Police Fire on Protesters at Sharpeville

On 21 March 1960, thousands of black South Africans assembled outside the police station in the township of Sharpeville, located south of Johannesburg in what was then the Transvaal Province. The demonstration was organized as part of a nationwide campaign by the Pan-Africanist Congress, which urged residents to leave their mandatory passbooks at home and present themselves for arrest. Under South Africa's influx control laws, African residents were legally required to carry identity books that regulated where they could live, work, and travel. By midday, a crowd of several thousand people stood outside the station fence, waiting to be addressed by government officials.

Tensions escalated as police reinforcements arrived, bringing the number of police to about 300, backed by Saracen armoured cars. Air force jets flew low overhead, but the demonstrators remained. Apart from stones thrown toward the police, there was no evidence that the protesters carried weapons. Early in the afternoon, following a scuffle near the station entrance, the police opened fire without first ordering the crowd to disperse. Over the course of about two minutes, officers, some armed with Sten submachine guns, fired directly into the crowd.