t appear to be related.
Greelyville is a town of 400 people, about 50 miles from Charleston, where the deadly shooting of a pastor and nine members of a historic black church occurred June 17 in what authorities are investigating as a hate crime.
State Law Enforcement Division agents were on their way to the church before the fire was extinguished, Division Chief Mark Keel said. But he said they will have to wait until the hot spots are put out before using dogs and other investigative tools to figure out what started it. He said investigators will be on the scene first thing Wednesday morning.
"We do know they apparently had some strong storms," Keel said. "Talked to a guy who said they had a lot of lightning down there tonight. I don't know whether that had anything to do with it at all."
The image of orange flames coming from the same church the KKK burned down 20 years ago brought up painful memories, said Williamsburg County Councilman Eddie Woods Jr., who got out of bed to drive to the church after hearing about the fire.
"That was a tough thing to see," Woods said. "It is hurting those people again. But we're going to rebuild. If this was someone, they need to know that hate won't stop us again," Woods said.
All of the fires currently under investigation broke out says after the killings in Charleston at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church. Dylan Roof has been charged with nine counts of murder in the shootings, and the FBI is investigating links between the 21-year-old white man and a hate manifesto that showed up online along with photos of him.
Mount Zion AME Church burned down June 20, 1995. Two Ku Klux Klan members pleaded guilty to starting the fire and a second at another predominantly black curch. They were each sentenced to nearly 20 years in prison.
Speaking at the church in 1996, President Bill Clinton implored people not to respond to what was a string of nearly three dozen church fires — many of them racially motivated — with the same hatred that drove the people who started the blazes. He gave the church a plaque to commemorate his visit, and noticed membership had grown four times over since the fire.
"The American people are the most religious, church-going people of any great democracy," Clinton said. "We cannot let someone come into our democratic home, the home of our faith, and start torching our houses of worship."
The Associated Press contributed to this report
end quote from:
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