AI ToolsNew
Tools to make learning and teaching easier
Fred Rochelle is a young, light-skinned Black man who lives in Bartow, Florida around the turn of the century, working in the phosphate mines there. In 1901, he is accused of raping and murdering a local white woman. In response, a mob of white citizens lynches him. Witnessing this violence made a permanent mark on Ossian Sweet and he carried the memory—and the fear it engendered—into his adulthood.
Fred Rochelle Quotes in Arc of Justice
The Arc of Justice quotes below are all either spoken by Fred Rochelle or refer to Fred Rochelle. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 2
Quotes
He’d recount it with frightening specificity: the smell of kerosene, Rochelle’s screams as he was engulfed in flames, the crowd’s picking off pieces of charred flesh to take home as souvenirs. Maybe, just maybe, he did see it all. The bridge was a short walk from his home. He could have been outside—coming back from his father’s fields—when the mob drove Rochelle through East Bartow. But he was only five years old in the summer of 1901. And it seems unlikely that Dora would have let him outside anytime that day. More likely, the horrific events imprinted themselves so deeply on Ossian’s mind that he convinced himself that he had been there. Either way, the effect was the same. The image of the conflagration—the heart-pounding fear of it—had been seared into his memory.
Related Characters:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
Unlock explanations and citation info for this and every other Arc of Justice quote.
Plus so much more...
Get LitCharts A+
Get the entire Arc of Justice LitChart as a printable PDF.
Fred Rochelle Quotes in Arc of Justice
The Arc of Justice quotes below are all either spoken by Fred Rochelle or refer to Fred Rochelle. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 2
Quotes
He’d recount it with frightening specificity: the smell of kerosene, Rochelle’s screams as he was engulfed in flames, the crowd’s picking off pieces of charred flesh to take home as souvenirs. Maybe, just maybe, he did see it all. The bridge was a short walk from his home. He could have been outside—coming back from his father’s fields—when the mob drove Rochelle through East Bartow. But he was only five years old in the summer of 1901. And it seems unlikely that Dora would have let him outside anytime that day. More likely, the horrific events imprinted themselves so deeply on Ossian’s mind that he convinced himself that he had been there. Either way, the effect was the same. The image of the conflagration—the heart-pounding fear of it—had been seared into his memory.
Related Characters:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
Unlock explanations and citation info for this and every other Arc of Justice quote.
Plus so much more...
Get LitCharts A+
