US civil-rights activist. His murder in 1963 fuelled the civil-rights movement and increased support for legislation that would become the Civil Rights Act 1964.

Evers served as Mississippi state field secretary of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) 1954-63. He travelled throughout the state working on recruitment and voter registration drives, economic boycotts and demonstrations, and investigations into crimes against blacks. His civil-rights work made him a target of white supremacists, and in June 1963 he was shot dead during an ambush at his house. His death and the subsequent trial of Byron De La Beckwith, the accused murderer, were widely publicized. He was buried with full military honours at Arlington National Cemetery and was posthumously awarded the 1963 NAACP Spingarn Medal. Beckwith was tried and acquitted twice, both by all-white juries. In 1994 he was tried a third time, by a mixed jury, and was sentenced to life in prison. He died in 2001.