The Road to Hell: The True Story of George Jackson, Stephen Bingham, and the San Quentin MassacreDuring one of the bloodiest incidents in the history of the New Left, murder, politics, and power forged an inextricable link between George Jackson - inmate, author, and Black Panther field marshal - and white radical lawyer Stephen Bingham. On August 21, 1971, Jackson, armed with a 9mm automatic, led the infamous San Quentin massacre, which resulted in his death and the brutal slaying of three guards and two other prisoners. Two months later, Bingham was indicted for murder and conspiracy - for allegedly smuggling the gun to Jackson. He had already gone underground as a fugitive. Award-winning author Paul Liberatore traces the chilling story of a young black man convicted of a $70 robbery who became a best-selling writer and a "revolutionary hero" of the counterculture and the young, white, Yale-educated civil rights activist turned Berkeley radical who became his lawyer. In telling this story, Liberatore plumbs the highly charged differences that indelibly marked the black and white wings of the radical New Left. Liberatore's behind-the-scenes account - based on interviews and previously confidential records - unweaves the tangled facts of the case: Jackson's rise to sudden celebrity with the publication of his book Soledad Brother, his alliance with the Black Panthers, his torrid encounter with Angela Davis, Bingham's own attraction to the Panthers, his relocation to Paris after Jackson's death, and his eventual trial in California thirteen years later. The Road to Hell reveals many never-before published facts about this violent, mystery-shrouded episode and is essential for anyone interested in the social, racial, and political turbulence of the sixties and seventies. |
