'Warrior For Justice' Laid To Rest

Hosea Williams' fellow soldiers in the civil rights movement joined his family at his funeral Tuesday, some of them honoring him by wearing his trademark denim overalls, red shirt and red sneakers.

The service at Ebenezer Baptist Church opened with the song This Little Light of Mine. It was to be followed by a procession with a mule-drawn wagon carrying Williams' coffin along the same route used after Martin Luther King Jr.'s slaying in 1968.

Williams died Thursday from kidney cancer complications. He was 74.

Among those attending the service were the Rev. Jesse Jackson; Rep. John Lewis; Andrew Young, the former Atlanta mayor and former ambassador to the United Nations; King's widow, Coretta Scott King; the Rev. Joseph Lowery, past president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference; and Sen. Zell Miller.

"Today we have to thank God for sending us one of his most bravest servants," Mrs. King said at the funeral. "He was a good Samaritan."

"What I liked most and admired most is his impatience," said Atlanta Mayor Bill Campbell. "He was not willing to wait for justice to come. He was not willing to wait for hunger to be eradicated. He was not willing (to wait) for dignity for those who needed it. He was a warrior for justice."

People who had joined Williams in the civil rights movement called him "Little David."

"Hosea wasn't afraid of Goliath," Lowery said at a memorial service Monday. "In fact, I was thinking about it, and I don't think there's anything he was scared of."

In 1965, Williams was at the head of the "Bloody Sunday" march across the Edmund Pettus bridge in Selma, Ala., when police with clubs, tear gas and dogs attacked peaceful demonstrators who sought the right to vote.

In 1970, he began serving holiday dinners to the poor. The growing tradition was expected to draw 30,000 this year to Turner Field at Thanksgiving and, again, at Christmas. Despite Williams' death, the dinners are slated to carry on, operated by his daughter Elisabeth Williams-Omilami and funded by rapper Sean "Puffy" Combs.

During an eight-hour viewing Monday, thousands of mourners streamed through the International Chapel at Morehouse College.

Tributes included a gold medal inscribed with King's "I have a dream" motto, an American flag for military service rendered in Germany during World War II and hymns from the darkest days of the civil rights era.

"He was one of the last true activists," said Renee Dawson, who brought her 6-year-old daughter, Riana. "I wanted Riana to see him, and understand that because of him there's a lot of people better off."