By Jerry Mitchell, The (Jackson, Miss.) Clarion-Ledger
JACKSON, Miss. For more than 40 years, the only images family and friends had of Henry Hezekiah Dee were the ones they carried in their minds.
Dee and fellow teenager Charles Eddie Moore were murdered in 1964. The one photo of Dee that relatives knew of was in his wallet when, according to the FBI, Klansmen threw him and Moore into the Mississippi River.
"There had always been a picture of Charles Moore, but it felt like Henry Dee, once he had been murdered, had simply vanished," said Canadian Broadcasting Corp. documentary filmmaker David Ridgen.
That changed last week.
Since 2005, Ridgen and Moore's brother, Thomas, have been working to have the killings prosecuted. Recently, someone they interviewed in 2005 discovered photographs in their home.
"Flipping through their collection, they saw one picture that reminded them of our questions," Ridgen said. "We got back in touch with this person, were given the photograph by them and then checked the photo with several people who knew Henry." Everybody who saw it confirmed it was Dee.
Thelma Collins, Dee's sister, said that when she found out there was a photograph of her brother, she was "so happy till I cried, because we've been looking for it for a long time."
The family had found no solace in visits to Dee's grave because no marker was there, nothing to indicate this 19-year-old had ever lived.
Dee's other sister, Mary Byrd, still feels the hurt — a hurt not only from losing a loved one, she said, but also from having nothing to remember him by.
When she learned Tuesday that a photograph had been found of her late brother, she said, "It feels good. I'm so glad for that."
Upon seeing the picture of his old friend for the first time, Thomas Moore said, "I almost felt the earth move beneath me. It was overwhelming."
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