Tag Archives: U.S. PRESIDENTS

THE AMERICAN BLACKSTORY 2022

DAY 21 — George Edwin Taylor

Shirley Chisholm, first African-American presidential candidate?

Everybody knows that in 1968 Shirley Chisholm was the first African-American candidate to run for United States President, right?

Right! She actually gets a brief mention in American history books, so surely that’s right…

…right?

Not even close.

64 years before Shirley, a man you’ve never even heard of tossed his hat into the presidential ring. His name was George Edwin Taylor and the reason you’ve never heard of him is because radical Black independents don’t make the history books.

But before we get into the specifics, let’s start at the beginning, because George lived a life that came full circle.

Born in 1857, he was only two years old when Arkansas passed the Free Negro Expulsion Bill, ordering all free Black people to vacate the state of Arkansas, or else find themselves re-enslaved for a full year to cover their own relocation fees. So to be clear, the offer was leave on your own now, or be enslaved and ultimately put out a year later. Of the state’s 700 free Black people, all but 144 took option A.

George’s mother was one of those people, and fled to the free state of Ohio where she and her son could live in their peace. But their shared peace was short-lived when she died just three years later. George was a 5-year-old orphan, with nothing and no one to call his own. For three years, he survived as a street urchin, until he was finally taken in by one family, assigned to another through foster care, and went on to a Wisconsin prep school. Even if he’d stopped achieving there, folks would have considered George a success for his time, his race, and his circumstances.

But for better or worse, George had a penchant for pushing the envelope, and good enough simply wasn’t. Over the next 20 years, he excelled in writing and operating an assortment of news publications, which gave him an intimate knowledge of political issues facing African-Americans and the country as a whole. And that knowledge came in handy in 1904 when the National Negro Liberty Party asked him to him run as their leading man.

Presidential race poster for George Edwin Taylor, the first African American ticketed as a political party’s nominee for president of the United States, running against Theodore Roosevelt in 1904 .
One bill that was supported by the National Negro Liberty Party. I wish I could tell you that it passed, but there’s no new news here. Read this document and many more on the party at the National Archives.

Here’s the kicker. Founded in 1897, the National Negro Liberty Party, formerly known as the Ex-Slave Petitioners’ Assembly, originated in Little Rock, Arkansas, where George had been born 40 years earlier. After the Free Negro Expulsion Bill that drove George & his mother out of Arkansas, it’s no wonder folks assembled politically against the state’s tyranny, and absolute kismet that the man who would come to represent those people nationally was born amongst them.

The Ex-Slave Petitioners’ Assembly was originally formed seeking legislative reparations of any sort after the “40 acres and a mule” that were promised did not materialize and “the poverty which afflicted [African-Americans] for a generation after Emancipation held them down to the lowest order of society, nominally free but economically enslaved,” as Carter G. Woodson put it in The Mis-Education of the Negro.

After years of trying (and failing) to push bills through Congress, the National Negro Liberty Party decided they’d shake another branch of government. And George was JUST the man for the job. He didn’t have the statesmanship of men like Frederick Douglass or W.E.B. DuBois. Their visibility among Black and White Americans helped them to temper their passions and find delicate ways to deliver harsh words to hearts and minds.

George’s National Appeal unofficially undermined any chance he might have had at running for office with the Democrats or Republicans. Read it in full at the Library of Congress.

George wasn’t that dude. He’d been both a Democrat and Republican, until they’d both offended him by rejecting proposals brought to them by Black delegates, backing candidates with clear racist platforms, and failing to take up issues that only affected people of color, but when George went full scorched earth against the Republican Party by printing “A National Appeal, Addressed to the American Negro and Friends of Human Liberty,” it was game over for any affiliation he might even hope to gain with those parties. He was officially a radical independent.

The National Negro Liberty Party shortened their name to remove “Negro,” as every American ought be in favor of liberty, and delivered their party’s demands:

  • Universal suffrage regardless of race
  • Federal protection of the rights of all citizens
  • Federal anti-lynching laws
  • Additional black regiments in the U.S. Army
  • Federal pensions for all former slaves
  • Government ownership and control of all public services to ensure equal accommodations for all citizens
  • Home rule for the District of Columbia

A very reasonable platform, but one that even George knew was unlikely to be taken seriously. “Yes, I know most white folks take me as a joke,” he said in interviews. “But I want to tell you the colored man is beginning to see a lot of things that the white folks do not give him credit for seeing. He’s beginning to see that he has got to take care of his own interests, and what’s more, that he has the power to do it.”

That Election Day was not a day of power for us. George’s name wasn’t added to a single state’s ballot. Though estimates say he received as many as 70,000 write-ins, none of that can be verified because his votes weren’t tallied in individual state records that only counted Democrats and Republicans. In fact, the only real success that George personally reaped in his presidential bid was that he came out of it alive. “He was a black man running on a third-party ticket in a country that had little interest in black men or third parties,” Trinity College historian Dr. David Brodnax said.

Between that sad but true reality and all the bridges that George had burned to get there, his national political ambitions were essentially one and done, go big or go home. But he actively continued making what strides he could by continuing his publishing career, supporting local politicians and community organizations, and empowering the Black community. He’d implored that same community on Emancipation Day in 1898 to “press on until [you have] reached the top of the ladder and then reach up to see if there isn’t another ladder on top of that one.” Then, in spite of his own certain failure, he took a leap that extended that ladder just a little further for those who’d climb next, even if American history never acknowledged his steps.

KEEP GOING BLACK IN HISTORY:

Discover more about “A Forgotten Presidential Candidate from 1904” and the circumstances that led to his nomination at NPR.

Dive into the photos, articles, and documents on George Edwin Taylor archived at the University of Wisconsin—La Crosse.

Find out more about the untold presidential run and more background on Black American politics in Bruce Mouser’s George Edwin Taylor, His Historic Run for the White House, and the Making of Independent Black Politics.

Read more about the book at the University of Wisconsin Press here.

THE AMERICAN BLACKSTORY 2022

DAY 12 — Elizabeth Keckly

“Slavery” is a cold, factual word that tidily boxes up millions of personal indignities repeated over and over again.

“Freedom” is usually considered its opposite, but I’d propose another: “agency.”

Elizabeth Keckly, in her prime. She came to be known as Madame Keckly among Washington D.C.’s high society.

Everything about the antebellum Virginia world Elizabeth Hobbs Keckly was born into was designed to deprive her of agency. She lived to take it back.

Elizabeth’s mother Aggy wasn’t as fortunate. Her daughter’s father wasn’t her husband George, but her owner Armistead Burwell. She’d attempted to claim what little agency she could in the circumstances by rejecting her enslaver/rapist’s last name in favor of her husband’s: Hobbs. Aggy didn’t share that truth with her daughter until her deathbed. Perhaps it brought back too many bad memories, like how Burwell gave the Hobbs family two hours notice before selling George to a slaver in the West. Elizabeth recalled their collective helplessness in her autobiography: “I can remember the scene as if it were but yesterday;–how my father cried out against the cruel separation; his last kiss; his wild straining of my mother to his bosom; the solemn prayer to Heaven; the tears and sobs–the fearful anguish of broken hearts… the last good-by; and he, my father, was gone, gone forever.”

Prized by the Burwells for her many talents, especially the seamstress skills that she was expected to teach her daughter, Aggy was kept. But Aggy could also read and write, and likely taught her daughter those skills as well. Instead of the domestication expected of her, Elizabeth eventually wielded her needle and pen as silent weapons of subversion instead.

That subversive streak simmered early on. As a teenager, she was sent to North Carolina to work in the service of her (then unknown) half-brother Robert. Perhaps because Robert’s wife Margaret easily guessed the source of Elizabeth’s light skin and wanted to punish her for it, or perhaps simply because she was cruel, Margaret enlisted the help of a neighbor to “break” Elizabeth. When the neighbor summoned Elizabeth, demanding that she strip down for her first humiliating beating, she replied, “You shall not whip me unless you prove the stronger. Nobody has a right to whip me but my own master, and nobody shall do so if I can prevent it.” She could not. Week after week, Elizabeth was beaten until her abuser was too exhausted to continue. Week after week, “I did not scream; I was too proud to let my tormentor know what I was suffering,” she wrote. Eventually, it was he who “burst into tears, and declared that it would be a sin” to continue inflicting such harm upon an innocent human being.

But her torment did not end, and a new owner inflicted a different physical punishment on Elizabeth. “For four years, a white man—I will spare the world his name—had base designs upon me. I do not care to dwell upon the subject, for it is one that is fraught with pain. Suffice it to say that he persecuted me for four years, and I… I became a mother,” she wrote.

Then and now, there is no greater personal indignity, but Elizabeth’s despair over that act went deeper: “I could not bear the thought of bringing children into slavery — of adding one single recruit to the millions bound in hopeless servitude.”

When Armistead Burwell died, Elizabeth returned to Virginia to care for his heirs, then accompanied them to St. Louis. That’s where she began stitching her terrible circumstances into gold.

By then, the family had grown to 17 members, and without a patriarch and his estate, they were destitute. Elizabeth was the only one among them with employable skills, and she was hired out to sew for other families, eventually growing that casual business arrangement into an actual business that single-handedly supported all 17 people.

Seeing her true value, Elizabeth made an offer to her owner. She would buy her freedom and her son’s for $1200. At first, he refused. Then he tried to trick her, saying he would accept no payment, but offering to pay her passage on the ferry across the Mississippi. She was smart enough to know that the Fugitive Slave Act meant she could be returned to her owner anytime, and she refused. In 1855, she finally gained her independence and made her first fateful decision. Elizabeth took her talents to the nation’s capital, where they caught the eye of a very important lady: Mary Todd Lincoln.

Mary Todd Lincoln in the gown Elizabeth made for the President’s inauguration ball.

Under the First Lady’s employ, Elizabeth flourished. In a single season she fashioned almost 20 dresses, many of which were complimented by the President himself. In Mrs. Lincoln, Elizabeth also found a timely friend. Elizabeth and Mary both lost sons in 1861 and 1862, respectively. That experience reshaped their very personal business relationship into a friendship. “Lizabeth, you are my best and kindest friend, and I love you,” Mrs. Lincoln once wrote. Best of all, she put her money where her mouth was.

One of the winter dresses Elizabeth made for Mary. See more of her collection in FIT’s digital collection.

Elizabeth was in high demand among D.C.’s high society women, even the wives of Confederacy President Jefferson Davis and General Robert E. Lee. And in true subversive fashion, she used their old southern money to employ more Black women in her shop and create the Contraband Relief Association, an organization that provided support, relief and assistance to formerly enslaved people. 

The First Lady’s letter to the President requesting funds on Elizabeth’s behalf.

Mrs. Lincoln regularly donated to the Contraband Relief Association, and requested that her husband do the same. “Elizabeth Keckley, who is with me and is working for the Contraband Association, at Wash[ington]–is authorized…to collect anything for them here that she can….Out of the $1000 fund deposited with you by Gen Corcoran, I have given her the privilege of investing $200 her.. Please send check for $200…she will bring you on the bill,” she wrote to President Lincoln.

A quilt Elizabeth Keckly fashioned from Mary Todd’s discarded dresses.

But alas, everyone reading knows what came soon enough. President Lincoln was assassinated, and with his death, public opinion of Mary and the ladies’ friendship unraveled. Elizabeth published her autobiography, believing it would salvage both and bolster her income, but her good intentions backfired. 

Elizabeth’s autobiography, Behind the Scenes, or Thirty Years a Slave, and Four Years in the White House.

“Readers in her day, white readers — they took it as an audacious tell-all,” Jennifer Fleischner, author of “Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly” said. “You know, ‘How dare she’? There were two categories: the faithful Negro servant or the angry Negro servant. Keckly was neither servant, nor faithful, nor angry. She presented herself, the White House and Mary Lincoln as she saw and knew them. And that didn’t work.”

Even the New York Times published a scathing review of Elizabeth’s book.

Mary was devastated by the personal revelations Elizabeth included, society women found it distasteful and didn’t want to appear in the pages of a book themselves, politicians spun it as reasons African-Americans shouldn’t be able to read, write or integrate with regular society, and that was that for Elizabeth. She died in her sleep in 1907, at a home for poor women & children that the Contraband Relief Association had founded.

But her story didn’t end there. Though it was suppressed upon its initial publication, Elizabeth’s biography is in print once again, and considered one of the most substantial documentations of the Lincoln White House surviving today, and proof of the value in owning your own story.

Elizabeth’s gravestone.

*Ed. Note: I’ve spelled Elizabeth’s last name as “Keckly” because that’s how she spelled it. She was historically recorded as “Keckley” and that spelling has persisted.

KEEP GOING BLACK IN HISTORY:

The Smithsonian National Museum of American History details how Elizabeth put her money to work for the people.

The New York Times featured Elizabeth’s biography in their “Overlooked” series that runs modern-day obituaries of famous contributors to American history that their paper overlooked at the time.

The White House Historical Association has thoroughly documented Elizabeth’s life from her autobiography and their own records as part of their “Slavery in the President’s Neighborhood” initiative.

THE AMERICAN BLACKSTORY 2022

DAY 10 — The Harlem Hellfighters

On January 1, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln wrote:

“I further declare and make known, that such persons of suitable condition, will be received into the armed service of the United States to garrison forts, positions, stations, and other places, and to man vessels of all sorts in said service.”

Having finally received “unalienable” rights and having witnessed the admiration bestowed upon white soldiers over the course of 4 separate wars, many African-American men were hopeful that enlisting and serving the United States by choice would force Americans to think better of the whole race.

But the words of the Emancipation Proclamation couldn’t sway the hearts and minds of men, especially when those words were undermined by another sitting president.

When the Buffalo Soldiers, went to battle on behalf of the U.S. Army in the Spanish-American War, Rough Rider Frank Knox said, “I never saw braver men anywhere.” Lieutenant John J. Pershing wrote, “They fought their way into the hearts of the American people.” President Teddy Roosevelt went on record saying “Negro troops were shirkers in their duties and would only go as far as they were led by white officers.”

Less than a decade later, the Harlem Hellfighters would make him eat crow.

When the United States joined the war against Germany, they did so woefully underprepared. American military forces had never gone to battle overseas before, and the Army’s ranks of a mere 126,000 men wasn’t going to cut it. Of the Armed Forces that existed at the time, only the Army allowed African-Americans to enlist for combat, even though it was hardly on an equitable basis. There were only 4 “colored regiments” and once their ranks were filled, the rest of the Black applicants who’d lined up for service were turned away. When Selective Service began in 1917, men of color were told to tear a corner of their draft card away so they could be easily identified and assigned. In the thick of World War I with the Central Powers devastating Allied forces in Europe, U.S. draft boards used those torn corners to send as many Black men to the front lines as they could.

The men of the 369th Regiment however, scrubbed toilets stateside when they first enlisted, relegated to menial and filthy tasks like slaves, even though they’d volunteered for service. But when the war demanded more soldiers, the 369th went from toilets to trenches , being upgraded to Infantry, and shipped off to France for three weeks of combat training before being stationed on the war’s front lines.

The 369th in the trenches.

But even there, they weren’t considered “soldiers.” White Col. William Heyward begged that the 369th be allowed to actually serve on the battlefield, rather than dig trenches, unload ships, and other manual labor they’d been assigned to, as if nothing had changed at all. Army command compromised, assigning the 369th to the French Army instead.

When it came to the 369th and many other all-Black regiments, the Army didn’t send soldiers or reinforcements, they sent human shields expected to die. They never dreamed that the 369th would gain the respect of the French, who’d nickname them “Hommes de Bronze,” or come to be feared by the German Army who first dubbed the 369th as Hollenkampfer (“Hellfighters”). The Army most certainly didn’t expect that the 369th Regiment would be the very first Allied force to breach Germany’s borders.

The Croix de Guerre awarded to Lawrence McVey, a Harlem Hellfighter from Flatonia, TX.

But the Army wasn’t entirely wrong. The Hellfighters spent 191 days in combat, more than any other unit in the war and suffered losses to match, with hundreds dead and thousands wounded over the course of their deployment. Those losses were deeply felt by Captain Arthur Little who wrote, “What have I done this afternoon? Lost half my battalion—driven hundreds of innocent men to their death.” Those who survived fought their way to becoming some of the most decorated American soldiers in history… by another nation. The entire 369th Regiment was awarded the Croix de Guerre, the French Medal of Honor, and over 170 of its servicemen were honored individually. The Hellfighters Band was even honored, being largely credited as Europe’s first introduction to jazz.

The Harlem Hellfighters were so much more than infantry. Their ranks included skilled musicians like James Reese Europe and jazz legend Eubie Blake. Read more about the Harlem Hellfighters Regimental Band here.

Sgt. Henry “Black Death” Johnson earned a personal mention in the war dispatches of Gen. John J. Pershing, commander of the entire American Expeditionary Forces and the same man who, in the words of Col. Heyward, “simply put the black orphan in a basket, set it on the doorstep of the French, pulled the bell, and went away.” With only a bolo, 5-foot-4, 130 pound Sgt. Johnson single-handedly defended himself and his wounded partner against armed German soldiers who raided an Allied outpost. President Roosevelt would later name him as one of the “five bravest Americans” of World War I.

Thousands of New Yorkers welcomed the veterans of the Hellfighters home.

“Up the wide avenue they swung. Their smiles outshone the golden sunlight. In every line proud chests expanded beneath the medals valor had won. The impassioned cheering of the crowds massed along the way drowned the blaring cadence of their former jazz band. The old 15th was on parade and New York turned out to tender its dark-skinned heroes a New York welcome,” the New York Tribune wrote of the Hellfighters’ homecoming parade down Fifth Avenue. See more beautiful newspaper spreads and historic news accounts of that day at the Library of Congress digital archives.

And then forgot them altogether.

Lawrence McVey’s service photo, preserved by the Smithsonian, inscribed “hero.”

In the best cases, the Hellfighters drifted back into their lives, and lived in relative anonymity. In the worst cases, like those of Lawrence Leslie McVey, their remarkable service earned them a death by beating in the streets of New York.

Despite all of those medals abroad and the pretty words spoken, the United States didn’t award the 369th Regiment anything until 2015. By then, no one survived to accept the Congressional Medal of Honor awarded to Sgt. “Black Death” Johnson who was injured in combat 21 times. On August 21, 2021, the entire unit was finally recognized posthumously with a Congressional Gold Medal, awarded since the American Revolution as the country’s “highest expression of national appreciation.”

In addition to World War Z, Max Brooks also wrote The Harlem Hellfighters.

Tomorrow, February 11 will be the anniversary of the Hellfighters’ return to the States. The 3,000 men who marched Fifth Avenue that day were only a small portion of the “25 percent of Americans fighting in France [as] hyphenated Americans,” according to Lt. Col. ML Cavanaugh and Max Brooks (yes, World War Z Max Brooks), fellows at West Point’s Modern War Institute. Those other 25% included Choctaw code-talkers whose language was unbreakable abroad, Chinese Americans, Latinos like “Pvt. Marcelino Serna, a Mexican American who migrated to El Paso before the war, took out an enemy machine gun, a sniper, and an entire German platoon on his own, becoming the most decorated Texan of World War I,” and so many more who’ve been forgotten.

I hope you’ll spend the day paying tribute to those Americans who didn’t let the hyphens and racism visited upon them by others stand in the way of sacrifice and the fight for their own unrealized freedom.

KEEP GOING BLACK IN HISTORY:

Read the National Museum of the United States Army account of the wars the Harlem Hellfighters fought at home and abroad.

Smithsonian Magazine features more personal details of the lives, accomplishments and times of the Harlem Hellfighters.

Browse the Smithsonian National Museum of African-American History and Culture’s “Double Victory: the African-American Military Experience” here.

THE AMERICAN BLACKSTORY 2019

DAY 18 — Charles Gittens

Charles Gittens - Black At the President’s Side

It was the dead of night when hysterical screams came from the First Lady’s Hyannisport bedroom.

Luckily, one of the United States Secret Service’s most level-headed agents was the first to Jackie Kennedy’s side… even though her assailant was only a giant flying bat.

From an early age, the call to serve his country in some capacity was so strong that shortly before he graduated from high school, Charles Gittens decided to enlist in the U.S. Army instead.

There, he earned his GED and a whole lot more. He ultimately served as a lieutenant in Japan during the Korean War, and once discharged, he earned two 4-year degrees in English and Spanish within just 3, with Magna Cum Laude designation.

He’d spent a year teaching in North Carolina when his friends encouraged him to take a government civil service exam. The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) was recruiting black agents and it couldn’t hurt to try, right? His high test scores, bilingualism and military background caught the attention of the Secret Service instead.

And so, in 1956, Charles Gittens became the first black agent in the United States Secret Service.

But it almost didn’t come to pass. The civil service exam was given in two parts: written and oral. After having passed the written exam, he traveled to an Atlanta regional office for the oral portion, where for one reason or another, the facilitator had it out for him. “The guy in charge had scribbled things down like, ‘speaks incoherently’ or ‘can’t be understood.’ Can you imagine such a thing?” he recounted. When he insisted on another facilitator he passed with flying colors, but never did get an explanation for the wild discrepancy.

Of course, Charles didn’t let the rough start hold him back. From his initial appointment in North Carolina, he was promoted to the agency’s largest field office in New York, where he investigated counterfeits and protected visiting presidents along with other dignitaries for 10 years. He was such an impressive and inspiring leader that he was subsequently promoted to senior agent of the Island of Puerto Rico, and finally in 1971, special agent in charge of the Washington, D.C. office, a job that put him on regular presidential protection and supervisory duties over more than 100 other agents.

He’d been so welcomed by his peers, dignitaries and presidents, and had operated in a world so separate from civilians that it was often easy to forget the racism that lurked just beyond the government’s most protected walls. But that didn’t mean he was immune to them.

“At that time, I was not a ‘negro,’ I was a Secret Service agent,” explaining how his job had become second nature to him. But the looks on the faces of the diners as he walked straight past a “No Negros” sign and into a restaurant where he was meeting other agents for breakfast told him otherwise. After an awkward wait, the manager came out and told the other agents they wouldn’t serve a black man. Despite the others coming to his defense, Charlie kept his dignity and left the situation, reminding them that they were always representing the President of the United States. (One account says the owner caught up to Charlie, apologized for the disrespect and served him after all.)

By the time Charlie ended his Secret Service career in 1979, he’d become the deputy assistant director overseeing all of the Secret Service field offices. In his 23 years of service, he protected Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon, countless diplomats, and the best interests of the country in myriad ways. And he continued doing so. After retiring from the Secret Service, he joined the Department of Justice’s Office of Special Investigations, tracking down and bringing war criminals hiding in the US to pay for their crimes.

Though he died in 2011 at the age of 82, he left a legacy of inclusion as a living testament to his devotion. During his career, he was a founding member of the National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives (NOBLE), dedicated to “fairness in the administration of justice, police community relations, [and greater inclusion] of black police officers.” In each of his ranking positions, the Secret Service encouraged Charlie to recruit more female and black agents. Today, there are nearly 400 of each among approximately 3500 special agents due largely in part to Charlie’s efforts, his leadership and his determination to serve, no matter the return.

KEEP GOING BLACK IN HISTORY:

Browse the Secret Service’s permanent digital dedication for Agent Gittens, including his profile in Ebony Magazine.

Upon his death, The Boston Globe featured a complete and truly inspiring obituary for Agent Gittens.

THE AMERICAN BLACKSTORY 2017

DAY 20 — Ona Judge

*PRESIDENT’S DAY EDITION*

On May 24, 1796, the Pennsylvania Gazette published the ad here requesting the capture of Oney Judge, First Lady Martha Washington’s personal, runaway slave.

Ona “Oney” Judge was born into slavery at Mount Vernon, VA around 1773, and was groomed as Martha Washington’s body attendant. She was so treasured by the First Family that she was one of 8 slaves who moved to the nation’s new capitol of Philadelphia with them in 1790. Her status as an upper echelon household slave afforded Oney luxuries that others didn’t have — she could accompany her mistress in town, or go alone to enjoy the local attractions, she wore nice clothes, and she even had a room of her own! What more could a slave want?

The Washingtons soon found out. In 1796, Martha’s granddaughter back home was married, and she promised Oney to the newlyweds as a gift. Oney knew that if she went back south to Virginia, the home of American slavery, she’d never return. So when she packed her bags to leave the Washingtons, she decided that those bags were packed for freedom.

And for years, she ran. Oney escaped that day, but she was never actually free. The Washingtons were shocked & infuriated by her disloyalty, and doggedly attempted to recover her. Ads like the one shown here were placed in newspapers, and on at least three separate occasions over the years, the President’s friends & associates attempted to facilitate Oney’s return by negotiation or by force.

Oney settled in New Hampshire, married a free man & had children, but there was no statute of limitations on slavery. If she had ever been captured, she would have been immediately returned to the Washingtons, and her children would become slaves too — the Washingtons property rights over their mother took precedent over their free father’s parental rights. So for the next several decades, she hid until she was in her 70s, hoping to be forgotten or too old to be worth the trouble.

When she finally granted her first newspaper interview in 1845, the reporter asked if she regretted escaping into isolation & poverty, in contrast to the affluence she could have have had with the Washingtons. Her response was moving: “No, I am free.”

KEEP GOING BLACK IN HISTORY:

Read author transcriptions of two of the only surviving interviews of Oney Judge.

On Juneteenth 2021, Mount Vernon erected a historical marker to preserve Ona’s story in the place where it happened. It’s the first marker in all of Fairfax County, VA recognizing a Black person.

Ona is “among the 19 enslaved people highlighted in ‘Lives Bound Together: Slavery at George Washington’s Mount Vernon,’ and the subject of Never Caught: The Washingtons’ Relentless Pursuit of Their Runaway Slave, Ona Judge by Erica Armstrong Dunbar.
Read more on both at the New York Times.

Dive deeper into the daily lives of Ona & another of the Washingtons’ slaves, William Lee.