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The Education Of The Negro Prior To 1861
Chapter V - Better Beginnings
by Woodson, Carter Godwin
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Sketching the second half of the eighteenth century, we have observed
how the struggle for the rights of man in directing attention to those
of low estate, and sweeping away the impediments to religious
freedom, made the free blacks more accessible to helpful sects and
organizations. We have also learned that this upheaval left the slaves
the objects of piety for the sympathetic, the concern of workers in
behalf of social uplift, a class offered instruction as a prerequisite
to emancipation. The private teaching of Negroes became tolerable,
benevolent persons volunteered to instruct them, and some schools
maintained for the education of white students were thrown open to
those of African blood. It was the day of better beginnings. In fact,
it was the heyday of victory for the ante-bellum Negro. Never had his
position been so advantageous; never was it thus again until the whole
race was emancipated. Now the question which naturally arises here
is, to what extent were such efforts general? Were these beginnings
sufficiently extensive to secure adequate enlightenment to a large
number of colored people? Was interest in the education of this class
so widely manifested thereafter as to cause the movement to endure? A
brief account of these efforts in the various States will answer these
questions.
In the Northern and Middle States an increasing number of educational
advantages for the white race made germane the question as to what
consideration should be shown to the colored people.[1] A general
admission of Negroes to the schools of these progressive communities
was undesirable, not because of the prejudice against the race, but on
account of the feeling that the past of the colored people having been
different from that of the white race, their training should be in
keeping with their situation. To meet their peculiar needs many
communities thought it best to provide for them "special,"
"individual," or "unclassified" schools adapted to their condition.[2]
In most cases, however, the movement for separate schools originated
not with the white race, but with the people of color themselves.
[Footnote 1: "Niles's Register", vol. xvi., pp. 241-243 and vol.
xxiii., p. 23.]
[Footnote 2: See "The Proceedings of the Am. Conv. of Abolition
Societies".]
In New England, Negroes had almost from the beginning of their
enslavement some chance for mental, moral, and spiritual improvement,
but the revolutionary movement was followed in that section by a
general effort to elevate the people of color through the influence
of the school and church. In 1770 the Rhode Island Quakers were
endeavoring to give young Negroes such an education as becomes
Christians. In 1773 Newport had a colored school, maintained by a
society of benevolent clergymen of the Church of England, with a
handsome fund for a mistress to teach thirty children reading and
writing. Providence did not exhibit such activity until the nineteenth
century. Having a larger black population than any other city in New
England, Boston was the center of these endeavors. In 1798 a separate
school for colored children, under the charge of Elisha Sylvester, a
white man, was established in that city in the house of Primus Hall, a
Negro of very good standing.[1] Two years later sixty-six free blacks
of that city petitioned the school committee for a separate school,
but the citizens in a special town meeting called to consider the
question refused to grant this request.[2] Undaunted by this refusal,
the patrons of the special school established in the house of Primus
Hall, employed Brown and Hall of Harvard College as instructors, until
1806.[3] The school was then moved to the African Meeting House
in Belknap Street where it remained until 1835 when, with funds
contributed by Abiel Smith, a building was erected. An epoch in the
history of Negro education in New England was marked in 1820, when the
city of Boston opened its first primary school for the education of
colored children.[4]
[Footnote 1: "Special Report of U.S. Com. of Ed.", 1871, p. 357.]
[Footnote 2: "Ibid.", p. 357.]
[Footnote 3: Next to be instructor of this institution was Prince
Saunders, who was brought to Boston by Dr. Channing and Caleb Bingham
in 1809. Brought up in the family of a Vermont lawyer, and experienced
as a diplomatic official of Emperor Christopher of Hayti, Prince
Saunders was able to do much for the advancement of this work. Among
others who taught in this school was John B. Russworm, a graduate of
Bowdoin College, and, later, Governor of the Colony of Cape Palmas in
Southern Liberia. See "Special Report of the U.S. Com. of Ed.", 1871,
p. 357; and "African Repository", vol. ii., p. 271.]
[Footnote 4: "Special Rep. of the U.S. Com. of Ed.", 1871, p. 357.]
Generally speaking, we can say that while the movement for special
colored schools met with some opposition in certain portions of New
England, in other parts of the Northeastern States the religious
organizations and abolition societies, which were espousing the cause
of the Negro, yielded to this demand. These schools were sometimes
found in churches of the North, as in the cases of the schools in
the African Church of Boston, and the Sunday-school in the African
Improved Church of New Haven. In 1828 there was in that city another
such school supported by public-school money; three in Boston; one in
Salem; and one in Portland, Maine.[1]
[Footnote 1: Adams, "Anti-slavery", p. 142.]
Outside of the city of New York, not so much interest was shown in
the education of Negroes as in the States which had a larger colored
population.[1] Those who were scattered through the State were allowed
to attend white schools, which did not "meet their special needs."[2]
In the metropolis, where the blacks constituted one-tenth of the
inhabitants in 1800, however, the mental improvement of the dark race
could not be neglected. The liberalism of the revolutionary era led
to the organization in New York of the "Society for Promoting the
Manumission of Slaves and Protecting such of them as have been or may
be liberated." This Society ushered in a new day for the free persons
of color of that city in organizing in 1787 the New York African
Free School.[3] Among those interested in this organization and its
enterprises were Melancthon Smith, John Bleecker, James Cogswell,
Jacob Seaman, White Matlock, Matthew Clarkson, Nathaniel Lawrence, and
John Murray, Jr.[4] The school opened in 1790 with Cornelius Davis as
a teacher of forty pupils. In 1791 a lady was employed to instruct the
girls in needle-work.[5] The expected advantage of this industrial
training was soon realized.
[Footnote 1: La Rochefoucauld-Liancourt, "Travels", etc., p. 233.]
[Footnote 2: "Am. Conv.", 1798, p. 7.]
[Footnote 3: Andrews, "History of the New York African Free Schools",
p. 14.]
[Footnote 4: "Ibid.", pp. 14 and 15.]
[Footnote 5: "Ibid.", p. 16.]
Despite the support of certain distinguished members of the community,
the larger portion of the population was so prejudiced against the
school that often the means available for its maintenance were
inadequate. The struggle was continued for about fifteen years with an
attendance of from forty to sixty pupils.[1] About 1801 the community
began to take more interest in the institution, and the Negroes
"became more generally impressed with a sense of the advantages and
importance of education, and more disposed to avail themselves of
the privileges offered them."[2] At this time one hundred and thirty
pupils of both sexes attended this school, paying their instructor,
a "discreet man of color," according to their ability and
inclination.[3] Many more colored children were then able to attend
as there had been a considerable increase in the number of colored
freeholders. As a result of the introduction of the Lancastrian and
monitorial systems of instruction the enrollment was further increased
and the general tone of the school was improved. Another impetus was
given the work in 1810.[4] Having in mind the preparation of slaves
for freedom, the legislature of the State of New York, made it
compulsory for masters to teach all minors born of slaves to read the
Scriptures.[5]
[Footnote 1: "Ibid.", p. 17.]
[Footnote 2: "Proceedings of the American Convention of Abolition
Societies", 1801, p. 6.]
[Footnote 3: "Ibid.", 1801, Report from New York.]
[Footnote 4: Andrews, "History of the New York African Free Schools",
p. 20.]
[Footnote 5: "Proceedings of the American Convention of Abolition
Societies", 1812, p. 7.]
Decided improvement was noted after 1814. The directors then purchased
a lot on which they constructed a building the following year.[1] The
nucleus then took the name of the New York "African Free Schools."
These schools grew so rapidly that it was soon necessary to rent
additional quarters to accommodate the department of sewing. This work
had been made popular by the efforts of Misses Turpen, Eliza J. Cox,
Ann Cox, and Caroline Roe.[2] The subsequent growth of the classes
was such that in 1820 the Manumission Society had to erect a building
large enough to accommodate five hundred pupils.[3] The instructors
were then not only teaching the elementary branches of reading,
writing, arithmetic, and geography, but also astronomy, navigation,
advanced composition, plain sewing, knitting, and marking.[4] Knowing
the importance of industrial training, the Manumission Society then
had an Indenturing Committee find employment in trades for colored
children, and had recommended for some of them the pursuit of
agriculture.[5] The comptrollers desired no better way of measuring
the success of the system in shaping the character of its students
than to be able to boast that no pupils educated there had ever been
convicted of crime.[6] Lafayette, a promoter of the emancipation
and improvement of the colored people, and a member of the New York
Manumission Society, visited these schools in 1824 on his return to
the United States. He was bidden welcome by an eleven-year-old pupil
in well-chosen and significant words. After spending the afternoon
inspecting the schools the General pronounced them the "best
disciplined and the most interesting schools of children" he had ever
seen.[7]
[Footnote 1: Andrews, "History of the New York African Free Schools",
p. 18.]
[Footnote 2: Andrews, "History of the New York African Free Schools",
p. 17.]
[Footnote 3: "Ibid.", p. 18.]
[Footnote 4: "Ibid.", p. 19.]
[Footnote 5: "Proceedings of the Am. Convention of Abolition Soc.",
1818, P. 9; Adams, "Anti-slavery", p. 142.]
[Footnote 6: "Proceedings of the American Convention", etc., 1820.]
[Footnote 7: Andrews, "History of the New York African Free Schools",
p. 20.]
The outlook for the education of Negroes in New Jersey was unusually
bright. Carrying out the recommendations of the Haddonfield Quarterly
Meeting in 1777, the Quakers of Salem raised funds for the education
of the blacks, secured books, and placed the colored children of
the community at school. The delegates sent from that State, to the
Convention of the Abolition Societies in 1801, reported that there had
been schools in Burlington, Salem, and Trenton for the education of
the Negro race, but that they had been closed.[1] It seemed that
not much attention had been given to this work there, but that the
interest was increasing. These delegates stated that they did not then
know of any schools among them exclusively for Negroes. In most parts
of the State, and most commonly in the northern division, however,
they were incorporated with the white children in the various small
schools scattered over the State.[2] There was then in the city of
Burlington a free school for the education of poor children supported
by the profits of an estate left for that particular purpose, and made
equally accessible to the children of both races. Conditions were just
as favorable in Gloucester. An account from its antislavery society
shows that the local friends of the indigent had funds of about one
thousand pounds established for schooling poor children, white and
black, without distinction. Many of the black children, who were
placed by their masters under the care of white instructors, received
as good moral and school education as the lower class of whites.[3]
Later reports from this State show the same tendency toward democratic
education.
[Footnote 1: "Proceedings of the American Convention", etc., 1801, p.
12.]
[Footnote 2: "Ibid.", p. 12, and Quaker Pamphlet, p. 40.]
[Footnote 3: "Proceedings of the American Conv.", etc., 1801, p. 12.]
The efforts made in this direction in Delaware, were encouraging. The
Abolition Society of Wilmington had not greatly promoted the special
education of "the Blacks and the people of color." In 1801, however, a
school was kept the first day of the week by one of the members of
the Society, who instructed them gratis in reading, writing, and
arithmetic. About twenty pupils generally attended and by their
assiduity and progress showed themselves as "capable as white persons
laboring under similar disadvantages."[1] In 1802 plans for the
extension of this system were laid and bore good fruit the following
year.[2] Seven years later, however, after personal and pecuniary aid
had for some time been extended, the workers had still to lament that
beneficial effects had not been more generally experienced, and
that there was little disposition to aid them in their friendly
endeavors.[3] In 1816 more important results had been obtained.
Through a society formed a few years prior to this date for the
express purpose of educating colored children, a school had been
established under a Negro teacher. He had a fair attendance of bright
children, who "by the facility with which they took in instruction
were silently but certainly undermining the prejudice"[4] against
their education. A library of religious and moral publications had
been secured for this institution. In addition to the school in
Wilmington there was a large academy for young colored women,
gratuitously taught by a society of young ladies. The course of
instruction covered reading, writing, and sewing. The work in sewing
proved to be a great advantage to the colored girls, many of whom
through the instrumentality of that society were provided with good
positions.[5]
[Footnote 1: "Ibid.", p. 20.]
[Footnote 2: "Ibid.", 1802, p. 17.]
[Footnote 3: "Proceedings of the American Convention", etc., 1809, p.
20.]
[Footnote 4: "Ibid"., 1816, p. 20.]
[Footnote 5: "Ibid"., 1821, p. 18.]
In Pennsylvania the interest of the large Quaker element caused the
question of educating Negroes to be a matter of more concern to that
colony than it was to the others. Thanks to the arduous labors of
the antislavery movement, emancipation was provided for in 1780.
The Quakers were then especially anxious to see masters give their
"weighty and solid attention" to qualifying slaves for the liberty
intended. By the favorable legislation of the State the poor were
by 1780 allowed the chance to secure the rudiments of education.[1]
Despite this favorable appearance of things, however, friends of the
despised race had to keep up the agitation for such a construction of
the law as would secure to the Negroes of the State the educational
benefits extended to the indigent. The colored youth of Pennsylvania
thereafter had the right to attend the schools provided for white
children, and exercised it when persons interested in the blacks
directed their attention to the importance of mental improvement.[2]
But as neither they nor their defenders were numerous outside of
Philadelphia and Columbia, not many pupils of color in other parts of
the State attended school during this period. Whatever special effort
was made to arouse them to embrace their opportunities came chiefly
from the Quakers.
[Footnote 1: "A.M.E. Church Review", vol. xv., p. 625.]
[Footnote 2: Wickersham, "History of Education in Pa"., p. 253.]
Not content with the schools which were already opened to Negroes, the
friends of the race continued to agitate and raise funds to extend
their philanthropic operations. With the donation of Anthony Benezet
the Quakers were able to enlarge their building and increase the scope
of the work. They added a female department in which Sarah Dwight[1]
was teaching the girls spelling, reading, and sewing in 1784. The
work done in Philadelphia was so successful that the place became the
rallying center for the Quakers throughout the country,[2] and was of
so much concern to certain members of this sect in London that in
1787 they contributed five hundred pounds toward the support of this
school.[3] In 1789 the Quakers organized "The Society for the Free
Instruction of the Orderly Blacks and People of Color." Taking into
consideration the "many disadvantages which many well-disposed blacks
and people of color labored under from not being able to read, write,
or cast accounts, which would qualify them to act for themselves or
provide for their families," this society in connection with other
organizations established evening schools for the education of adults
of African blood.[4] It is evident then that with the exception of the
school of the Abolition Society organized in 1774, and the efforts
of a few other persons generally coöperating like the anti-slavery
leaders with the Quakers, practically all of the useful education of
the colored people of this State was accomplished in their schools.
Philadelphia had seven colored schools in 1797.[5]
[Footnote 1: "Ibid"., p. 251.]
[Footnote 2: Quaker Pamphlet, p. 42.]
[Footnote 3: Wickersham, "History of Ed. in Pa"., p. 252.]
[Footnote 4: "Ibid"., p. 251.]
[Footnote 5: Turner, "The Negro in Pa"., p. 128.]
The next decade was of larger undertakings.[1] The report of the
Pennsylvania Abolition Society of 1801 shows that there had been an
increasing interest in Negro education. For this purpose the society
had raised funds to the amount of $530.50 per annum for three
years.[2] In 1803 certain other friends of the cause left for this
purpose two liberal benefactions, one amounting to one thousand
dollars, and the other to one thousand pounds.[3] With these
contributions the Quakers and Abolitionists erected in 1809 a handsome
building valued at four thousand dollars. They named it Clarkson Hall
in honor of the great friend of the Negro race.[4] In 1807 the Quakers
met the needs of the increasing population of the city by founding an
additional institution of learning known as the Adelphi School.[5]
[Footnote 1: Parish, "Remarks on the Slavery", etc., p. 43.]
[Footnote 2: "Proceedings of the American Conv"., 1802, p. 18.]
[Footnote 3: "Ibid"., 1803, p. 13.]
[Footnote 4: "Statistical Inquiry into the Condition of the Colored
People of Philadelphia", p. 19.]
[Footnote 5: "Ibid"., p. 20.]
After the first decade of the nineteenth century the movement for the
uplift of the Negroes around Philadelphia was checked a little by the
migration to that city of many freedmen who had been lately liberated.
The majority of them did not "exhibit that industry, economy, and
temperance" which were "expected by many and wished by all."[1] Not
deterred, however, by this seemingly discouraging development, the
friends of the race toiled on as before. In 1810 certain Quaker women
who had attempted to establish a school for colored girls in 1795
apparently succeeded.[2] The institution, however, did not last many
years. But the Clarkson Hall schools maintained by the Abolition
Society were then making such progress that the management was
satisfied that they furnished a decided refutation of the charge that
the "mental endowments of the descendants of the African race are
inferior to those possessed by their white brethren."[3] They asserted
without fear of contradiction that the pupils of that seminary would
sustain a fair comparison with those of any other institution in which
the same elementary branches were taught. In 1815 these schools were
offering free instruction to three hundred boys and girls, and to a
number of adults attending evening schools. These victories had been
achieved despite the fact that in regard to some of the objects of the
Society for the Abolition of the Slave Trade "a tide of prejudice,
popular and legislative, set strongly against them."[4] After 1818,
however, help was obtained from the State to educate the colored
children of Columbia and Philadelphia.
[Footnote 1: "Proceedings of the American Conv"., 1809, p. 16, and
1812, p. 16.]
[Footnote 2: Wickersham, "History of Ed. in Pa"., p. 252.]
[Footnote 3: "Proceedings of the American Convention", etc., 1812,
Report from Philadelphia.]
[Footnote 4: "Ibid"., 1815, Report from Phila.]
The assistance obtained from the State, however, was not taken as a
pretext for the cessation of the labors on the part of those who had
borne the burden for more than a century. The faithful friends of the
colored race remained as active as ever. In 1822 the Quakers in the
Northern Liberties organized the Female Association which maintained
one or more schools.[1] That same year the Union Society founded in
1810 for the support of schools and domestic manufactures for the
benefit of the "African race and people of color" was conducting three
schools for adults.[2] The Infant School Society of Philadelphia was
also doing good work in looking after the education of small colored
children.[3] In the course of time crowded conditions in the colored
schools necessitated the opening of additional evening classes and the
erection of larger buildings.
[Footnote 1: Wickersham, "History of Education in Pa.", p. 252.]
[Footnote 2: One of these was at the Sessions House of the Third
Presbyterian Church; one at Clarkston Schoolhouse, Cherry Street; one
in the Academy on Locust Street. See "Statistical Inquiry into
the Condition of the Colored People of Philadelphia", p. 19; and
Wickersham, "Education in Pa.", p. 253.]
[Footnote 3: "Statistical Inquiry", etc., p. 19.]
At this time Maryland was not raising any serious objection to the
instruction of slaves, and public sentiment there did not seem to
interfere with the education of free persons of color. Maryland was
long noted for her favorable attitude toward her Negroes. We have
already observed how Banneker, though living in a small place, was
permitted to attend school, and how Ellicott became interested in this
man of genius and furnished him with books. Other Negroes of that
State were enjoying the same privilege. The abolition delegates from
Maryland reported in 1797 that several children of the Africans and
other people of color were under a course of instruction, and that an
academy and qualified teachers for them would be provided.[1] These
Negroes were then getting light from another source. Having more
freedom in this State than in some others, the Quakers were allowed to
teach colored people.
[Footnote 1: "Proceedings of the American Convention", etc., 1797, p.
16.]
Most interest in the cause in Maryland was manifested near the cities
of Georgetown and Baltimore.[1] Long active in the cause of elevating
the colored people, the influence of the revolutionary movement was
hardly necessary to arouse the Catholics to discharge their duty of
enlightening the blacks. Wherever they had the opportunity to give
slaves religious instruction, they generally taught the unfortunates
everything that would broaden their horizon and help them to
understand life. The abolitionists and Protestant churches were also
in the field, but the work of the early fathers in these cities was
more effective. These forces at work in Georgetown made it, by the
time of its incorporation into the District of Columbia, a center
sending out teachers to carry on the instruction of Negroes. So
liberal were the white people of this town that colored children were
sent to school there with white boys and girls who seemed to raise
no objection.[2] Later in the nineteenth century the efforts made to
educate the Negroes of the rural districts of Maryland were eclipsed
by the better work accomplished by the free blacks in Baltimore and
the District of Columbia.
[Footnote 1: "Special Report of the U.S. Com. of Ed"., pp. 195 "et
seq"., and pp. 352-353.]
[Footnote 2: "Ibid"., p. 353.]
Having a number of antislavery men among the various sects buoyant
with religious freedom, Virginia easily continued to look with favor
upon the uplift of the colored people. The records of the Quakers of
that day show special effort in this direction there about 1764, 1773,
and 1785. In 1797 the abolitionists of Alexandria, some of whom were
Quakers, had been doing effective work among the Negroes of that
section. They had established a school with one Benjamin Davis as a
teacher. He reported an attendance of one hundred and eight pupils,
four of whom "could write a very legible hand," "read the Scriptures
with tolerable facility," and had commenced arithmetic. Eight others
had learned to read, but had made very little progress in writing.
Among his less progressive pupils fifteen could spell words of three
or four syllables and read easy lessons, some had begun to write,
while the others were chiefly engaged in learning the alphabet and
spelling monosyllables.[1] It is significant that colored children
of Alexandria, just as in the case of Georgetown, attended schools
established for the whites.[2] Their coeducation extended not only
to Sabbath schools but to other institutions of learning, which some
Negroes attended during the week.[3] Mrs. Maria Hall, one of the early
teachers of the District of Columbia, obtained her education in a
mixed school of Alexandria.[4] Controlled then by aristocratic people
who did not neglect the people of color, Alexandria also became a sort
of center for the uplift of the blacks in Northern Virginia.
[Footnote 1: "Proceedings of the Am. Conv"., etc., 1797, p. 35.]
[Footnote 2: "Ibid"., 1797, p. 36.]
[Footnote 3: "Proceedings of the Am. Conv.", p. 17; "ibid.", 1827, p.
53.]
[Footnote 4: "Special Report of U.S. Com. of Ed.", 1871, p. 198.]
Schools for the education of Negroes were established in Richmond,
Petersburg, and Norfolk. An extensive miscegenation of the races in
these cities had given rise to a very intelligent class of slaves and
a considerable number of thrifty free persons of color, in whom the
best people early learned to show much interest.[1] Of the schools
organized for them in the central part of the commonwealth, those
about Richmond seemed to be less prosperous. The abolitionists of
Virginia, reporting for that city in 1798, said that considerable
progress had been made in the education of the blacks, and that they
contemplated the establishment of a school for the instruction of
Negroes and other persons. They were apprehensive, however, that their
funds would be scarcely sufficient for this purpose.[2] In 1801, one
year after Gabriel's Insurrection, the abolitionists of Richmond
reported that the cause had been hindered by the "rapacious
disposition which emboldened many tyrants" among them "to trample upon
the rights of colored people even in the violation of the laws of the
State." For this reason the complainants felt that, although they
could not but unite in the opinion with the American Convention of
Abolition Societies as to the importance of educating the slaves for
living as freedmen, they were compelled on account of a "domineering
spirit of power and usurpation"[3] to direct attention to the Negroes'
bodily comfort.
[Footnote 1: "Ibid.", p. 393.]
[Footnote 2: "Proceedings of the Am. Conv.", etc., 1798, p. 16.]
[Footnote 3: "Proceedings of the Am. Conv"., 1801, p. 15.]
This situation, however, was not sufficiently alarming to deter all
the promoters of Negro education in Virginia. It is remarkable how
Robert Pleasants, a Quaker of that State who emancipated his slaves
at his death in 1801, had united with other members of his sect to
establish a school for colored people. In 1782 they circulated a
pamphlet entitled "Proposals for Establishing a Free School for the
Instruction of Children of Blacks and People of Color."[1] They
recommended to the humane and benevolent of all denominations
cheerfully to contribute to an institution "calculated to promote
the spiritual and temporal interests of that unfortunate part of our
fellow creatures in forming their minds in the principles of virtue
and religion, and in common or useful literature, writing, ciphering,
and mechanic arts, as the most likely means to render so numerous a
people fit for freedom, and to become useful citizens." Pleasants
proposed to establish a school on a three-hundred-and-fifty-acre
tract of his own land at Gravelly Hills near Four-Mile Creek, Henrico
County. The whole revenue of the land was to go toward the support of
the institution, or, in the event the school should be established
elsewhere, he would give it one hundred pounds. Ebenezer Maule,
another friend, subscribed fifty pounds for the same purpose.[2]
Exactly what the outcome was, no one knows; but the memorial on
the life of Pleasants shows that he appropriated the rent of the
three-hundred-and-fifty-acre tract and ten pounds per annum to the
establishment of a free school for Negroes, and that a few years after
his death such an institution was in operation under a Friend at
Gravelly Run.[3]
[Footnote 1: Weeks, "Southern Quakers", p. 215.]
[Footnote 2: Weeks, "Southern Quakers", p. 216.]
[Footnote 3: "Ibid"., p. 216.]
Such philanthropy, however, did not become general in Virginia. The
progress of Negro education there was decidedly checked by the rapid
development of discontent among Negroes ambitious to emulate the
example of Toussaint L'Ouverture. During the first quarter of the
nineteenth century that commonwealth tolerated much less enlightenment
of the colored people than the benevolent element allowed them in the
other border States. The custom of teaching colored pauper children
apprenticed by church-wardens was prohibited by statute immediately
after Gabriel's Insurrection in 1800.[1] Negroes eager to learn were
thereafter largely restricted to private tutoring and instruction
offered in Sabbath-schools. Furthermore, as Virginia developed few
urban communities there were not sufficient persons of color in any
one place to coöperate in enlightening themselves even as much as
public sentiment allowed. After 1838 Virginia Negroes had practically
no chance to educate themselves.
[Footnote 1: Hening, "Statutes at Large", vol. xvi., p. 124.]
North Carolina, not unlike the border States in their good treatment
of free persons of color, placed such little restriction on the
improvement of the colored people that they early attained rank among
the most enlightened ante-bellum Negroes. This interest, largely
on account of the zeal of the antislavery leaders and Quakers,[1]
continued unabated from 1780, the time of their greatest activity,
to the period of the intense abolition agitation and the servile
insurrections. In 1815 the Quakers were still exhorting their members
to establish schools for the literary and religious instruction of
Negroes.[2] The following year a school for Negroes was opened for
two days in a week.[3] So successful was the work done by the Quakers
during this period that they could report in 1817 that most colored
minors in the Western Quarter had been "put in a way to get a portion
of school learning."[4] In 1819 some of them could spell and a few
could write. The plan of these workers was to extend the instruction
until males could "read, write, and cipher," and until the females
could "read and write."[5]
[Footnote 1: Weeks, "Southern Quakers", p. 231; Levi Coffin,
"Reminiscences", pp. 69-71; Bassett, "Slavery in North Carolina", p.
66.]
[Footnote 2: Weeks, "Southern Quakers", p. 232.]
[Footnote 3: Thwaites, "Early Travels", vol. ii., p. 66.]
[Footnote 4: Weeks, "Southern Quakers", p. 232.]
[Footnote 5: "Ibid"., 232.]
In the course of time, however, these philanthropists met with some
discouragement. In 1821 certain masters were sending their slaves to
a Sunday-school opened by Levi Coffin and his son Vestal. Before the
slaves had learned more than to spell words of two or three syllables
other masters became unduly alarmed, thinking that such instruction
would make the slaves discontented.[1] The timorous element threatened
the teachers with the terrors of the law, induced the benevolent
slaveholders to prohibit the attendance of their Negroes, and had the
school closed.[2] Moreover, it became more difficult to obtain aid
for this cause. Between 1815 and 1825 the North Carolina Manumission
Societies were redoubling their efforts to raise funds for this
purpose. By 1819 they had collected $47.00 but had not increased this
amount more than $2.62 two years later.[3]
[Footnote 1: Coffin, "Reminiscences", p. 69.]
[Footnote 2: "Ibid"., p. 70.]
[Footnote 3: Weeks, "Southern Quakers", p. 241.]
The work done by the various workers in North Carolina did not affect
the general improvement of the slaves, but thanks to the humanitarian
movement, they were not entirely neglected. In 1830 the General
Association of the Manumission Societies of that commonwealth
complained that the laws made no provision for the moral improvement
of the slaves.[1] Though learning was in a very small degree diffused
among the colored people of a few sections, it was almost unknown to
the slaves. They pointed out, too, that the little instruction some of
the slaves had received, and by which a few had been taught to
spell, or perhaps to read in "easy places," was not due to any legal
provision, but solely to the charity "which endureth all things" and
is willing to suffer reproach for the sake of being instrumental in
"delivering the poor that cry" and "directing the wanderer in the
right way."[2] To ameliorate these conditions the association
recommended among other things the enactment of a law providing for
the instruction of slaves in the elementary principles of language at
least so far as to enable them to read the Holy Scriptures.[3] The
reaction culminated, however, before this plan could be properly
presented to the people of that commonwealth.
[Footnote 1: An Address to the People of North Carolina on the Evils
of Slavery by the Friends of Liberty and Equality, "passim".]
[Footnote 2: "Ibid."]
[Footnote 3: "Ibid."]
During these years an exceptionally bright Negro was serving as a
teacher not of his own race but of the most aristocratic white people
of North Carolina. This educator was a freeman named John Chavis. He
was born probably near Oxford, Granville County, about 1763. Chavis
was a full-blooded Negro of dark brown color. Early attracting the
attention of his white neighbors, he was sent to Princeton "to see
if a Negro would take a collegiate education." His rapid advancement
under Dr. Witherspoon "soon convinced his friends that the experiment
would issue favorable."[1] There he took rank as a good Latin and a
fair Greek scholar.
[Footnote 1: Bassett, "Slavery in North Carolina", p. 73.]
From Princeton he went to Virginia to preach to his own people. In
1801 he served at the Hanover Presbytery as a "riding missionary under
the direction of the General Assembly."[1] He was then reported also
as a regularly commissioned preacher to his people in Lexington. In
1805 he returned to North Carolina where he often preached to various
congregations.[2] His career as a clergyman was brought to a close
in 1831 by the law enacted to prevent Negroes from preaching.[3]
Thereafter he confined himself to teaching, which was by far his
most important work. He opened a classical school for white persons,
"teaching in Granville, Wake, and Chatham Counties."[4] The best
people of the community patronized this school. Chavis counted among
his students W.P. Mangum, afterwards United States Senator, P.H.
Mangum, his brother, Archibald and John Henderson, sons of Chief
Justice Henderson, Charles Manly, afterwards Governor of that
commonwealth, and Dr. James L. Wortham of Oxford, North Carolina.[5]
[Footnote 1: "Ibid"., p. 74; and Baird, "A Collection", etc., pp.
816-817.]
[Footnote 2: Paul C. Cameron, a son of Judge Duncan of North Carolina,
said: "In my boyhood life at my father's home I often saw John Chavis,
a venerable old negro man, recognized as a freeman and as a preacher
or clergyman of the Presbyterian Church. As such he was received by my
father and treated with kindness and consideration, and respected as a
man of education, good sense and most estimable character." Mr. George
Wortham, a lawyer of Granville County, said: "I have heard him read
and explain the Scriptures to my father's family repeatedly. His
English was remarkably pure, containing no 'negroisms'; his manner was
impressive, his explanations clear and concise, and his views, as I
then thought and still think, entirely orthodox. He was said to have
been an acceptable preacher, his sermons abounding in strong common
sense views and happy illustrations, without any effort at oratory
or sensational appeals to the passions of his hearers." See Bassett,
"Slavery in N.C"., pp. 74-75.]
[Footnote 3: See Chapter VII.]
[Footnote 4: Bassett, "Slavery in North Carolina", p. 74.]
[Footnote 5: John S. Bassett, Professor of History at Trinity College,
North Carolina, learned from a source of great respectability that
Chavis not only taught the children of these distinguished families,
but "was received as an equal socially and asked to table by the most
respectable people of the neighborhood." See Bassett, "Slavery in
North Carolina", p. 75.]
We have no evidence of any such favorable conditions in South
Carolina. There was not much public education of the Negroes of that
State even during the revolutionary epoch. Regarding education as a
matter of concern to persons immediately interested South Carolinians
had long since learned to depend on private instruction for the
training of their youth. Colored schools were not thought of outside
of Charleston. Yet although South Carolina prohibited the education of
the slaves in 1740[1] and seemingly that of other Negroes in 1800,[2]
these measures were not considered a direct attack on the instruction
of free persons of color. Furthermore, the law in regard to the
teaching of the blacks was ignored by sympathetic masters. Colored
persons serving in families and attending traveling men shared with
white children the advantage of being taught at home. Free persons of
color remaining accessible to teachers and missionaries interested in
the propagation of the gospel among the poor still had the opportunity
to make intellectual advancement.[3]
[Footnote 1: Brevard, "Digest of the Public Statute Law of South
Carolina", vol. ii., p. 243.]
[Footnote 2: "Ibid"., p. 243.]
[Footnote 3: Laws of 1740 and 1800, and Simmons, "Men of Mark", p.
1078.]
Although not as reactionary as South Carolina, little could be
expected of Georgia where slavery had such a firm hold. Unfavorable as
conditions in that State were, however, they were not intolerable. It
was still lawful for a slave to learn to read, and free persons of
color had the privilege of acquiring any knowledge whatsoever.[1] The
chief incentive to the education of Negroes in that State came from
the rising Methodists and Baptists who, bringing a simple message to
plain people, instilled into their minds as never before the idea that
the Bible being the revelation of God, all men should be taught to
read that book.[2]
[Footnote 1: Marbury and Crawford, "Digest of the Laws of the State of
Georgia", p. 438.]
[Footnote 2: Orr, "Education in the South".]
In the territory known as Louisiana the good treatment of the mixed
breeds and the slaves by the French assured for years the privilege
to attend school. Rev. James Flint, of Salem, Massachusetts, received
letters from a friend in Louisiana, who, in pointing out conditions
around him, said: "In the regions where I live masters allow entire
liberty to the slaves to attend public worship, and as far as my
knowledge extends, it is generally the case in Louisiana. We have,"
said he, "regular meetings of the blacks in the building where I
attend public worship. I have in the past years devoted myself
assiduously, every Sabbath morning, to the labor of learning them to
read. I found them quick of apprehension, and capable of grasping the
rudiments of learning more rapidly than the whites."[1]
[Footnote 1: Flint, "Recollections of the Last Ten Years", p. 345.]
Later the problem of educating Negroes in this section became more
difficult. The trouble was that contrary to the stipulation in the
treaty of purchase that the inhabitants of the territory of Louisiana
should be admitted to all the rights and immunities of citizens of the
United States, the State legislation, subsequent to the transfer of
jurisdiction, denied the right of education to a large class of mixed
breeds.[1] Many of these, thanks to the liberality of the French, had
been freed, and constituted an important element of society. Not a few
of them had educated themselves, accumulated wealth, and ranked with
white men of refinement and culture.[2]
[Footnote 1: Laws of Louisiana.]
[Footnote 2: Alliot, "Collections Historiques", p. 85; and Thwaites,
"Early Western Travels", vol. iv., pp. 320 and 321; vol. xii., p. 69;
and vol. xix., p. 126.]
Considering the few Negroes found in the West, the interest shown
there in their mental uplift was considerable. Because of the scarcity
of slaves in that section they came into helpful contact with their
masters. Besides, the Kentucky and Tennessee abolitionists, being much
longer active than those in most slave States, continued to emphasize
the education of the blacks as a correlative to emancipation.
Furthermore, the Western Baptists, Methodists, and Scotch-Irish
Presbyterians early took a stand against slavery, and urged the
masters to give their servants all the proper advantages for acquiring
the knowledge of their duty both to man and God. In the large towns
of Tennessee Negroes were permitted to attend private schools, and in
Louisville and Lexington there were several well-regulated colored
schools.
Two institutions for the education of slaves in the West are mentioned
during these years. In October, 1825, there appeared an advertisement
for eight or ten Negro slaves with their families to form a community
of this kind under the direction of an "Emancipating Labor Society"
of the State of Kentucky. In the same year Frances Wright suggested a
school on a similar basis. She advertised in the "Genius of Universal
Emancipation" an establishment to educate freed blacks and mulattoes
in West Tennessee. This was supported by a goodly number of persons,
including George Fowler and, it was said, Lafayette. A letter from a
Presbyterian clergyman in South Carolina says that the first slave
for this institution went from York District of that State. The
enterprise, however, was not well supported, and little was heard of
it in later years. Some asserted it was a money-making scheme for the
proprietor, and that the Negroes taught there were in reality slaves;
others went to the press to defend it as a benevolent effort. Both
sides so muddled the affair that it is difficult to determine exactly
what the intentions of the founders were.[1]
[Footnote 1: Adams, "Anti-slavery", p. 152.]
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