ABSTRACT
Chapter 7 examines the impact of the police massacre on the Sharpeville community. It begins with a re-examination and re-calculation of the number of victims, using archival documentation, including medical autopsies, to demonstrate that the old figures of 69 dead and 180 or 186 injured are false and severely underestimate the extent of the massacre. It determines that at least three unborn children were killed by the police, two along with their mothers, the third as the result of a medically induced abortion on the injured mother, and that, by comparing the original documentation with subsequent official figures, at least 91 Sharpeville residents were killed by the police and 238 or more injured, much higher figures than the police count that has been repeated throughout the media right up to the present day. The chapter then assesses the impact of these killings and injuries on the community, focusing especially on families and how they dealt with the emotional and economic aspects of loss.
