Draft:Rosalee McGee

Rosalee McGee, born as Rosetta Saffold, was a public figure in the case of Willie McGee who she stood by represented as his husband and the mother of their children, a falsehood that was uncovered after the execution of Willie McGee.

Early life
She was born on April 1, 1919 in Holmes County, Mississippi. Her parents, Henry Saffold and Nancy Williams, were poor farmers who worked from “dawn till dark to keep body and soul together” and support their ten children. She married at the age of twenty-two to a Lexington man named George Gilmore Jr. on December 13, 1941.

Role in Willie McGee’s Life
Rosalee was a public figure during the defense case of her husband, Willie McGee, who was on trial for the alleged rape of Wiletta Hawkins, a white woman in Laurel, MI. Between 1941 and 1951, her name appeared in scores of newspaper articles as a “loyal wife” and “selfless mother” of four children. Although she never left Mississippi prior to Willie’s trial, Rosalee spoke at tours all over the North, Midwest, and West to inform the public about McGee’s case and advocate for his release. These speaking engagements were primarily funded by the Civil Rights Congress (CRC), who allocated money from their Prisoner’s Relief Fund to support Rosalee during Willie’s trial. One of her first speeches in support of her husband took place in June 1950 at a peace rally in Madison Square Garden, where she shared the stage with prominent figures such as Paul Robeson and New York Representative Vito Marcantonio. Overtime, Rosalee developed in her role as a strong public speaker, resonating with black southerners who related to Willie’s story of injustice in the hands of white supremacy. Oppression against blacks was nothing new to Rosalee: at one point during her speaking tour, she mentioned that Willie’s impending execution would mark the third time that a man in her family died as a result of white supremacist violence in Mississippi. She reportedly claimed, “I saw my nephew lynched by six white hoodlums, and my first cousin was put to death in the electric chair.”

Rosalee’s key involvement in Willie McGee’s case was her sworn affidavit against Mrs. Hawkins in 1950 and 1951, through which she confirmed that Willie and Mrs. Hawkins engaged in a consensual extramarital affair. She supported Willie’s allegation that Mrs. Hawkins had relentlessly pursued him and detailed Mrs. Hawkins’s frequent inappropriate pursuits of Willie, including how she once accosted them both on the streets of Laurel, telling him “Don’t fool with no Negro Whore,” in reference to Rosalee. While Willie was in jail, she frequently wrote letters to him and the CRC, advocating for his innocence and her needs as his wife of four children. Her first letter, written in mid-1949, said: “I am the wife of Willie McGee who have been behind iron bars since Nov. 1945. We have four children and no one to help me with them and I have been very quite until he get this last sentence in April. I am a poor colored woman and I need my husband with these four kids to help me having to send two away to Neb. and I wont to no will he go to the chair on June 3. Please save him for me.”

After this initial letter, she soon began a diligent correspondence with the CRC, informing them of his condition in jail and asking for subsistence money for herself and her children. Many letters were exchanged with Lottie Gordon, a woman who ran CRC’s prisoner’s relief committee, arranging $5 checks and clothing for her children and newspapers and Bible tracts for Willie in jail. At one point, her facilitation of these connections between Willie and the CRC banned her from visiting Willie at the Hinds County Jail in Jackson, Mississippi, where he was imprisoned. According to a letter that Rosalee wrote to the CRC head, William L. Patterson, on August 1, 1950, “The jailer said if I ever come over there, he was going say something to me so he could beat hell out of me and lock me up.” Around the same time, Willie wrote to the CRC, claiming that the jailers only allowed him to receive mail from his family and that they forced him to sign a slip allowing prison officials to read any of his outgoing mail. In response to all of these challenges, Rosalee refused to back down, stating, “my job is not done and if I begin to run, I can’t fight.” Her association with her husband made it difficult for her to get a job, as described in a letter to Gordon in April, 1950: “Soon as the Lady found out i was willie wife she didn’t wont me to get of to go see him.”1 Recognizing the potential value of Rosalee’s letters for generating support and funds for Willie, the CRC started telling her story in press releases.

All throughout Willie’s tumultuous imprisonment, Rosalee loyally remained by his side, vowing, “I'm going to keep fighting till my blood runs like water.” In their final letters to one another, Willie wrote to Rosalee fatalistically, “Dearest Wife: I no you have done everything there is to do and I apraciate you courage… don’t worry honey take care of the children,” and signed it, “Yours truly husband Willie McGee.” While his execution was inescapable, the fight that Rosalee had undertaken only marked the beginning of her advocacy against the racist corruption that had sentenced him to death.

Uncovering the Falsehood
While meeting with Willie McGee’s grandchildren in an effort to learn more about the case, author Alexander Heard was shown photographs of a light-skinned black woman, who the relatives informed him was their grandmother, or the mother of Willie’s children. Shockingly, the woman’s name was Eliza Jane Patton McGee, not Rosalee. Further investigation revealed that Eliza and all of Willie’s children left Mississippi immediately following their father’s arrest, which meant that Rosalee McGee, the woman who had loyally stood by Willie’s side throughout his entire case, was neither his wife nor the mother of his children. The affidavit, where Rosalee attested to her marriage to Willie and their life together in Laurel with their four children, was proven false: she was married to another man and living in Lexington and Durant areas at that exact time, and she was found to never even have been a permanent resident of Laurel. In fact, despite their close relationship during his imprisonment, Willie and Rosalee were likely never legally married at all, as Willie’s divorce from Eliza didn’t happen until he was already in jail.

Heard realized that many people knew of this deception, including the CRC. By 1950, even Mississippi newspapermen were aware that there were two women in Willie’s life. The reason that they went along with it was to try to create a better public image for McGee, as he was "a man with enough problems," and according to a relative, they wanted a "prettier picture, probably, of Willie" as a “married man with children, something to pull for sympathy.” Willie was worried that the CRC would drop him if they knew he'd abandoned his wife and children, and therefore he likely dragged her into a lie and asked her to swear to the story in Eliza’s place. Others, such as Willie’s granddaughter, Bridgette McGee Robinson, questioned Rosalee’s presumed “country” origins and conspired that she actually worked for the CRC, having been hired to help lessen the severity of his case.

Another factor to possibly explain Rosalee’s deception was the opportunities that the lie afforded her. Her involvement with the CRC led her all around the country, giving her a glimpse of the exciting world outside of Mississippi. She spoke in front of over 9,000 people at Madison Square Garden, conversed with important left-wing leaders, and was featured in numerous articles for newspapers around the nation. Further, her implication in Willie’s case propelled her into the position as an advocate against the corrupt system that had falsely convicted him, awakening in her an intrinsic passion to fight for his justice. In the same aforementioned letter to Patterson, she writes: “I am going to fight until all Americans are free from Jim crow system. I have learned that Willie’s life is not the only one that is in danger. I am going to fight not for one but for all. We never know who may be next.”

Rosalee's Contributions
Following Willie’s execution, Rosalee remained a determined advocate for civil rights and continued to speak at events sponsored by the CRC. Just a week after her husband’s execution, Rosalee spoke at an event in New Orleans, expressing her support of the CRC and affirming her belief that Willie’s presumed guilt and execution were a product of racial injustice. At the event, she stated, “The CRC kept my husband alive for the last five years...I know who swindled my husband and who fought to the last minute to save him. Later that year, Rosalee also took part in the committee that initiated the Sojourners for Truth and Justice, a civil rights organization formed specifically to support the advancement of black women. A year later, Rosalee spoke to a crowd of 1,400 people at the CRC-sponsored “Rally Against Genocide” in Harlem, during which she revealed that she had watched her husband’s execution while surrounded by a mob of people cheering the execution on. This deeply angered Rosalee, who recalled, “I couldn’t cry. Instead I got mad. And everyday I’ve gotten a little madder. Now I know mourning is not enough. I’ve got to keep on fighting.” Over time, and with encouragement from the CRC, Rosalee altered her narrative from one of a victim to one of an advocate for black women and their struggles, allowing for her advocacy to persist long after Willie’s execution.