Photograph by Ed Pollard, Hasselblad H4D50 - 2018.

Wife of a Lynch Victim, Irwinton, Georgia

Artist Marion Palfi (American (born Germany), 1907 - 1978)

CultureAmerican

Date1949, printed ca. 1960

MediumGelatin silver print, mounted on board

DimensionsOverall, Image: 16 1/8 × 13 1/8 in. (41 × 33.3 cm)
Overall, Support: 20 × 16 in. (50.8 × 40.6 cm)
Overall, Mat: 22 × 18 in. (55.9 × 45.7 cm)

SignedSigned on the mount, recto.

InscribedVerso: FROM “THERE IS NO MORE TIME” / (THE TOWN WHICH HAD THE FIRST REPORTED LYNCHING IN 1949) / WIFE OF THE LYNCH VICTIM / 1949

PortfolioFrom "There Is No More Time"

Credit LineMuseum purchase

Object number2018.24

Not on view

DescriptionThe photograph depicts the wife of Caleb Hill, Jr., a 28-year-old chalk miner living in Irwinton, GA. On March 30, 1949, Hill was kidnapped from a jail where he was being held for “creating a disturbance.” His body was later found severely beaten and shot multiple times.
Label TextMarion Palfi American, b. Germany, 1907–1978 Wife of a Lynch Victim, Irwinton, Georgia, 1949 Gelatin silver print (photograph), printed ca. 1960 Anger, weariness, and sorrow mix on the face of a woman widowed by a lynching in Georgia. Marion Palfi made this photograph in the rural town where Caleb Hill, Jr., had been kidnapped from a prison cell and murdered. Two men were arrested for Hill’s murder, but an all-white jury ruled there wasn’t enough evidence to go to trial. Newspaper accounts suggest indifference among the town’s white residents. One commented, the hanging “didn’t upset a checkers game.” Palfi spent several weeks interviewing and photographing people from the town. While many white residents drew on religion and pseudoscience to downplay and justify the killing, black residents recounted harrowing experiences of violence and dehumanization. Museum purchase 2018.24Exhibition History"5 Years of Photography: Building the Chrysler Collection," Photography & Focus Galleries, Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, VA, June 26 - November 10, 2019.