Walter Sillers Jr.

Walter Sillers Jr. (April 13, 1888 – September 24, 1966) was an American lawyer, politician, and landowner. A legislative leader from Mississippi, he served as the 56th Speaker of the Mississippi House of Representatives. An outspoken White Nationalist, Sillers has been referred to as one of the most racist political leaders in Mississippi's history. He was one of the wealthiest people to have ever served in the Mississippi legislature.

Walter Sillers Jr.
56th Speaker of the Mississippi House of Representatives
In office
January 4, 1944 – September 24, 1966
Preceded bySam Lumpkin
Succeeded byJohn Junkin
Member of the
Mississippi House of Representatives
from Bolivar County
In office
January 4, 1916 – September 24, 1966
Preceded byGeorge Shelby
Succeeded byJohn L. Pearson
Personal details
Born(1888-04-13)April 13, 1888
Rosedale, Mississippi, U.S.
DiedSeptember 24, 1966(1966-09-24) (aged 78)
Jackson, Mississippi, U.S.
Political partyDemocratic
Spouse(s)
Lena Roberts
​
(m. 1911)​
ParentsWalter Sillers
Florence Warfield
EducationSt. Andrew's-Sewanee School
Alma materUniversity of Mississippi

Biography

Sillers was born in Rosedale, Mississippi to Walter Sillers, Sr. and his second wife, Florence Warfield Sillers. He was a brother of the columnist and segregationist Florence Sillers Ogden.[1] A member of a prominent Mississippi Delta family, his paternal grandparents were planters and slaveholders in Rosedale. His maternal grandfather was Colonel Elisha Warfield, a planter and Confederate military officer who served in the 2nd Arkansas Infantry Regiment. He was a great-great grandson of Elisha Warfield and a great-grandnephew of Mary Jane Warfield Clay.[2] He was a grandnephew of Charles Clark, a Confederate general who served as Governor of Mississippi.[3]

Sillers grew up in Rosedale and was raised in the Methodist Episcopal Church.[3] He lived with his family in a large Victorian-style mansion on Levee Street.[4] He was educated at St. Andrew's-Sewanee School, an Episcopal boarding school in Sewanee, Tennessee.[3]

Originally an attorney, he served in the Mississippi House of Representatives from 1916–1966.[3] He served as Speaker of that body from January 4, 1944 until his death on September 24, 1966.[5] He was a delegate to the Democratic National Conventions of 1916, 1924, 1944, 1948, 1952, and 1956.[6][4]

He has been called "one of the most racist political leaders in Mississippi's history."[7]

He inherited multiple plantations from his father and held interests in banks, oil companies, and other businesses in Mississippi.[3] Due to his inheritance and business ventures, he was one of the wealthiest people to have ever served in the Mississippi legislature.[3]

Legacy

A building was named after him, for political reasons, at the historically black Mississippi Valley State University. The Walter Sillers State Office Building, a government high-rise in Jackson, Mississippi is also named after him.[4]

References
  1. King, Ed; Watts, Trent (October 7, 2014). Ed King's Mississippi: Behind the Scenes of Freedom Summer. Univ. Press of Mississippi. ISBN 9781626743304 – via Google Books.
  2. "Warfield Family History". July 10, 2009.
  3. "DRY SEPTEMBER REVISITED" (PDF). www.mississippilawjournal.org. Retrieved 2020-07-15.
  4. "Walter Sillers and His Fifty Years Inside Mississippi Politics | Mississippi History Now". mshistorynow.mdah.state.ms.us.
  5. Sillers Mississippi Bluebook 2004, p. 145
  6. "Sillers Is Taken By Death," Biloxi Daily Herald, September 24, 1966, pp. 1–2
  7. Loewen, James W. (1999). Lies Across America : what our historic sites get wrong. The New Press. p. 236. ISBN 1565843444.
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