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In August 2014, shortly after the controversial shooting death of teenager Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, the above-quoted e-mail forward began circulating. In it, a dying black veteran rattled off a laundry list of loosely related (and some entirely unconnected) issues the author perceived to be prevalent among black Americans: Since it began appearing in our inboxes in August 2014, the dying black vet e-mail has changed a bit. Many versions are prefaced with a brief introduction suggesting the original author wasn't the author at all, making its true origins murky. The paragraphs commonly introducing the e-mail suggest even in its initial circulation the piece was not the work of a dying black veteran, but rather of a white person inventing an authoritative black person to convey a message: (If the black vet who supposedly authored this piece were truly 70 years old, he could not possibly have seen combat in Korea as he states in the initial paragraph of the message: that war took place from 1950-53, when he would have been a mere elementary school-age child. Later iterations of this piece conveniently upgraded his age to 83 to support the Korean War vet timeline.) The author of the introduction above is unknown, as is the author of the original e-mail. However, on 27 August 2014, the e-mail was posted to the personal blog of a person who prefaced it thusly: The text seemingly did not enter widespread circulation until this 27 August 2014 blog post, and given the qualifiers of sent to me by a friend who admitted up front no name was associated with it and who was unable to verify it due to unspecified safety concerns, it's possible the words of a dying black veteran originated with the blog post itself. By November 2014, it seems that concerns about the anonymity of the e-mail hampered its spread, as a name became attached to the commentary: William G. Lillas. For months, the remarks circulated without attribution, and it's not clear how the name William G. Lillas adhered to it. It's possible the missive was reposted or e-mailed by a person of that name, creating the incorrect impression the reposter was the original author. While the words are aimed at the presumed failings of black Americans, we can't find one forward or notable repost of the item that didn't come from a white person. Most likely, the e-mail forward was authored by a white person who wished to express unpopular racial prejudices and felt the image of an elderly (and wise) black gentleman with a proud history of military service was the most authoritative candidate to deliver his list of grievances with a number of racial issues and general events.
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