Atticus Shows Courage In To Kill A Mockingbird

To Kill a Mockingbird takes place in Maycomb, Alabama. Atticus Finch is a lawyer and has two kids, Scout and Jem, who he raises alone because his wife died. Scout is a young girl that acts like a tomboy. Her brother Jem is the oldest and is a boy, who is in love with football. Tom Robinson a person of color was accused of raping a white woman, Mayella. Even though the evidence leads to Mayella's father, Bob Ewell. Bob was forcing Mayella to say things to convict Tom. Most people in the courtroom knew Tom was innocent. Towards the end of the book when Scout and Jem get attacked by Bob Ewell who Atticus accused of raping Mayella. During this attack the Finches neighbor, Arthur Radley, who they have never seen comes out and saves Jem and Scout.
It is very evident at the beginning when Mrs. Dubose is dying from an illness. The kids think she is a very mean, old woman but Atticus thinks differently and tells the kids "Don't pay any attention to her, just hold your head high and be a gentleman"(135). Atticus understands what’s happening and knows what Mrs. Dubose is going through. She took morphine for a long time during her sickness to ease the pain. One day she went too far according to Jem. She had mentioned something about Atticus defending a person of color and Jem had enough. Later that day he went to her house and destroyed all of her flowers because he was outrageously mad. When Atticus found out what he had done, he made Jem go to Mrs. Dubose’s house and apologize for what he had done. When he was there she said that to serve his punishment he would have to go over there every day for a month and read to her because she was slowly stopping to take her morphine and needed something to help her pass time. By the end of Jem’s readings to her, she was completely off the morphine. Only a brave and courageous woman would be able to completely stop taking her medicine and live the rest of her life without anything making her feel