Posts Tagged ‘Abraham Lincoln’

Dred Scott Decision: Impact on African American Citizenship in the United States

Tuesday, November 24th, 2009

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In 1847 an enslaved African American, Dred Scott, went to trial to sue for his freedom.  This case, which later became known as Dred Scott v. Sanford, impacted the citizenship of all African Americans throughout the United States.

Dred Scott was born a slave in Southampton County, Virginia and was owned by Peter Blow.  Peter Blow was the great-nephew of Colonel Michael Blow who owned my ancestors before they were brought to Wessyngton Plantation by Joseph Washington.

Scott was taken to Alabama by the Blow family and later to St. Louis.  After Peter Blow’s death in 1832, Scott was bought by an army surgeon Dr. John Emerson who took him to Illinois and the Wisconsin Territory.

Scott’s stay in Illinois and Wisconsin, where slavery was prohibited, gave him the legal standing to make a claim for his freedom.  The abolitionists  encouraged  him  to sue for his freedom.  The case and appeals took  ten years.  In March 1857, the United States Supreme Court declared that all blacks, slaves as well as free blacks, were not, and could never become, citizens of the United States.

The decision was a victory for southern slaveholders, while northerners were outraged at its outcome.  The Dred Scott case influenced the nomination of Abraham Lincoln to the Republican Party and his election that led to the South’s secession from the Union and ultimately the freedom of all African Americans.

Peter Blow’s sons, who had grown up with Dred Scott, helped him pay the legal fees for his lengthy case.  After the Supreme Court’s decision, they purchased Scott and his wife and then emancipated them.

Dred Scott died nine months later—a free man.

 

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Runaway Slaves During the Civil War

Wednesday, October 14th, 2009
Runaway Slaves from Wessyngton Plantation 1862-1863

Runaway Slaves from Wessyngton Plantation 1862-1863

 

President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, issued September 22, 1862, declared freedom to slaves in the confederate states that did not return to the control of the Union by January 1, 1863.  It did not free slaves from the border  states Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri, and Tennessee.  Many slaves from these states, however, were already free by this time due to self-emancipation─running away or being abandoned by their owners.

George A. Washington realized that his slaves would soon be tempted to leave his plantation Wessyngton.  At the same time the Union Army was recruiting black soldiers, George made an offer to hire some of his slaves for a rate of $10 per month.  From February through May 1863, twenty-four men agreed to stay on the plantation and work for the offered $10 per month.  Of those twenty-four, however; eighteen left within a few months.  The men had worked on the plantation all their lives and no doubt wanted to see what the outside world had to offer and to taste freedom.  The men must have seen the offered salary as an attempt to keep them on the plantation.  The above document lists the eighteen individuals who ran away from Wessyngton Plantation from 1862-1863.

Television Interview with John Seigenthaler Sr.

Monday, May 18th, 2009

My half-hour television interview with John Seigenthaler Sr, A Word on Words, is available as a free downloadable Podcast.

http://www.wnpt.org/productions/wow/

 

Mr. Seigenthaler asked me many in-depth thought-provoking questions.  At the end, he said, “I learned more from your book than I learned from reading my friend Alex Haley’s book called  Roots.” I hope you enjoy the interview. Leave a comment with your reaction.