Alberta King, mother of the late Rev Martin Luther King, was shot and killed today as she played the organ for morning service

The 70-year-old mother of the late Rev Martin Luther King, the civil rights leader who was assassinated six years ago, was herself shot and killed today as she played the organ for morning service in the Ebenezer Baptist Church in the centre of Atlanta, Georgia.



Her assailant, a young black man, who eye-witnesses said "went berserk," and who was later reported to have said that "all Christians" were his enemies, was held by members of the church choir after he had wounded two other members of the congregation, one of them fatally.

Aware of the potential consequences of this latest tragedy, the Mayor of Atlanta, Mr Maynard Jackson, issued a statement beseeching the community to remain calm.

Mr Jackson, elected last year as the first black mayor of a major southern city, had returned abruptly to Atlanta from a West Coast conference last Wednesday after ominous civil disturbances had erupted in the streets following the police shooting of a young black man who had violated his parole. The mood in the city had been calming after the tense and uneasy week when this morning's tragic shootings took place.

Atlanta said later that a 21-year-old black man, Marcus Wayne Chenault, of Dayton, Ohio, had been charged with two counts of murder, one of assault, and one of carrying a concealed weapon.

According to witnesses Mrs Alberta King, whose husband, the Rev Martin Luther King Snr, is pastor of the church on Auburn Avenue, was playing the organ for the Lord's Prayer near the start of the service when the attack began. A young black man jumped and screamed: "You must stop this! I am tired of all this! I'm taking over this morning."

With that he drew two pistols and for the next 90 seconds fired wildly and continuously, hitting Mrs King, another elderly woman parishioner, and a 69-year-old church deacon, Mr Edward Boykin.

'Delirious'

While members of the congregation dived beneath the pews, a few men from the choir jumped on the gunman, who was shouting: " I’m going to kill everyone in here - they did it to me in the war."

Mrs King's grandson Derek, who said he helped to subdue the gunman as he tried to reload a pistol, added: "He was delirious. He appeared to be in a fever. He said over and over, 'The war did this to me. It's the war.'"

Mrs King was taken to the nearby Grady Memorial Hospital, where officials said she was "barely alive" on arrival. She died shortly afterwards from a gunshot wound to the right of her head. Mr Boykin was pronounced dead on arrival.

The attack on Mrs King took place less than 100 yards from where her famous son, killed in 1968 at the age of 39, is buried.

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