Hector Pieterson

Hector Pieterson, whose birth name was Hector Pitso was the first child to die on June 16th, 1976. Hector was only thirteen years old when he was gunned down by policemen in Sowetu. The picture of dying Hector carried by a friend and his sister running next to them, became an iconic image around the world and portrayed the cruelty of apartheid. It is one of the most famous pictures that exists in South Africa and in the world today.

Hector's family changed his last name before his death from Pitso to Pieterson, in the hope that he may pass as being 'colored'(another racial group withing South Africa who received better treatment than blacks, but not the same treatment as whites).