‘More to Be Done’: Mississippians Celebrate Juneteenth Across Mississippi
Juneteenth commemorates the day when federal troops arrived in Galveston, Texas, in 1865 to take control of the state and ensure that all enslaved people were freed.
The History Of Juneteenth And The Emancipated People Kept UnfreeÂ
On June 19, 1865, Black dockworkers in Galveston, Texas, first heard the word that freedom for the enslaved had come. “There were speeches, sermons and shared meals, mostly held at Black churches, the safest places to have such celebrations,” history professor Kris Manjapra writes. “But the emancipation that took place in Texas that day in 1865 was just the latest in a series of emancipations that had been unfolding since the 1770s.”
