Posts Tagged ‘African American History’
Friday, June 25th, 2010
Washington Family at Wessyngton Plantation
On June 19th members of the Washington family visited Wessyngton Plantation as part of their family reunion. The tour included a visit to the mansion, Washington family cemetery, and a restored slave cabin. Family members descend from Temperance Washington born 1795, who was enslaved on the plantation along with her son Sam and daughter Jane in 1815. Sam Washington born 1812 married Jane Hadley 1835-1916. After emancipation the Washington family remained in the Cedar Hill, Tennessee area. Members of the family were instrumental in establishing the St. James Baptist Church in Cedar Hill. On June 20th the church celebrated its anniversary where numerous Washington descendants still worship. These members descend from Sam and Jane’s children: Nelson Washington, Irvin Washington, Temperance Washington Sherrod, and Betty Washington Smothers.
Tags: African American History, Cedar Hill Tennessee, Slavery, St. James Baptist Church, Washington family, Washington family reunion, Wessyngton Farms
Posted in Civil War, Genealogy & DNA, Interviews, Introduction & Personal, Plantation Life, Research | 3 Comments »
Wednesday, April 7th, 2010
The following story sheds light on the impact of the Transatlantic slave trade on the lives of native Africans. Some of these slaves ended up on the plantations of the Blow families.
I found this story while searching through a Sussex County deed book looking for genealogical information and noticed the names of several slaves. What stood out most were the names of some of the slaves: August, September, June, April, Caesar, and Quaco. I then thought these were likely Africans. Some slave owners gave Africans the names of the months of the year or days of the week. Planters did not realize in some African cultures children were named for the days of the week they were born on, thereby continuing an African tradition. Names such as Samba, meaning born on Monday, which was later, corrupted to Sambo.
The plight of the Africans was revealed in detail in a Virginia court case that lasted eighteen years. The story began in 1781 during the Revolutionary War. John Wigfall owned a large plantation at Wambaw on St. Thomas Parish in South Carolina. During this time, Wigfall was a Loyalist to Britain and was banished from the colony and had, his property confiscated which included his slaves. At the same time, Captain John Singletary was issued a commission as a privateer in his cutter Victory. His commission ordered him to take as prize any British property. Captain Singletary and a small crew set out in rowboats up the Santee River and landed at Wigfall’s plantation, where they captured thirty-four of his slaves: April, Will, August, Dolly, September, Wally, Philander, Philis, Caesar, Horah, Scipio, Cloey, Daniel, Santon, Will, Neppy, June, Dianah, Pegg, Binah, Jenny, Peter, Cyrus, Duke, Flora, Limbrick, Pharo, Toby, Nanny, Sabina, Rosanna, Carolina, Wallis, and Quashilla.[1][1] The slaves at first were taken to Beaufort, North Carolina.
Although Wigfall was to be banished, he was granted leniency because he pleaded poor health and a large family to support and was allowed to remain in South Carolina. Thus, Wigfall made immediate application for the return of his slaves, as a Court of the Admiralty convened in New Bern and ruled that the slaves were a fair prize. They were declared property legally condemned by the court.
After discovering that Beaufort was threatened by the British, Singletary took the slaves to Virginia and sold them to four planters: Richard Blow of Sussex County, who was the nephew of Colonel Michael Blow, Colonel Benjamin Baker of Nanesmond County, Captain Sinclair in Smithfield, and William Hines of Southampton.
Wigfall was informed of the whereabouts of some of the slaves and managed to steal back a few of them, although some of their names had been altered to conceal their identities. Wigfall and his son and the plantation owners had several heated disputes over the ownership of the slaves.
In 1792, John Wigfall gave his friend James Warrington of Richmond power of attorney to recover his property, to no avail. In 1798 his son Joseph, who was the executor of his estate pursued the case. The judgment in all matters of the case except the ownership of the slaves was in favor of the defendants. However, each purchaser had to pay Wigfall for the use of the slaves during the time they were in Virginia.
Some forty years later some of the Africans were still living on Richard Blow’s plantation in Sussex County called Tower Hill. An 1830s register of slaves for Tower Hill lists August, Tember (September) and April, who was also called Joe, (possibly a shortened version of the African day name Cudjo) as being African Negroes. They died in 1832, 1826, and 1829 respectively, ranging in age from 60 to 80.[2][2] Their names first appeared on tax lists for 1784 for Richard Blow when they were purchased.[3][3]
August probably suffered the greatest loss of all the Africans. According to descendants of the Blows, after August learned English he and the other Africans related the story of their capture and voyage from Africa. August informed the Blow family that his father was an African king and he was next in line to succeed him to the throne but was betrayed by a jealous uncle who sold him to slave traders so he could rule as king. Instead of living the life of African nobility, August was condemned to a life of American servitude.
Tags: African American History, African History, African Names, African naming patterns, African Slavery, Africans in America, Beaufort, Benjamin Baker, Day Names, James Warrington, John Singletary, John Wigfall, Loyalist, Michael Blow, Middle Passage, Nanesmond County, NC, New Bern, Plantation Life, plantation slavery, Revolutionary War, Richard Blow, Richmond Virginia, SC, slave trade, Southampton County Virginia, Southern Plantations, St. Thomas Parish, Sussex County Virginia, Tower Hill Plantation, Transatlantic Slave Trade, Triangular trade, VA, Wambaw, Wigfal vs Blow, William Hines
Posted in Civil War, Genealogy & DNA, Interviews, Introduction & Personal, Plantation Life | 13 Comments »
Thursday, March 4th, 2010
The Washingtons of Wessyngton Plantation reviewed in Nashville City Paper by Todd Dills. Click here to see review.
Tags: African American History, Ann Nixon Cooper, black history, Black History Month, family history, family tree, Genealogy & DNA, Nashville Tennessee, plantation slavery, Roots, Tennessee history, Tennessee slavery, Washington family, Wessyngton Plantation, Who Do You Think You Are
Posted in Book Tour & Reviews, Civil War, Current Events, Genealogy & DNA, Interviews, Introduction & Personal, Plantation Life | No Comments »
Tuesday, November 10th, 2009
Surnames of Wessyngton Slaves
Slaves were usually known by their first names, especially on small farms with few slaves. Plantation owners rarely recorded their slaves with surnames unless they had several individuals with the same first names. For that reason the use of surnames by slaves was far more common on large plantations where more people were likely to have the same given names.
Due to Wessyngton Plantation having such a large enslaved population many African Americans are listed with their previous owners’ surnames as early as the 1820s.
Slave bills of sale and other documents in the Washington Family Papers collection details the origins of many of these African American families.
The list above documents the names African Americans on Wessyngton Plantation who used surnames prior to emancipation and the date of their arrival on the plantation.
Tags: African American History, African American Surnames, African Slavery, Day Names, Given Names, Naming Patterns, Naming Practices, Plantation Records, plantation slavery, Slave Bills of Sale, Slave Names, Slave Surnames, slave trade, Tennessee slavery, United States slavery, Virginia Slavery
Posted in Civil War, Current Events, Genealogy & DNA, Interviews, Introduction & Personal, Plantation Life, Research | No Comments »
Monday, November 2nd, 2009
Archaeological Dig at Wessyngton Slave Cabin Site
In 1991, I had an opportunity that few historians or genealogists ever have; to literally walk in your ancestors’ footsteps. In 1989 I was approached by the president of the Bloomington-Normal black history Project and director of the Midwestern archaeological research Center, about the potential investigations of the salve cabin area on Wessyngton Plantation to get an interpretation of slave life there. Similar digs have been conducted at the Hermitage, Mt. Vernon, and Monticello.
The actual digging at Wessyngton did not start until 1991. The thought of actually walking in my ancestors’ footsteps and holding objects they used in their everyday lives one hundred years earlier was surreal to me. Three sections of the slave cabin area were selected for exploration. One site was where the cabin of my great-great-grandparents Emanuel and Henny Washington once stood.
The dig yielded fragments of pottery and dishes used by my ancestors as well as coins and arrowheads made by Native Americans.
The photograph above shows the site of the archaeological dig on Wessyngton Plantation where my ancestors once lived.
Tags: African American History, African Slavery, Arrowheads, black history, Black History Month, Civil War, Monticello, Mt. Vernon, Native Americans, Plantation Archaeology, plantation slavery, Slave Cabin, Slave Housing, Slave Life, Tennessee slavery, The Hermitage
Posted in Civil War, Genealogy & DNA, Interviews, Introduction & Personal, Plantation Life, Research | No Comments »
Monday, October 26th, 2009
Blow Family Bible
Slave owners kept detailed records of their slaves’ births, and deaths, and purchases; although many of them have not survived. They often recorded these events in their family bibles along with information on their own families.
The 1715 Blow family bible records the births of slaves owned by the Blows of Sussex, and Southampton counties in Virginia. Nineteen births of four mothers are recorded from 1737 to 1763 spanning three generations. This is a goldmine of information for African American research. Descendants of these slaves can be found searching other records in the Blow Family Papers in the Swem Library in Virginia.
Tags: African American History, African American Names, African Slaves, Black Genealogy, Blow Family, Blow Family Bible, family history, family research, Genealogy & DNA, George Blow, Michael Blow, plantation slavery, Richard Blow, Samuel Blow, Slave Bill of Sale, Slave Name Patterns, Slave Names, Slave Records, slave trade, Southampton County Virginia, Sussex County Virginia, Swem Library, Tower Hill Plantation, Transatlantic Slave Trade, Virginia Plantation, Virginia Slavery
Posted in Civil War, Genealogy & DNA, Interviews, Introduction & Personal, Plantation Life, Research | 17 Comments »
Friday, October 23rd, 2009
Arry Fort Pitt 1836-1918
Today divorce is very common, but in 1800s and early 1900s it was rarely heard of, especially among African Americans. In my research I found this extraordinary divorce case of two former slaves in Robertson County, Tennessee which detailed the history of their family.
Alford Pitt 1830-1900 and his wife Arry Fort Pitt 1836-1918 were married during slavery and had eleven children. Alford was a carpenter and later accumulated more than 500 acres of land. He had African American and white sharecroppers working his land.
In 1900, Arry filed for divorce from Alford stating that he had an affair with two black women and one white one. She stated that she had worked hard to help him amass everything they owned and she was entitled to half. Alford claimed that she had not helped him accumulate his wealth and felt since they married during slavery and never married after they were emancipated that she was not legally his wife and therefore not entitled to any of his property.
The divorce case put a great strain on the Pitt family, their friends and neighbors. Arry had more than fifty witnesses to prove her claims and Alford had nearly as many to support his. Half the children sided with their mother and the others their father.
Arry was represented in court by a family member of her former owners. In 1866, a law was passed in Tennessee which made all former slave marriages legal if the couple continued to live as man and wife.
The courts ordered Alford to give Arry 100 acres of land, $1,000, a horse and buggy and other livestock. Shortly after the verdict Alford died from complications of a cold that he caught from walking to court in bad weather.
Some of the Pitt property is still owned by their direct descendants. A street that runs through the property bears the family name.
Tags: African American Genealogy, African American History, Black Landowners, Divorce, Divorce Cases, Emancipation, family history, family research, Freedmen, Freedmens Bank, Freedmens Bureau, Genealogy & DNA, Oral History, Pitt Family, Slave Family, Slave Marriage, Slavery
Posted in Genealogy & DNA, Interviews, Introduction & Personal, Plantation Life, Research | 3 Comments »
Tuesday, October 20th, 2009
Names Among Wessyngton Slaves
African Americans got their given or first names from various sources during the slavery. Some of them used African “day names” such as Cudjo, Mingo, and Cuffee, denoting the day of the week on which they were born. Others used names from the Bible, classical names, place names, names of plantation owner’s families, famous individuals like the presidents and their own family members.
The document above lists various sources of names of individuals enslaved on Wessyngton Plantation from 1796 to 1865.
Tags: African American History, African American Names, African American slavery, African Names, Biblical Names, Day Names, Naming Practices, Slave Names
Posted in Civil War, Genealogy & DNA, Interviews, Plantation Life, Research | No Comments »
Sunday, October 18th, 2009
Joseph Washington 1895-2002
In more than thirty years of researching my ancestry and the lives of African Americans enslaved on Wessyngton Plantation, I have had the honor of interviewing more than twenty individuals whose parents or grandparents lived on the plantation. These individuals ranged in age from eighty to 107 years old.
Although I found hundreds of documents about my ancestors from plantation records written by the owners of Wessyngton, I learned many personal things about my ancestors from conducting interviews with elder family members.
In 1994, I visited my cousin Joseph Washington 1895-2002 (pictured above) at his home in Mansfield, Ohio on his one hundred second birthday. As a child Joseph lived next door to my great-great-grandparents Emanuel and Henny Washington who were born at Wessyngton in the early 1800s. He related many stories about them to me including ghost stories that my great-great-grandfather used to tell all the children on the plantation and songs he used to sing. Joseph told me what life was like on the plantation when he grew up there and how many people on the plantation were related to one another.
Oral history is a vital key to tracing African American genealogy and provides many details about our ancestors that can’t be found in records.
Tags: African American History, African American Oral History, African American slavery, Black Genealogy, black history, Civil War, family history, Griot, Interviews, Joseph Washington, Oral History, Oral Tradition, plantation slavery, Plantations, Tennessee history, Tennessee slavery
Posted in Civil War, Current Events, Interviews, Plantation Life, Research | No Comments »
Friday, October 9th, 2009
Slave Women Processing Pork on Wessyngton Plantation
Enslaved African American women performed various task on southern plantations and farms. Women on Wessyngton Plantation were not required to do any hard labor in the fields as the men did; however, they were an important part of other operations on the plantation. Women did light work in the gardens, they knitted and sewed for the slave community and their owners, worked the looms, and did the spinning and weaving. They were responsible for cooking, cleaning, washing, ironing, making cheese, preserves, and soap. No mother with a young baby was expected to do any outside work until her baby was two years old. There was a nursery on the plantation were children were cared for by elderly women too old to work. Women were a vital part of the pork processing industry on the plantation as seen in the photo above. Each week the women on the plantation would assemble at the plantation smokehouse (building in background of photo) and would be allotted bacon, meal, flour, sugar, and coffee based on the number of individuals in their families. Hundreds of hogs were killed at each year at Wessyngton to feed the enslaved population and the Washington family. Wessyngton had a reputation for producing its famous Washington Hams which could be found on the menus of the finest restaurants as far south as New Orleans and as far north as Philadelphia.
Tags: African American History, African American slavery, African American Women, Black Women during Slavery, Children in Slavery, Plantation Life, plantation slavery, Pork Production, Slave Labor, slave trade, Slave Women, Slave women in the south, Task System
Posted in Book Tour & Reviews, Civil War, Interviews, Plantation Life, Research | 2 Comments »
