Category Archives: Black history

Christmas 1848 Slave Escape

December 25, 2016 Woodstock Whisperer Leave a comment

Christmas 1848 Slave Escape

Slave Resistance

In the past, US history books certainly included the fact that the US once allowed humans to be bought and sold as property, yet at the same time those books excluded the fact that slaves never stopped trying to escape and often organized revolts against their involuntary servitude.

Methods of escape were always desperate but often ingenious. One, Henry “Box” Brown, mailed himself north in a wooden crate.

Christmas 1848 Slave Escape

William and Ellen Craft

William was born in Macon, Georgia to a master who sold off Craft’s family to pay gambling debts. William’s new owner, a local bank cashier, apprenticed him as a carpenter in order to earn money from William’s labor.

Ellen Craft was born in Clinton, Georgia and was the daughter of an African American biracial slave and her white owner. Because of her light complexion, strangers often mistook Ellen as white. Bothered by such a situation, Ellen’s plantation mistress sent the 11-year-old Ellen to Macon to the mistress’s daughter as a wedding present in 1837, where Ellen served as a ladies maid.

It was in Macon that William and Ellen met.

In 1846 their owners allowed Ellen and William to marry, but they could not live together since they had different owners. Obviously unhappy with that forced separation and the fear that their masters could sell any children, the couple started to save some of the meager wages their owners allowed them to keep and William and Ellen planned an escape.

Christmas 1848 Slave Escape

Escape

In December 1848, they attempted just that. Because they were “good” slaves, their masters permitted them passes for a few days leave at Christmastime. Those days would give the couple time to be missing without notice.

As it was not customary for a white woman to travel with a black male servant, they decided that they would escape by traveling as a white male and his black servant.

On December 21, 1848, William cut Ellen’s hair and put her right arm in a sling. Not being able to read or write, but knowing others would ask Ellen, the “white male” to sign papers at check points along their way, an injured arm prevented signatures.

Also William partially covered Ellen’s face with a “bandage” to further hide her female appearance. Ellen dressed in trousers she’d sewn and a top hat.

Christmas 1848 Slave Escape

The perilous journey

They went by train from Macon to Savannah; a steamship to Charleston, South Carolina; another steamer to Wilmington, North Carolina; a train to Fredericksburg, Virginia; another steamer to Washington, D.C; a train to Baltimore, Maryland, and thence to Pennsylvania.

They had to travel separately the whole worrisome journey with constant fear that someone would see through their ruse and reveal them.

That fear was almost realized several times, but they nonetheless arrived in Philadelphia on Christmas day, 1848.

The Crafts moved on to Boston, which had an established free black community and a well-organized, protective abolitionist activity. William, a skilled cabinetmaker, started a furniture business.

Christmas 1848 Slave Escape

Fugitive Slave Act

In 1850, the US Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Act which made it a crime for residents of free states to harbor or aid fugitive slaves like the Crafts. The act also rewarded anyone for assisting slave owners by apprehending their fugitive “property” and returning them to slavery.

Two slave catchers, Willis Hughes and John Knight, traveled north to capture the Crafts. The town of Boston sheltered the couple and kept them away from the bounty hunters.

Hughes and Knight returned south, but still feeling unsafe anywhere, the Crafts moved to England in 1851.

Christmas 1848 Slave Escape

West London

The Crafts settled in West London where they eventually raised their five children: Charles Estlin Phillips, William, Brougham, Alfred, and Ellen. They continued in the abolitionist movement by lecturing in England and Scotland.

In 1860 they published Running a Thousand Miles For Freedom.

During their nineteen years in England, the Crafts taught, ran a boarding house, and William created commercial and mercantile agreements in West Africa.

Christmas 1848 Slave Escape

Return to the US

They returned to the United States in 1870 and settled near Savannah, where they opened the Woodville Co-operative Farm School in 1873 to teach and employ newly freed slaves. The school closed after a few years because of a lack of funding.

In 1890 William and Ellen Craft moved to Charleston to live with their daughter. Ellen Craft died there in 1891. William Craft died in Charleston in 1900.

Here is a link to a PDF of their book: Running a Thousand Miles

Christmas 1848 Slave Escape

Black history, Today in history

Missouri Hangs Slave Celia

December 21, 2016 Woodstock Whisperer Leave a comment

Missouri Hangs Slave Celia

After four years of Robert Newsom repeatedly sexually assaulting her, the girl Celia killed Newsom as he was about to rape her again

Missouri hung Celia.

December 21, 1855

“Spiegel im Spiegel” from Alina by Arvo Pärt

Missouri Hangs Slave Celia

1850

It was 1850 and Robert Newsom owned 800 acres of land in Middle River, Missouri. He also owned five male slaves. During that summer Newsom purchased Celia, a fourteen-year-old girl from a slave owner in neighboring Audrain County.

Newsom immediately began to rape Celia. Between 1851 and 1855 Celia gave birth to two children.

In late 1854 or early 1855, George, one of Newsom’s slaves, began a relationship with Celia.

In early March 1855, Celia was again pregnant. George told Celia that she must stop Newsom’s abuse. George would later say that “he would have nothing more to do with her if she did not quit the old man.”

Celia asked Newsom’s adult daughters to intervene. They may or may not have, but if they did, nothing happened. Newsom continued to rape Celia. Celia asked Newsom to stay away while she was pregnant. He refused.

Missouri Hangs Slave Celia

June 23, 1855

On June 23, 1855 around 10 PM, Newsom entered Celia’s cabin. He advanced upon her, but she picked up a large stick and struck him in the head. He collapsed. She hit him again, killing him.

Celia decided to burn Newsom’s body. She built a large fire in the cabin’s fireplace, dragged Newsom’s body into it, and kept the fire burning. Late in the night, with the body mostly ashes, she dispersed them in the outside yard. She buried larger pieces of bone under the hearth.

Missouri Hangs Slave Celia

June 24, 1855

Noting the absence of Newsom the next morning, the worried family searched for him. Neighbors assisted, one of whom was William Powell. Powell knew of the relationship between George and Cilia (and also likely knew of Newsom’s abuse). Powell questioned George suspecting that George may have sought revenge.

George denied any knowledge and at first did not cooperate, but did eventually tell Powell that the last thing he knew Newsom had done was walk toward Celia’s cabin. A search of the cabin turned up nothing.

Powell questioned Celia. He threatened to take away her children if she did not cooperate. She did finally admit that Newsom had come to her cabin and that with him still outside she had hit him and that he had left.

Powell continued to question Celia, She finally confessed to the killing, but as self-defense. A more intense search of her cabin and the area revealed Newsom’s burnt bone fragments, buttons, a pocketknife, and other personal items. Authorities arrested Celia.

Missouri Hangs Slave Celia

June 25, 1855

At the June 25 inquest, Celia insisted that she did not mean to kill Newsom. Nonetheless, a six-person panel found probable cause to charge Celia with murder. She was brought to the Callaway County jail in Fulton, nine miles to the north of the Newsom farm.

Missouri Hangs Slave Celia

October 9, 1855

The trial began in the Callaway County Courthouse. Circuit Court Judge William Hall presided. Hall chose John Jameson as Celia’s defense lawyer. Jameson was an experienced lawyer, but a slave owner. Hall also appointed two inexperienced lawyers to assist Jameson.

The twelve jurors were all white males (women were not allowed as jurors at the time), all but one married with children, and several were slave owners.

Missouri Hangs Slave Celia

October 10, 1855

The trial

Celia’s defense planned on demonstrating that her actions were in self-defense, but Judge Hall denied many defense requests that would have ameliorated the charge, including the request to instruct the jury that the killing was justifiable if done to prevent a sexual assault.

The jury returned a guilty verdict the same day.

Missouri Hangs Slave Celia

October 11, 1855

Defense lawyers moved to set aside the jury verdict and grant a new trial. Hall ruled two days later.

Missouri Hangs Slave Celia

October 13, 1855

Judge Hall denied the defense’s motion for a new trial and sentenced Celia to be “hanged by the neck until dead” on November 16. Judge Hall refused to issue an order staying execution until the Missouri Supreme Court could rule on Celia’s appeal.

Missouri Hangs Slave Celia

November 11, 1855

While in jail Celia delivered a stillborn child. By November 11, the Missouri Supreme Court still had not ruled on the appeal. What probably happened next is that the defense team helped Celia escape and kept her hidden until the November 16 execution date passed. In late November, they Celia returned to jail. Hall set a new execution date of December 21.

Missouri Hangs Slave Celia

December 14, 1855

The Supreme Court ruled against Celia in her appeal on December 14. In part, the state justices said they “thought it proper to refuse the prayer of the petitioner,” having found “no probable cause for her appeal.”

Missouri Hangs Slave Celia

December 21, 1855

Celia died on the gallows at 2:30 P.M.

More: Another source

Lynching, Music et al, Peace Love Art and Activism, Today in history

December 20 Peace Love Art Activism

December 20, 2016 Woodstock Whisperer Leave a comment

December 20 Peace Love Art Activism

BLACK HISTORY

Slave Celia

December 20, 1855: Celia, convicted of first degree murder, was hanged. (see Slave Celia for expanded chronology)

Dyer Anti-lynching Bill

December 20, 1893: Georgia became the first state in the Union to pass a law against lynching, making the act punishable by four years in prison. The statute was not particularly effective. (next BH, see March 18, 1895; next Lynching, see January 12, 1893; see 19th century for expanded lynching chronology)

38 Years later

December 20, 1921, on the federal level, southern Democrats defeated the Dyer Anti-Lynching bill. Although outnumbered in the House by more than two to one, Democrats under the leadership of Tennessee Representative Garrett filibustered so successfully against consideration of the Dyer Anti-Lynching bill, that Rep Mondell, the Republican floor leader, was forced to capitulate and agree that the bill should not come up until after the Christmas holidays. (see January 4, 1922)

1964 Harlem Riot

December 20, 1964: a jury found William Epton, the leader of the Harlem Progressive Labor Movement, guilty of conspiring to riot, of advocating the overthrow of the New York State government, and of conspiring to overthrow it.(see December 22, 1968)

Howard Beach

December 20, 1986: in Howard Beach, Queens white teens chased Michael Griffith, an African-American youth, onto a freeway where a motorist hit him. Griffith died from his injuries setting off a wave of protests and racial tensions in New York. (see Dec 22)

SOUTH AFRICA/APARTHEID & Nelson Mandela

December 20, 1991: negotiations began to prepare an interim constitution based on full political equality. de Klerk and Mandela traded recriminations, with Mr. de Klerk criticizing Mr. Mandela for not disbanding the A.N.C.’s inactive guerrilla operation and Mr. Mandela saying that the president “has very little idea of what democracy is.” (see June 17, 1992)

December 20 Peace Love Art Activism

Technological Milestone

Nuclear News

December 20, 1951: EBR-I (Experimental Breeder Reactor-I) became the first reactor to generate usable amounts of electricity from nuclear energy by lighting four light bulbs at the National Reactor Testing Station of Argonne National Laboratory, Butte County, Idaho. (TM, see March 27, 1953; NN, see February 28, 1953)

December 20 Peace Love Art Activism

see December 20 Music et al for more

Elvis drafted

December 20, 1957: while spending the Christmas holidays at Graceland, his newly purchased Tennessee mansion, rock-and-roll star Elvis Presley received his draft notice for the United States Army. (see Dec 27)

Beatles

December 20, 1968, The Beatles sent out their Beatles 1968 Christmas Record. (see Dec 28)

Peter, Paul and Mary

December 20 – 26, 1969: “Leaving on a Jet Plane” by Peter, Paul, and Mary #1 on the Billboard Hot 100.

December 20 Peace Love Art Activism

Vietnam

December 20, 1960: North Vietnam announced the formation of the National Front for the Liberation of the South. More commonly known as the National Liberation Front (NLF), organizers intended to replicate the success of the Viet Minh, the umbrella nationalist organization that successfully liberated Vietnam from French colonial rule. (see March 21, 1961)

December 20 Peace Love Art Activism

The Cold War

December 20, 1963: more than two years after East Germany constructed the Berlin Wall to prevent its citizens from fleeing its communist regime, nearly 4,000 West Berliners were allowed to cross into East Berlin to visit relatives. Under an agreement reached between East and West Berlin, over 170,000 West Berlin citizens received passes. Each pass allowed a one-day visit. (see February 18, 1964)

Dissolution of Yugoslavia

December 20, 1995: NATO began peacekeeping operation in Bosnia. (see March 24, 1998)

December 20 Peace Love Art Activism

Feminism

December 20, 1984: in People v. Liberta, the New York State Court of Appeals decided that there was no basis for distinguishing between marital rape and non-marital rape. The court noted that “a marriage license should not be viewed as a license to forcibly rape [the defendant’s] wife with impunity” and struck the marital exemption from the statue in question for violation of the state and federal Constitution.

Guerrilla Girls

In the spring of 1985: Guerrilla Girls, an anonymous group of feminist, female artists devoted to fighting sexism and racism within the art world, formed in New York City with the mission of bringing gender and racial inequality within the fine arts into focus within the greater community. Members were known for the gorilla masks they wore to remain anonymous. They wear the masks to conceal their identity because they believed that their identity was not what mattered as GG1 explains in an interview “…mainly, we wanted the focus to be on the issues, not on our personalities or our own work.” Also, their identity was hidden to protect themselves from the backlash of prominent individuals within the art community. (see Dec 14)

December 20 Peace Love Art Activism

LGBTQ

December 20, 1999: the Vermont Supreme Court ruled in Baker v. State of Vermont that same-sex couples must be treated equally to different-sex married couples. The Vermont legislature responded by establishing civil union, a separate legal status that affords couples some, but not all, of the protections that come with marriage – falling short of the constitutional command of equality, but far more than gay couples had before. The law went into effect on July 1, 2000. (see April 26, 2000)

Utah’s ban on same-sex marriage

December 20, 2013: U.S. District Judge Robert Shelby struck down Utah’s ban on same-sex marriage as unconstitutional handing a major victory to gay rights activists in a conservative state where the Mormon Church wields considerable influence. Shelby, in a lawsuit brought by three gay couples, found that an amendment to the Utah Constitution defining marriage as exclusively between a man and a woman violated the rights of gay couples to due process and equal protection under the U.S. Constitution. “The state’s current laws deny its gay and lesbian citizens their fundamental right to marry and, in doing so, demean the dignity of these same sex couples for no rational reason. Accordingly, the court finds that these laws are unconstitutional,” Shelby said.(see Dec 23)

December 20 Peace Love Art Activism

Religion and Public Education

FREE SPEECH

December 20, 2005: in Kitzmiller v. Dover, a US District Court ruled that a Pennsylvania school district’s “intelligent design policy” violated the First Amendment. The policy required district teachers to inform students of the “gaps/problems in Darwin’s Theory,” and they are required to introduce “other theories of evolution including, but not limited to, intelligent design.” (NYT article) (FS, see May 30, 2006; Religion, see May 27, 2012)

December 20 Peace Love Art Activism

Stop and Frisk Policy

ACLU suit allowed

December 20, 2012: In a unanimous finding, the Appellate Division, First Department, reinstated a purported class action brought by the New York Civil Liberties Union that claimed the NYPD’s refusal to seal records of the stops violated state law. Hundreds of thousands of people who were subjected to the New York Police Department’s controversial “stop and frisk” program, but not convicted of a crime, can sue the NYPD for keeping their personal information in a database, a New York appeals court ruled Thursday.

2012 statistics

In December 2012 statistics showed that the NYPD stopped people 533,042 times: 473,300 were totally innocent (89 percent). 286,684 were black (55 percent); 166,212 were Latino (32 percent); 50,615 were white (10 percent). (see January 8, 2013)

December 20 Peace Love Art Activism

Environmental Issues

December 20, 2016: President Obama announced what he called a permanent ban on offshore oil and gas drilling along wide areas of the Arctic and the Atlantic Seaboard as he tried to nail down an environmental legacy that could not quickly be reversed by Donald J. Trump.

Obama invoked an obscure provision of a 1953 law, the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act, which he said gave him the authority to act unilaterally. While some presidents have used that law to temporarily protect smaller portions of federal waters, Mr. Obama’s declaration of a permanent drilling ban on portions of the ocean floor from Virginia to Maine and along much of Alaska’s coast is breaking new ground. [NYT article] (see February 14, 2017)

Incandescent Bulbs/Trump

December 20, 2019: the Trump administration announced that it would block a rule designed to phase out older incandescent bulbs and require Americans to use energy-efficient light bulbs.

In announcing the move, the secretary of energy, Dan Brouillette, who was a former auto lobbyist, said the administration had chosen “to protect consumer choice by ensuring that the American people do not pay the price for unnecessary overregulation from the federal government.” The new rule was unnecessary, he said, because innovation and technology are already “increasing the efficiency and affordability of light bulbs without federal government intervention.”

The rule, which would have gone into effect on Jan. 1, was required under a law passed in 2007 during the administration of President George W. Bush. [NYT article] (next EI, see January 23, or see April 26, 2022 for Bidin change)

December 20 Peace Love Art Activism

Nuclear/Chemical News

December 20, 2018: North Korea official news agency said that it would not dismantle its nuclear weapons program until the United States also agreed to diminish its military capacity in the vicinity of the Korean Peninsula. [NYT article] (see January 30, 2019)

December 20 Peace Love Art Activism

Immigration History

December 20, 2019: the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General said that it had found “no misconduct or malfeasance” by department officials in the deaths of two Guatemalan children who died in the custody of the United States Border Patrol in December 2018.

The office announced the finding in two brief reports. The reports did not name the children, but the details listed matched the deaths of Jakelin Caal Maquín, 7, and Felipe Gómez Alonso, 8, both of whom died in December 2018.

The Department of Homeland Security said that it was “still saddened by the tragic loss of these young lives,” and added that it continued “to bolster medical screenings and care at D.H.S. facilities on the border.” [NYT article] (next IH, see January 8, 2020)

December 20 Peace Love Art Activism

Women’s Health

December 20, 2019: the Trump administration added a new policy to the Affordable Care Act that could potentially make it more difficult for women to receive abortions by requiring insurance providers to generate separate bills for anyone whose insurance plan covers abortions. If the bill for abortion coverage goes unpaid, then insurance companies can exercise the right to cancel the entire policy. [Newsweek article] (next WH, see January 17, 2020)