Slavery at the South Carolina College in Columbia

Urban Slavery in Columbia, sc

DeSaussure College (1809) is the second-oldest building on campus, formerly the North Building and later Old North Building. Named for Carolina chancellor Henry William DeSaussure, it survived an earthquake in 1811 and a fire in 1851.

In the early 1800s, South Carolina College was a significant institution in the growing city of Columbia. In order to understand slavery on campus, it is necessary to examine the role of slaves in Columbia during this era. Contrary to popular belief, not all slaves lived on plantations. In some ways, urban slaves, such as those in Columbia, inhabited a very different world than their rural counterparts.

One major difference between urban and rural slavery was the high concentration of slaves in cities. Whereas great distances often separated small communities of rural slaves, urban slaves typically lived and worked in close proximity with one another. In 1830, approximately 1,500 slaves lived and worked in Columbia; this population grew to 3,300 by 1860. Some members of this large enslaved population worked in their masters’ households. Masters also frequently hired out slaves to Columbia residents and institutions, including South Carolina College. Hired-out slaves sometimes returned to their owner’s home daily; others boarded with their temporary masters.

The movement of slaves throughout Columbia fostered ample opportunities for interaction among blacks in public and private spaces. These relationships permitted communication among slaves and the city’s small community of free blacks. Legislators developed state and local statues to restrict the movement of urban slaves in hopes of preventing rebellion. Although various decrees established curfews and prohibited slaves from meeting and from learning to read and write, such rulings were difficult to enforce. Several prewar accounts note that many Columbia slaves were literate; some slaves even conducted classes to teach others to read and write. In spite of white efforts to prevent blacks from congregating, slaves and free blacks persevered to build a strong community of their own in Columbia.

Urban slaves also participated in white organizations throughout the city, though in limited roles. Many slaves attended services at local Baptist, Presbyterian, and Methodist churches, yet some struggled to obtain membership in these institutions. Jack, a college slave, applied for membership in the First Presbyterian Church in April 1820. Church leaders postponed this decision for nearly two years and consulted the college’s board of trustees regarding Jack’s character. Jack did not obtain membership before his death in 1822. Jack’s story reveals the close ties between campus slaves and their urban environment. It also provides evidence of whites’ utter disregard for the contributions of slaves throughout this period.

(source: http://slaveryatusc.weebly.com/urban-slavery-in-columbia.html)

Slavery at Princeton

Slavery at Princeton

Princeton University, in the words of colonial historian Jeff Looney, cannot be said to have had a "glowing history in opposing slavery." He and fellow historian John Murrin both state that John Witherspoon, president of the College of New Jersey from 1768-1794, owned slaves. Indeed, Varnum Lansing Collins notes that the inventory of Witherspoon's possessions taken at his death included "two slaves . . . valued at a hundred dollars each." Neither Murrin or Looney have any reason to believe that the College itself owned slaves, though individual trustees did.

Israel Read, for example, who served as a trustee from 1761 to 1793 and was the first Princeton graduate to become a member of the synod of the Presbyterian church, disposed of three slaves upon his death, two to his children and one to a life of freedom (see Princetonians: 1748-1768). Jeremiah Halsey of the Class of 1752, a trustee from 1770 to 1780 and Clerk of the Board beginning in 1772, as well as the College's longest serving 18th-century tutor, also owned a slave (see Princetonians: 1748-1768). Richard Stockton of the Class of 1779, a trustee from 1791 to 1828 and the first citizen of Princeton, reputedly owned several slaves, freeing one in 1823 (Princetonians: 1776-1783). On the other hand, Joseph Bloomfield, a trustee from 1793 to 1801 and 1819 to 1823, was a prominent abolitionist, serving as president of the New Jersey Society for the Abolition of Slavery. As Governor of New Jersey from 1801 to 1812, Bloomfield presided over legislation enacted in 1804 that provided for the gradual abolition (over a twenty-year period) of slavery in the state.

Looney noted that the College offered a congenial home for Southerners since it numbered many "colonizationists" among its faculty, including John Maclean, president of the College of New Jersey from 1854 to 1868, who was a member of the American Colonization Society, which sought to repatriate blacks to Africa. Princeton attracted more Southerners than Harvard and Yale, and during the 1840s, there was only one year in which the percentage of Southern students at Princeton fell below 40%, and in 1848, it stood at 51.5% (see "Answering 'The Trumpet to Discord': Southerners at the College of New Jersey, 1820-1860, and Their Careers," a senior thesis by Ronald D. Kerridge). Gradualism was the order of the day at Princeton in the first half of the 19th-century, and the same could be said of New Jersey as a whole. As Kerridge puts it, "New Jersey was very conservative on the slavery question as free states went, and Mercer County and the town of Princeton were no exceptions. David A. Hillstrom's thorough study of the colonization and abolition movements in New Jersey (also a senior thesis) reveals strong support for the former but little backing for the more aggressive anti-slavery position." (source: Princeton University)

Slavery at William & Mary College

CNN reported: Last March, a crowd of nearly 100 gathered in Williamsburg, Virginia, for an all-day symposium about slavery and reconciliation. The event, put on by the College of William & Mary, wasn't a broad, rhetorical discussion of the past.

It was personal.

In 2009, the school acknowledged that it, "owned and exploited slave labor from its founding to the Civil War."
In response, it created The Lemon Project, named after a college-owned slave, to understand the role of race at the university.

Kimberely Phillips, an associate professor of history and American studies and Lemon Project co-chairwoman, said it's not just about slavery, "but about the lingering past with segregation."

Wren Chapel built by slave labor

On that spring Saturday, students, faculty and Williamsburg residents gathered to discuss research into the history of slavery at the school and how to move forward.

It's a conversation taking place on campuses around the country as they, too, discover and come to terms with their past ties to slavery. It's a history shared by Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island; Emory University in Atlanta and Harvard University, the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States. All admit they benefited from their relationships with slavery.

Some, like Emory, were physically built by the manual labor of slaves. Early university presidents and leaders at Harvard were slave owners. Still other schools were built with money made from the slave trade.

Historian said universities are typically focused on the present, and a history tied to slavery is seen as an embarrassment. Only within the last decade have historians pieced together this past, which some institutions had previously ignored or denied.

"Universities like to represent their abolitionist, anti-slave history and not talk about their connection to slavery [because] universities became battlegrounds for people opposed to slavery versus people in favor of it," said anthropologist Mark Auslander, who teaches history at Brandeis University.

In 2003, Brown University became one of the first colleges to acknowledge its history with slavery. University President Ruth Simmons, the first African-American to lead an Ivy League school, appointed a Steering Committee on Slavery and Justice to investigate ties between the New England slave trade and the university. (source: CNN)

Another View - The Lemon Project