Category Archives: Abolitionists in NJ

Abolitionists in NJ

What Do We Owe Our Ancestors?

This blogpost is dedicated to all Speakers of TRUTH, especially my fellow BlackProGen LIVE  panelists,  who are on the battlefield for their ancestors and who continue to speak truth to power in a manner that makes their ancestors proud.

 

Our Obligation to Our Ancestors…

On this Good Friday 2019, I want to discuss the moral obligation that descendants have to their ancestors.  This is a topic I have spoken about for years now and will continue to speak about. My cultural worldview is one that is African-Native and has been shaped by the fundamental belief that there is NO SEPARATION between those who reside on high and those of us still among the living here on earth. Our ancestors are with us wherever we go! They not only exists in the features they left us with, the beautiful rainbow shades we have, the color of our eyes, but they also are with us in the words we speak and the acts of restorative social justice that we do in THEIR NAMES. We call their names so that they will be remembered by all.

For years now, my multi-racial extended family has been in places and situations that can only be described as guided by our ancestors. We were not supposed to be at the last public hearing in Greenwich, CT before the “Byram African-American Cemetery,” Byram Cemetery and Lyon Cemetery were to be acquired by the Town of Greenwich back in September 2016. And yet we were there. On April 17, 2019, our extended family attended the Rutgers-Newark Agitate! The Legacy of Frederick Douglass and Abolition in Newark celebration . We were not supposed to be there originally, but there we were. I was initially slated to only speak three minutes due to time constraints, but I spoke for 10 minutes. Our ancestors rendered possible what  seemed to be impossible. It was through God and their divine intervention that I was able to point out the FACTS of their lives — that they made up the bedrock of abolitionism in Newark.

 

 

These T-shirts can be purchased on www.rrbb-shop.com to support the preservation of cemeteries.

On Restorative Social Justice for Our Ancestors

Last  week  my Goin cousin and fellow BlackProGen LIVE panelist, Dr. Shelley Murphy, informed me that the Boyd Carter Cemetery in Kearneysville,  West Virginia, another historic African-American cemetery, is facing destruction. Our ancestors are in this cemetery facing a peace disturbed because a pipeline is slated to run through their sacred resting space. Shelley is working with other descendants of people interred there along with concerned allies, like Chris Petrella, a professor at American University and the Director of Advocacy and Strategic Partnerships with the Antiracist Research and Policy Center and others.

While we love working in tandem with our allies and welcome any help we can get, descendants of those buried in cemeteries, facing desecration and destruction, should fight on behalf of their own ancestors. It is OUR MORAL IMPERATIVE, OUR MORAL OBLIGATION as long as we reside on this earth to be our ancestors’ unified voice to articulate their pain, loud and clear, with our heads held high…

I want to say to the many people who have ancestral places that are currently under attack by outside forces that the battle is only over when WE SING and SHOUT! Don’t be dismayed that things aren’t going the way that you want them to go. To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven! And in this our season, it’s time to get LOUDER and resurrect the lives and memories of those who are facing historic erasure. While the powers that be may eventually do what they always have done and erase our ancestral presence from the physical world,  we, as descendants, have the power to do what we always had to do and that is to find ways of remembering those who have gone before us. While our ancestors risked being severely punished, mutilated and killed for writing and speaking out in their own defense, they always relied on the power of memory and oral history to stay in touch with their own ancestors. Today, we have the power to remember our ancestors, resurrect their communities, and then turn around and tell the world about our kin. We are not powerless! Our ancestors left behind their DNA in us to fight any battle that comes our way! We’ve come this far by faith…

 

 

Stories from the National Memorial for Peace and Justice

BlackProGen LIVE has been working with the descendants of lynching victims and have been helping them flesh out their family trees and tell their ancestral stories. As Nicka Smith points out,  “In 2018, The Equal Justice Initiative opened the The National Memorial for Peace and Justice which memorialized more than 4,400 African American men, women, and children who were hanged, burned alive, shot, drowned, and beaten to death by white mobs between 1877 and 1950.”  Our two upcoming BlackProGen LIVE episodes “will feature the family history of some of the victims documented in the memorial in an effort to humanize and bring light to their lives outside of a tragic event they have been associated with,” states Smith.

BlackProGen LIVE is committed to educating and helping descendants of both Free and enslaved ancestors discover their ancestral stories. As a group, we believe that  our research is nothing short of reparational acts of restorative social justice. Time and time again, we have proven that here are ways in which our ancestral stories and family history can be discovered in spite of slavery.

 

 

 

In conclusion, I posted this video almost 8 months ago and I am going to leave it right here AGAIN because our ancestors are with us wherever we go and they guide our research every step of the way!

 

Our Abolitionist Ancestors: Newark Born and Bred

This blog is written as a supplement to the Agitate! The Legacy of Frederick Douglass and Abolition in Newark celebration taking place at Rutgers University-Newark on April 17, 2019. A special thank you goes to City of Newark Town Historian Junius Williams who several years ago invited me to add our Thompson-King family history to his website which is devoted to African-American political mobilization and activism in Newark and to his Rutgers University -Newark students Peter Blackmer, Noelle Lorraine Williams, and others. Dr. James Amemasor and the staff at the NJ Historical Society deserve special mention as they have all aided my research for almost a decade now along with my good friend Rich Sears Walling for his endless quest to bring the Van Wickle Illegal Slave Trade to light and seek social justice for the 177 Lost Souls–some of whom were our NJ ancestors.  My best friend and purveyor of all the research items I need,  Professor Rhonda L. Johnson, Head of Access Services at CUNY- Hostos Community College, my BlackProGen LIVE geneabuddies and fellow Truth Seekers, Muriel “Dee Dee”Roberts, Shannon Christmas, Calvin Schermerhorn, James J. Gigantino II, Joshua Rothman, Graham Russell Hodges, and others who have supported my research over the years.

The greatest thanks go to Chancellor Nancy Cantor, Peter Englot, Sr. VP Chancellor of Public Affairs and Chief of Staff, and Sr. VP Chancellor for External and Government Relations Marcia Brown and for inviting my extended family to this hisoric event and allowing me to speak as well as Dr. Consuella Askew, Director, John Cotton Dana Library. On behalf of our Thompson-King family, we look forward to working with Rutgers University in the near future.

This blog is dedicated to each and everyone of my extended family members who will join us at this event — in person or in spirit, especially my cousin-homie-sister-genealogy research partner, Andrea Hughes. Our Ancestor Angels will be watching us on this day  happily knowing that  it is in THEIR NAMES that their history of AGITATION will be remembered by all! I can imagine that they are also happy that we will be honoring a man whom they honored in life and that we are being united with his DESCENDANTS on this day. Indeed, this is a day that the Lord has made and we will be glad and rejoice in it.

On April 17-18, 1849, our Prophet of Freedom, Frederick Douglass, visited our hometown of Newark to speak at the Plane Street Colored Presbyterian Church as part of his tour of Northeast African-American churches after the publication of his  first book and to drum up support for his newspaper, The North Star.  When he arrived, he was introduced by Rev. Samuel Cornish, the pastor of the church at the time, as well as greeted by many of our ancestors among whom were the  Thompson, King,  O’Fake, Ray, Van Riper, Francis, Lewis,  Jackson, Goosebeck, and  Van Ness families among so many others.

Let it be known that our extended Thompson- King family has an over 400+ year history in Newark/Essex County, NJ as well as most counties across the state, and they were among the original foot soldiers of freedom who insitutionalized what became known as the Underground Railroad in the Northeast. They were the ones who founded churches, schools, anti-slavery societies (The Colored Anti-Slavery Society of Newark, the Anti-Slavery Society of Essex County, The New Jersey State Anti-Slavery Society, as well as the American Anti-Slavery Society), businesses, benevolent and mutual aid organizations, anti-colonization societies, Masonic lodges, literary societies, temperance  societies, etc. as I have previously mentioned in my blogposts (1) From Slave to Stagecoach Owner: Thomas Thompson, (2)My Poor 3rd Great-Grandfather Cato, (3)The Underground Railroad House that Jacob D. King Built in Newark, (4) Rev. John A. King: Abolitionist, Preacher, and Planemaker and (5) The Blanchard Family of Orange, NJ: From Slavery to Freedom.

Our ancestors are descended from the Ramapough Lenape who have lived in C/NY/NJ  for the millenia, Emmanuel d’Angola, one of the first “Spanish Negroes,” other enslaved people from all over West Africa, the first enslaved people from Madagascar, and European (Dutch, Scots-Irish, British and French Huguenot) colonizers.

With the exception of our indigenous ancestors, all others arrived in the early 1600s (see Part II: The DNA Trail from Madagascar to Manhattan & Our Family’s Malagasy Roots). We are especially proud of our African-Native roots because we know that our ancestors survived the triple horrors of genocide, colonization, and slavery so that we could tell their true stories — the good, bad, and ugly. It is their DNA of resistance that was handed down to us and which is embodied in our multi-racial family history working on the Underground Railroad.

The Abolitionist Context: Newark, NJ Pre-1849

  

Newark Daly Advertiser April, 8, 1864
Centinel of Freedom November 3, 1863
Centinel of Freedom November 3, 1863

Like most colonial families, our ancestors fought on both sides during the War of Independance. The famed Black Loyalist, Colonel Tye, led the Black Brigade in acts of resistence against the Patriots by launching attacks on Long Island, Westchester County, Staten Island and all over East Jersey. At this time, New York City was under British control. Colonel Tye worked directly with General John Graves Simcoe‘s Queen’s Rangers. These revolts occured in the same locations where our ancestors lived and labored for free. On the last ship out of NYC at the end of the Revolutionary War, were 3,000 Black Loyalists.  Among them were Mary Thompson and her daughters May and Polly plus two small girls, who may have been daughters of either one, from Newark, Rose Fortune and her family — all ancestors of ours that we know of at this time.  That being said, it is also known that the true number of Black Loyalists who left for Canada was undercounted.

Slavery in Newark persisted after the Revolutionary War as you can see by the two  newspaper clippings above. Though our ancestors migrated from the Tappan Patent (Bergan County, NJ and Rockland/Orange Counties, NY) up to Ulster County, and then down to Greater Middlesex County prior to the Revolutionary War,  they ending up in  Newark (Essex County) after the Revolutionary War. Some were emancipated as early as the 1790s, others were enslaved for a term under the Gradual Emancipation Act of 1804, and others remained enslaved for life. The mixed-status households that our ancestors resided in is the reason why they espoused political activism and mobilization. They saw the horrors of slavery up close and personal— from every angle. The fact that only some of them were freed earlier than others meant nothing to them if everyone was not free. They always saw the full humanity of their people.  That our African-Native ancestors were disenfranchised, along with women in 1807, only added to their anger. They had lived through the Revolutionary War living and working side by side along well-known American Patriots, such as Abraham Ogden, and David A. OgdenCaleb Bruen, and had believed in the American Dream from its inception only to have their fundamental right to vote snatched from their hands. They never gave up on the American Dream though.

It must be noted that after the founding of the AME Zion Church in Newark in 1822, there was an exodus of our ancestors and other African-Americans from the First Presbyterian Church who ended up joining the AME Zion Church. Our ancestors only came back to their Presbyterian roots when the Colored Presbyerian Church was founded in 1836. Both of these churches can be considered “Freedom Churches” as the early Newark African-American community was united in their embrace of abolitionism. Both churches engaged in abolitionist activities whereby the early Black community routinely attended events at each church. We seen this in the early Colored School  as the school alternated  between both churches in its early years. Likewise, we see this in the First of August celebrations held in Lincoln Park where opening and closing prayers were held at both churches and ministers from each church spoke at these celebrations.

Starting in the early 1800s and up until 1900, our abolitionist ancestors knew all the early abolitionists from their participation in both the AME Zion Church that our King Family founded alongside of Rev. Christopher Rush and the Colored Presbyterian Church where our Thompsons were among the founding families. [Later, our ancestors would be among the founding families of St. Phillip’s Church and Bethany Baptist Church in Newark.] Rev. Samuel Cornish, John B. Russwurm, Rev. Theordore Hunt, Rev. E.P. Rogers, Rev. Theordore S. Wright, David Ruggles, Rev. Henry Highland Garnet, Rev. James McCune Smith,  Rev. Peter Williams and his son Rev. Peter Williams, Jr.,  Isaac Hopper, Thomas Shipley, Charles L. Reason, Rev. Alexander Crummel, Rev. Samuel Ringgold Ward, Gerrit Smith, Lewis and Arthur Tappan, Rev. James C. W. Pennington, Harriet Tubman, Sojouner Truth, Rev. W. T. Catto, James Forten, Robert Purvis, Rev. Simeon Jocelyn, Angelina Grimke Weld and Sarah Grimke, Rev. William O. Jackson, William Lloyd Garrison, Rev. John S. Rock, Rev. Daniel A. Payne, John Brown, William Still, Rev. Daniel Vanderveer, Mary Ann Shadd Cary, William C. Nell, John Teasman, Rev. Bishop James Varick, Rev Jehiel Beman and his son Rev. Amos G. Beman,  Martin Delaney, and William Wells Brown are just of the some of the  abolitionists my ancestors personally knew.

When Frederick Douglass came to Newark in 1849, Newark was already an epicenter of abolitionism and could hold its own among other Northeast epicenters like New York City and Albany/Troy, NY, Philadelphia, PA, Boston and New Bedford, MA, Providence, RI, and Hartford, CT.

Our Lyon Family Legacy: From CT to NY/NJ

Connecticut Puritans  settled in Newark (Essex County) and all over East Jersey in the early 1600s. Among Newark’s original settlers were the New Jersey Branch of our CT Lyon Family. Our Lyon ancestors have a strong abolitionist history with our Lyon-Green-Merritt ancestors who have always been linked by blood and kinship. The following blogposts detail our united family history that spans centuries up to TODAY: (1) A Look at Northern Slavery Personified: The Greens and Merritts of Greenwich, CT, (2) My Ancestors Are Now Buried In Someone’s Front Lawn, (3) Coming to the Table In Honor of Jack Husted, (4) Hangroot Was Our Hood: Reclaiming Black Greenwich History, (5) Our Ancestors Willed It And So It Came To Be, and (6) Off the Battlefield, But Still Suffering from PTSD. Most of our ancestors on our NJ Lyon line were Patriots during the Revolutionary War.
This 1806 map is in the Special Collections of Rutgers University http://mapmaker.rutgers.edu/NEWARK/Newark_1806.jpg

However, some Lyons, who migrated to New Jersey and New York, were Loyalists and ended up in Nova Scotia and Upper Canada West. One of our Lyon cousins, Pamela Lyons Neville, has documentation, both oral and written, that her ancestor, John Lyons, settled in Upper Canada West (Toronto, ON) at the request of the First Lieutenant Governor of Upper Canada John Graves Simcoe. His father, Thomas Lyons, fought in the King’s Orange Rangers under Colonel John Bayard. The Canadian Loyalists Lyons, when joined by our Patriot Lyons from CT/NY/NJ, represent the full scope of our multi-racial abolitionist history in the Tri-State (CT/NY/NJ) area.

Lyons Farm Schoolhouse, Library of Congress (https://www.loc.gov/resource/hhh.nj0497.photos?st=gallery) This school was the first schoolhouse erected in Newark 1728 and was burned during the Revolutionary War in 1782, but later rebuilt.

Writing Our Other UGRR Abolionist Ancestors Back Into the Historic Record

This blogpost is nothing short, as Nicka Smith states, “an act of restorative social justice” for our ancestors.  It is our duty as descendants to honor the legacy that out ancestors bequeathed to us. For far too long our ancestral stories have been lost, remained hidden in archives, or have been rendered silent. We owe it to our ancestors to write them back into the historic record without hestitation, for every individual has a life story that is worthy to be told. We can count among our extended Thompson-King line many other abolitionist ancestors like Dr. John V. Degrasse and his brother Rev. Isaiah G. DeGrasse, Thomas Downing and his son George T. Downing who are related to us via our Van Salee/Hedden line. Below, however, are our ancestors who  are inextricably tied to the City of Newark through blood and marriage.
 Rev. Dr. Charles H. Thompson, (1820-1902)

Rev. Charles H. Thompson was the second Thompson-King family member to take up the cause of voting rights after the death of our Rev. John A. King in 1849. He deserves special mention here because of his life-long commitment to the civil rights and education of our people.  Rev. Thompson was born in Little York, PA, near Harrisburg, in 1820. He was the son of John Thompson, a brother of our Thomas Thompson. As a young person, he traveled back and forth from Little York, PA to Newark, NJ and Brooklyn, NY. In 1845, he married Elizabeth Berry of Brooklyn, NY and they had several children.

In the early 1850s, Rev. Charles Thompson became involved with the American Missionary Association (AMA), an abolitionist group led by Rev. Simeon Jocelyn, one of the original lawyers for the Amistad captives who landed in New Haven, CT in 1839. The AMA was founded in 1846 by political abolitionists, Black and White, who were also opposed to colonization and wwere members of  Presbyterian or Congregationalist churches. Unlike the Quakers, members of the AMA insisted on full equality between the races in their organization. Some of the Black founding members were Rev.  James W. Pennington, Rev. Theodore S.  Wright, Rev.  Samuel Ringgold Ward, and Charles B. Ray. Rev. Samuel Cornish, Rev.  Amos N. Freeman, and Rev. Henry Highland Garnet also served as officers in later years.

In the late 1850s, with sponsorship from the AMA and Reverend Jocelyn, Rev. Thompson enrolled in Oberlin College, known for its commitment to abolitionism,  in Oberlin, OH. He was among one of the first Black graduates in 1860. According to records in The Black Abolitionist Papers, Rev. Charles H. Thompson maintained a close relationship with Rev. Simeon Jocelyn often writing to him asking for money to help enslaved people as he was also ministering while being a student.

After graduating from Oberlin, Rev. Charles H. Thompson became a minister at Siloam Presbyterian Church in Brooklyn, NY. It is not surprising that he ended up in Brooklyn as his wife’s family was from Brooklyn. Charles served three years as the reverend of this church. He later ministered at Shiloh Presbyterian Church in New York City.

In 1861, Rev. Charles H. Thompson became the minister of the Plane Street Colored Presbyterian Church. There can be no doubt that he became the minister of this church because of his family’s known ties to the church and also because of his political activism. While a minister at this church, he took up the cause of voting rights prior to the ratification of the 15th Amendment in 1870 and actively challenged the NJ State Legislature to restore the voting rights of people of color.  According to an article titled “Have Negroes the Right to Vote in New Jersey” in the Camden Democrat newspaper written on October, 27, 1866, it mentions that Rev. Charles H. Thompson was one of three plaintiffs who filed both a State Supreme Court and a Circuit Court of the United States lawsuit that challenged the disenfranchisement of people of color. On October 25th, 1870, the Centinel of Freedom mentioned how Rev. Charles H. Thompson addressed a meeting of a colored Republican group and admonished Black voters to vote Republican. As we know, the Republican Party was the party of Lincoln at that time. Earlier that year, he spoke at the “Negro Jubilee,” an event organized by a lot of our ancestors and other Newark abolitionists, held in Lincoln Park on April 20th, 1870 where Black Newark celebrated their right to vote. The 15th Amendment was finally ratified in New Jersey on February 21, 1871.

Rev. Charles H. Thompson stayed at the Plane St. Colored Presbyterian Church for 11 years. After earning a D.D degree from Avery College in Harrisburg, PA in 1870, he became an educator, as well as a minister, with the AMA.  The AMA played a major role in educating newly freed Blacks in the post-Civil War era. It was instrumental in founding Howard University, Berea College, Hampton Institute, Atlanta University, Fisk University, Straight University (now Dillard), Tougaloo College, Talladega College, LeMoyne (now LeMoyne-Owen) College as well as other historically black universities and colleges. Rev. Charles H. Thompson left the church and became a professor at Straight University (now Dillard University) as well as a minister at St. Philips Church in New Orleans. After his stint at Straight University, he moved on to teaching at Alcorn State University and ministered at St. Mary’s Church in Vicksburg, Mississippi. He later served at St. Matthews in Detroit, MI, St. Mary’s in Augusta, GA, and St. Andrew’s Missions in both Lexington, KY and Cincinnati, OH. He passed away in Cincinnati in 1902 and is buried in “the Colored American Cemetery near Madisonville,” according to the Diocese of Lexington, KY.

Centinel of Freedom April 20, 1870-The “Negro Jubilee” was the day that the city of Newark celebrated the ratification of the 15th Amendment. As in all of Newark’s First of August celebrations, this historic event took place in Lincoln Park, the only park in the city large enough to hold thousands of people.
Hawley Green (1810-1880) and his wife Harriet Peterson Green (1816-1886)
Hawley Green, a photo taken by a cousin, circa 1870

When my 2nd great-grandparents married, their union represented the merger of two early abolitionist families, The Thompsons of Newark, NJ with the Greens of Greenwich (Byram/Glenville), CT  and Peekskill, NY). Hawley Green was a cousin of my 2nd great-grandfather George E. Green. Hawley and his wife Harriet owned an Underground Railroad House located at 1112 Main Street in Peekskill, NY. He bought this house from James Brown, a well-known Quaker anti-slavery proponent, for 9 years before selling the home in 1839 to William Sands, another Quaker. Hawley Green and his wife went on to own several other properties in Peekskill. In addition, Hawley Green  was one of Peekskill’s best known barbers —an occupation that enabled him to surreptitiously gather intelligence related to “fugitives.”

Hawley and Harriet Green’s UGRR House at 112 Mainstreet in Peekskill. From John J. Curran’s 2008 book , Peekskill’s African American History: A Hudson Valley Community’s Untold Story.

Hawley Green was a well-known UGRR stationmaster, like our Jacob D. King,  who was a member of the AME Zion Church in Peekskill. It was said that, if a self-emancipating man made it to Hawley’s House, the next stop was Canada. Peekskill, NY was right on the Hudson River and transporting enslaved people would have been easy because of his UGRR home’s location. As a member of the AME Zion Church, he also  helped form a Colored School located there, along with J. W. Purdy. The AME Zion church also routinely hosted agents from Black Abolitionists newspapers like the Colored American and The Emancipator. David Ruggles, Rev. Henry Ward Beecher, and Harriet Tubman certainly knew Hawley and Harriet Green as did all major abolitionists of the day. Gerrit Smith, the wealthy abolitionist  gave Hawley a land grant in the amount of 160 acres in Upstate New York which was 4 times the land given to other African-American abolitionists so that they could vote as land owners. Other Peekskill abolitionists such as Hawley’s brother, Goodman Green, son-in-law George Butler, Riley Peterson, Abraham Ray, Henry Jackson, and Moses Stedell also received 40 acre land grants from Smith.

Photo taken by Teresa Vega of a section of a 1837 Map of Peekskill. The full map is in the Collection of the Field Library, Peekskill, NY.

Other notable descedants on Hawley and Harriet Green’s line include the Deyo and Bolin families from Ulster County and Poughkeepsie, NY.

From: Colin T. Naylor, Civil War Days in a Conutry Village, Peekskill,NY: Highland Press, 1961:58. Note: He was only married to Harriet who, like other colonial people of African descent had Native-American, West African and Malagasy ancestry.

 

The Highland Democrat, Peekskill, NY November 29, 1919
Rev. John Wesley Dungey (1783-1866)

Rev. John Dungey is the father of my 3rd great grandfather Cato Thompson’s 2nd wife, Rosetta Dungey whom he married after my 3rd great-grandmother, Susan Pickett Thompson, died in the late 1850s. Cato met Rosetta through his sister Catherine Thompson who married, Mattias (Thomas) Hedden, Rosetta’s uncle.  Rosetta’s mother was Sarah Heady.  The Heddens/Headys are Westchester County’s oldest Free Black family. Thomas Hadden (1694-1761) of Scarsdale, NY had a  long-term relationship with Rose (1727-1777), his slave. When he died in 1761, in his 5 page will, he freed Rose and their 7 children, gave Rose a house to live on the same property as his white wife and children, provided for his “mulatto” children’s education, and left them an inheritance. Both Sarah and Mattias were the children of his son, Lazaraus Heady, Sr. (1751-1850). It should be noted that the Heady family is also linked to both our Green and Lyon families of Byram (also at times known as East Port Chester and Rye. NY), Greenwich, CT.

Rev. John Dungey was born in Richmond, VA in 1783. He was born to an enslaved mother, Isabel Dungey, and her slave owner with the surname Overton. His father was said to have descended from an English nobleman. When his father’s family moved to Kentucky, they wanted John to come with him. He refused to go as he was married to an enslaved woman at the time. He stayed in Virginia and learned the shoemaking trade and ultimately obtained his freedom.

His first wife died shortly after their son was born. Because his wife was enslaved, his son was also a slave. When she died, he offered to buy his son for $250 from the woman who owned him, but she refused his offer. It was then that he left Virginia and landed in New York City.

He married his 2nd wife, Sarah Heady, after arriving there and she bore him 5 children. However, we only know about two of them. By that time, he already had a large wholesale and retail shoe store at 24 Chatham Street and employed around 20 white men. His shoe store was right next to the New York Free School (which was different from the African Free School). Rev. James Varick, one of the founders of the AME Zion Church and it’s first Bishop, used to be a shoemaker and the two men probably first met to discuss his business as well as community issues. By 1812, Rev. John Dungey became a minister in the AME Zion Church. When Sarah died of an illness, he was left with 5 young children and his business suffered a downturn that left his family impoverished. It was then that he took stepped out on his faith and became a full-time minister.

Rev. John Dungey established AME Zion churches in  Flushing and Ossining, NY, New Haven, CT and finally the last one in Troy, NY. He was a minister for over 50 years in the AME Zion Church. He attented Colored conventions, spoke at numerous abolitionist events, and aided those who sought freedom in the North.

The New York Tribune October 5, 1862

 

The Times Record, Troy new York June 13,1942
Rev. George Weir, Sr. (circa 1800- 1862) and Rev. George Weir, Jr. (1822-1882)

Rev. George Weir, Sr. was married to Rev. John Dungey’s daughter Nancy Dungey. Both he and his son, from his first wife,  Rev. George Weir, Jr., were UGRR stationmasters in Buffalo, NY, Rochester, NY and Upper Canada West. Rev. George Weir, Sr. was the first permanent pastor of the Vine Street AME Church (which was later named the Bethel AME Church). He served as pastor from 1838-1847). The Vine Street AME Church was very active in the Abolitionist Movement from its inception and was known as a “Buffalo Station.” Among the abolitionists known to have ties to this church were Abner Francis, Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, William Wells Brown, Lewis Baker, Henry Moxley, George DeBaptiste, Thomas Hamilton, and James Whitfield among many others. Buffalo, NY was the station on the other side of Niagara Falls from the final destination of self-emancipating people fleeing slavery.  Both Rev. Weirs represent our family’s UGRR ties to Upper Canada West, especially St. Catherines Parish. Hand in hand, working with both Black and White abolitionists, they ferried people across Lake Erie starting in the late 1830s and escalating after the passage of the 1850 Fugitive Slave Act.

Rev. Weir, Sr. was a member of the National Negro Convention Movement, Buffalo Anti-Slavery Society, Temperance Movement, and routinely gave anti-slavery lectures across the North. He regulary traveled to Newark and New York City  and was routinely feature in the Colored American and the North Star. Likewise, Rev. George Weir, Jr. owned a grocery store and was one of Buffalo’s weathiest Black residents and his home was also a known UGGR depot. He was a regular contributer to Frederick Douglass, North Star. Our Newark ancestors also made visits to Buffalo, Rochester, and Upper Canada West no doubt to visit family, friends, and engage in abolitionist activities.

The Buffalo Daily Republic August 8, 1849 Rev. Weir organized the first First of August Celebration in Buffalo.
North Star, March 20, 1851

The Liberator, June 27, 1862

 

Six Degrees of Separation: Frederick Douglass and Our Ancestors

Frederick Douglass had a 50-year intergenerational relationship with our ancestors that also included some of his family members. At times, it seems like there is six degrees of separation between the descendants of Frederick Douglass and our Thompson-King Family.

His son, Frederick Douglass, Jr. was married to our cousin Muriel “Dee Dee” Robert’s 3rd great-grandmother’s niece, Virginia L. Molyneaux Hewlett. On Dee Dee’s line, her ancestors were both Black Loyalists and Patriots.  Her Thompson line is connected to Jeremiah Lott, an original settler of Flatbush, Brooklyn, NY.

Frederick Douglass, Jr., husband of Virginia L. Molyneaux Hewlett

Pvts. George Butler, son-in-law of Hawley Green, and his brother Albert,  were members of the 54th Massachusetts Infantry Regiment along with Peter Vogelsang and Dr. John Van Surley DeGrasse, two of our other ancestors who are on our Van Salee-Hedden line that goes back to New Amsterdam. Frederick Douglass’ two sons, Sergeant Major Lewis Henry Douglass and First Sergeant Charles Redmond Douglass, also served in the 54th Regiment. All five were our “Glory” ancestors, the epitome of Patriots!

George Butler, Peter Vogelsang, and Dr. John A. DeGrasse
Lewis Henery and Charles Redmond Douglass

Finally, our own ancestor, Wallace King, son of William King and Phyllis Goosbeck (Thompson), was an abolitionist, Prince Hall Mason, and one of the most famous internationally known Black opera singers and minstrels in the post-Civil War era. Of him, Frederick Douglass commented that he was “among his most gifted proteges.”

San Francisco Chronicle, February 22, 1903

On Honoring Our Ancestors and Newark History

For 10 long and illuminating years, my cousin Andrea and I have been researching our “Radiant Roots.”  This precious time has been filled with joy, anger, tears, grief, and laughter. As we near the completion of our research, we have decided to further listen to the voices and messages of our ancestors and publish a book on our extensive family history.  In this way, we will place them back into the historical record.  This blogpost is just an inkling of what we have uncovered…

 

 

Rev. John A. King: Abolitionist, Preacher, and Planemaker

This blog is dedicated to the memory of the King Family as they were one of Newark’s Black founding families.

In the book, Prophets of Protest: Reconsidering the History of American Abolitionism, Richard Newman has a chapter entitled “A Chosen Generation”: Black Founders and Early America. He wrote:

“Black founders” is a fancy term to describe the charter generation of free blacks in early national America. Born in the eighteenth century, some free (like James Forten of Philadelphia)) but many enslaved (like Richard Allen, Prince Hall, and Venture Smith, all of whom struggled mightily for their freedom), black founders came of age just as the American nation took shape….For they were of a generation that first battled bondage in an organized fashion, the generation that created vibrant free black institutions throughout the nation, and that innovated protest tactics—from establishing print as a key form of black activism to aiding fugitive slaves and distressed free blacks to forming the first national conventions dedicated to racial justice and independence—which still held sway on the eve of the Civil War.”

Given Newman’s definition of “Black Founders”, I maintain that the King Family was one of Newark’s Black founding families. I have chosen to focus on Rev. John A. King simply because there is more in the public record on him than his brothers. But, make no mistake about it, the lives of the other King brothers, especially Jacob and Abraham, are also noteworthy.

Over the past few years, my cousin Andrea and I have pieced together the King brothers’ early lives. Based on the 1830 census, John was born about 1790 in Morris County, NJ making him the oldest of Lucy King’s sons. Abraham was born around 1795. Their mother was originally a slave on Abraham Ogden’s estate in Morristown, NJ. Their father was Dublin King, a man born in British Guiana. John and Abraham were also tradesmen which tells us that they occupied a more privileged status over enslaved people. We don’t know when they became free or how they learned their trade, but Abraham Ogden’s estate was settled in 1802 and we assume Lucy was freed thereafter. He children inherited their father’s estate.

Sometime prior to 1820, the King brothers met Rev. Christopher Rush, another Black founder. Together with Rev. Rush, they founded the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church (now known as the Clinton Memorial A.M.E. Zion Church) in Newark in 1822. This church was the first black church founded in Newark and was also considered to be a sister church to the Mother Zion Church in Lower Manhattan that was founded in 1796. Rev. Rush would go on to become the Bishop of the A.M.E. Zion Church in 1828. As stated in a previous post, before he left to become a bishop, he sold his land to Jacob D. King who built an Underground Railroad House in 1830.

I should add that around 1820, John married Phebe Beard who was from Delaware. They ended up having 6 children: John Jr., Mary Rebecca, Cornelia, Robert, Edward, and Christopher Rush King. That John named one of his children after  Rev. Rush indicates how close a colleague and friend he considered Rev. Rush to be. Abraham married Mary McIntosh in Morristown, NJ in 1824 and they had 2 sons, Abraham Ogden King, Jr. and William.

The A.M.E. Zion Church in Newark was active in both the Underground Railroad and in the education of all Blacks. By 1826, the Church was teaching Blacks, both young and old, how to read and write. According to the Township of Newark records, On April 14, 1828, Abraham and John walked into the town meeting with a petition asking for funding for a colored school. Please note that this school had already been in existence for years. They were only asking for formal funding from the town. They received limited funding initially and were able to have a formal budget for the school from 1836 onward.

In the early years, the Colored School, as it came to be known, was located first  in the A.M.E. Zion Church and then in the Plane Street Colored Presbyterian Church. It wasn’t until 1864, when James Baxter became the principal, that the Colored School had their own building. The Colored School lasted until 1909. I should also mention that two of Jacob’s daughters, Marcia and Harriet King, were teachers in the Colored School.

Plaque on James Baxter mentioning the King Brothers

At the same time that the King brothers were educating Blacks, building churches, and harboring fugitive slaves, between  the mid-1820’s and early-1830’s, they were also holding down full-time jobs in the carpentry trade. Abraham was a carpenter and Jacob was a cooper. However, John was one of the four Black planemakers in the United States prior to the Civil War. The others were Cesar Chelor of Wrentham, MA, John Teasman, Jr., a fellow Newarker whose father became the principal of the New York African Free School in Manhattan in 1797, and George Ball of New York City.

You may ask yourself what exactly was a planemaker. Well, in the 18th and 19th centuries, woodworking was a specialized activity. Carpenters, cabinetmakers, and joiners used a variety of tools in their trade.  A “plane” was one such tool that shaved down a piece of wood to a particular thickness. The plane held an iron chisel in a fixed position so the wood could evenly be removed from the surface. There were different types of wooden planes used to create different surfaces. For example, you had utilitarian planes and planes that created moldings and edges.  Hence,  planemakers made planes and they were considered to be toolmakers.  Wooden planes were used up until the Industrial Revolution.

John A. King Wooden Plane in NJ Toolmakers:A Heritage of Quality by Alexander Farnham

After researching John’s career as a planemaker, I have come across a couple of inaccuracies in the public record on him. There have been several websites and articles that list John’s years as a planemaker as only being between 1835-1837. One of the most notable is a website on African-American woodworkers in the 18th and 19th centuries. However, the Newark City directory has him clearly listed as being a planemaker from 1836-1846. Since the directory was only published in 1836, he may have even worked earlier than that.  In addition, there was an article written by Ronald Pearson called “Hand Tools: A Significant Find” in The Chronicle of the Early American Industries (Vol.37:49-50) . In the article, Pearson writes about how he acquired an old tool box that had 38 wooden planes, 13 of which were made by John A. King. He hypothesizes that John was only a “jobber” working for two white planemakers, the Andruss brothers. There is no basis in fact for his hypothesis as John was an independent planemaker with his own business. In his later years, he was known to have only worked with James Searing, another Newark planemaker. By not doing the  primary research that would have indicated John’s long career as a planemaker and insinuating that John couldn’t possibly work for himself, these researchers have done a disservice to his memory. Today, they stand corrected.

In the early 1830’s, John become very active in the abolitionist movement and he also became an ordained minister in the A.M.E. Zion Church in Newark at this time. He participated in local, state, and national anti-slavery societies as well as national Negro conventions. Through these activities, he met some of the most well-known white abolitionists of the day like the Tappan brothers and William Lloyd GarrisonIn addition, he also started writing for The Liberator.

He also met more often and socialized with other well-known early Black abolitionists like Rev. Amos N. Freeman, David Ruggles, Rev.Theodore S. Wright, and Rev. Samuel Cornish, who later became a minister at the Plane Street Colored Presbyterian Church in Newark. In fact, by the late 1830’s, John was also writing for Cornish’s Colored American newspaper.

In his newspaper articles, John addressed the concerns of the day. These included the issue of colonization. In 1816, the American Colonization Society was founded. The Presbyterian Church was a main proponent of the colonization of free Blacks to Africa and later to the Caribbean after 1834. Many free Blacks in Newark, including John, were  vocal anti-colonizationists. Having grown up in the shadow of the Revolutionary War, these people believed that they, too, sang America. It was the US that they called home and they saw all attempts to remove them from the US as nothing more than an extension of slavery’s hand.

The colonization movement hit close to home. In 1839, one of the first ministers of the Plane Street Colored Presbyterian Church, Rev. T. P. Hunt emigrated to Trinidad with his family and some members of the congregation. In 1841, Rev. Hunt returned to Newark and met with his old congregation and told them what he encountered. Very little was positive for they had been deceived into emigrating in the first place. John then wrote the article below in the Colored American. Please note the resolutions made.

Anti-Colonization article by John A. King

Another topic John was concerned about was the restoration of Black citizen’s voting rights. From 1790-1807,  free Blacks and women had the right to vote in New Jersey. In 1807, the state of NJ, disenfranchised over 3,000 free Blacks and untold number of women. John took note of this Black disenfranchisement  in an article for the Colored American.

 

John A. King advocating for Black voting rights

From the mid-1830’s to the mid-1840’s, John, in addition to continuing to preach at the Newark A.M.E. Zion Church,  was also a minister at the Mother Zion Church in NYC as well as the Mount Zion A.M.E. Church in Eatontown, NJ which was part of Shewsbury Township back then.  In Carter G. Woodson’s book, The History of the Negro Church, he mentions John A. King as being one of the leaders in A.M.E. Zion Church between 1830 and 1840.

 

John A. King mentioned in Woodson’s History of Negro Churchpapers.

John is also listed in all history books pertaining to the founding of the A.M.E. Zion Church. Moreover, John, Abraham, and Jacob are also listed in the Black Abolitionist Papers which is a testament itself to their abolitionist activities during their lifetimes. I consider this to be an honor.

In 1848, the Newark Daily Advertiser reported a fire at John’s house on 20 Academy Street in Newark.

Newark Daily Advertiser, 3/16/1848

Most of the inside of the house was destroyed. We don’t really know if he was ever able to rebuild his house.

Over a year ago, I also found two articles written in 1849 in the Newark Daily Advertiser that broke my heart. The tears flowed uncontrollably. In January 1849, John’s wife Phebe died which, together with the fire, quite possible made him depressed. It was on April 6th and 7th, 1849, that the Newark Daily Advertiser announced his suicide below.

Newark Daily Advertiser, 4/7/1849

 

Newark Daily Advertiser, 4/6/1849

After his death on 04/05/1849, John’s brother William was left to settle his affairs. It wasn’t until 1852 that his estate was settled.

Estate sale of John A. King’s properties

 

Estate sale of John A. King

In the 1850 census, John’s 2 youngest children, Edward and Christopher, are living with William.

After reading that article, I wondered how often do we consider the needs of those who lead our flock. Do we really know how well are shepards are doing? John was a preacher who comforted and led others. Was he being comforted?  I shed tears for a man who did so much for others, but couldn’t do enough for himself. Tears, tears, and more tears.

I would be remiss if I ended my blog post on this note. Those who know me also know I just won’t do that. I truly believe it is up to those of us alive to give voice to our ancestors, to allow them to speak in a voice that is their own, and to correct the inaccuracies about them. Likewise, I believe it is up to us descendants to remember our role model ancestor, our radiant roots, in a positive light. If we don’t, then who will? So, 165 years after the death of my ancestor, Rev. John A. King, I offer a prayer of remembrance to him.

Dear Uncle John,

I want to THANK YOU for the wonderful life you left behind. It has truly been an honor to retrace your footsteps. You have made us proud to call you an esteemed ancestor. We claim all aspects of your life and the lives of your brothers, as our own now. We exalt you for making Newark, NJ a better place for all African-Americans at a time when we were not considered to be full citizens. That you never gave up the call for equal rights is laudable. Your quest for equality showed us just how much a true American you were and how much you believed in the ideals of the American Revolution—freedom, liberty, and equal rights for all.

I want you to know that you were loved, not only by your immediate family and by us, your descendants, but also, by God. God never failed you–not even in your greatest moment of despair. I pray that you have continued to find comfort in His arms. You served an awesome God — a God that we continue to serve.

God bless you, John, and the legacy you left behind. Continue to rest in peace as we continue to spread your good name and the good deeds you did during your lifetime. You are still loved and remembered.

We call your name, John, we… call… your… name…

Amen!

PostScript:

If I could speak to John, I would tell him that his extended family is still hanging strong in Newark on Academy St. Our family has never left Newark.

 

My cousin Raymond Armour, Esq.

 

The Underground Railroad House that Jacob D. King Built in Newark

This post is in honor of all my King ancestors. Jacob D. King and his family, including my 3rd aunt Mary Thompson King, stood up against the evil that was slavery in 19th century Newark, NJ and triumphed.

 

Shortly after finding out that Jacob D. King, my 3rd great-uncle by marriage, built his Underground Railroad house at 70 Warren Street in Newark in 1830, Andrea and I set out to find out more about him and his family. After looking through probate records, census records, church records, and newspaper articles, we were able to piece together parts of his life.

One of the first things we found out, via his daughter Harriet Brown’s obituary in a New York Age newspaper article on 9/12/1912, was that the King family had been in Newark since the mid-1700s.

NY Age Newspaper 9/12/1912

However, my 5th cousin Eleanor Mire, who descends from Jacob’s daughter Martha, told me that King oral history has indicated that they were in New Jersey during King Philip’s War (1675-76). From our research, we have learned that King family was in Essex and Morris counties prior to the mid-1700s.

One of the things Andrea and I are doing now is researching the Essex and Morris county’ slave owners who are affiliated with our family — the Ogdens, Riggs, Thompsons, Canfields, Morris families among others. DNA is also confirming the links to these slave owners families. For example, Andrea’s uncle Robert  matches almost 20 centimorgans  with a descendant of Edward Riggs, an original settler of Newark. Newark was founded in 1666 by Puritans from Connecticut which means that our ancestors were probably there close to its founding which makes us one of the oldest African-American families to continuously reside in Newark, NJ from the start.

Jacob was born in Newark on April 6, 1806 to Lucy, formerly owned by Abraham Ogden, and a Scots-Irish man named Dublin King. His father was the late sexton of Trinity Church in Newark. Unfortunately, church records did not record his name.

Jacob’s 1806 Trinity Church Baptism Record

He was one of 8 chilldren born tho his parents. The others being Abraham, John, Henry, and Charles. She also had a daughter named Venus. Lucy and Dublin had two other infant sons who died and who were later buried with their father. One of her sons, Abraham Ogden King was named after her slave owner, Abraham Ogden, a Patriot.

Abraham Ogden’s Inventory featuring Lucy King

It should be mentioned that Trinity Church in Newark was founded by Josiah Ogden and was the Ogden family’s home church as well as Hercules Daniel Bize’s church.

Mary Thompson married Jacob King in 1829 in the First Presbyterian Church in Newark, NJ. At the time, my Thompson ancestors were members of the First Presbyterian Church and her marriage to Jacob reflects her family’s membership in his church. However, the King family were founding members of the first African Methodist Zion Church, later known as the Clinton Avenue A.M.E. Zion Church. This church was founded in 1822 by Rev. Christopher Rush, who was one of the first missionaries of the black Methodist movement.

NYPL Digital Collection, Schomburg Center

Bishop Christopher Rush was born in Craven County, NC in 1777. He escaped to New York City in 1798 and became a member of the A.M.E. Zion Church which gave him a license to preach in 1815. He was ordained as a deacon in the church in 1822 was also charged with founding an A.M.E. Zion church in Newark, NJ. In 1828, he became the Bishop of the A.M.E. Zion (aka Mother Zion Church) in NYC. I should also mention that my 3rd great-grandfather’s 2nd wife Rosetta Thompson’s father, Rev. John A. Dungey, was also a founding member of this church as well.

The A.M.E. Zion church, it should be noted, was known for it’s Underground Railroad activity. In addition to Jacob D. King and his family, later Black abolitionists of this church included Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman and Sojourner Truth. Bishop Christopher Rush advocated helping fugitive slaves escape slavery and he charged the early A.M.E. churches with helping with this task. And they did.

In 1830, Jacob King bought land from Rev. Christopher Rush in the amount of $100. According to the deed, Rev. Christopher Rush was already a resident of NYC. I should mention that Jacob’s brother, Rev. John A. King, was a minster in the Newark A.M.E. Zion church.

Jacob D. King’s 1830 Land Deed

It is on this land that Jacob built an Underground Railroad house at 70 Warren Street in Newark. Jacob was a cooper by trade and two of his brothers were also involved in the carpentry field. Abraham was a carpenter and John was a planemaker, one of three African-American planemakers in the United States prior to the Civil War. Their brother-in-law Cato Thompson, was also a carpenter and we assume he learned the trade from his in-laws and also helped to build this house.

After I found the photo of Jacob’s house in Charles F. Cumming’s article, I went to the NJ Historical Society to see I could locate the actual article since Cummings didn’t give the date the article was published. I am so thankful for the staff at the NJ Historical Society, especially James Amemasor.  James has gone above and beyond in helping me find the documents needed for my research. He helped me go through a year’s worth of the Newark Sunday Call  newspaper. Thank God it was just a weekly paper!  On the first day of looking, I didn’t find anything after 5 hours of looking. But, when I arrived back home an hour later, James had left me a message saying that he thought the article on Jacob’s house was in the magazine section. So, I went back a couple of days later. It took a while, but we found the article and James was right. It was in the magazine section and it included 4 more photos! I am so glad I went to look for the source of the photo. I believe my ancestors were guiding me.

Here are the photos of the inside of Jacob’s Underground Railroad house in 1937, a year after Jacob’s daughter Ellen passed away. It should be noted again that this house stayed in the family for 106 years. I wish this house could talk because I would love to hear all the stories that could be told.

Full Sunday Newark Call Magazine Article, 10/3/1937

 

 

Newark Sunday Call Magazine, 10/3/1937

 

Newark Sunday Call Magazine, 10/3/1937

 

Newark Sunday Call Magazine, 10/3/1937

 

Newark Sunday Call Magazine, 10/3/1937

 

My 3rd great-aunt Mary Thompson King’s Dutch oven

Words cannot express how excited I was to see these photos. I ran home and had to tell everybody about this find.

One of my favorite photos is of my 3rd great-aunt Mary’s old Dutch oven. For too long, the role of  everyday, drylongso African-American women has been absent from the historical record as it pertains to the Underground Railroad. Yes, we know about the role of Black men and the role of white male and female abolitionists on the UGRR. But, what about the wives, daughters, and sisters of Black abolitionists?  Weren’t their roles just as important?

I am reminded of a post on my cousin Dawn Terrell’s  Answering The Ancestor’s Call blog, where she writes about an ancestor calling her out to be remembered. When I saw Mary’s Dutch oven, I know she was calling me out and reminding me that she, too, had helped fugitive slaves. We now know that it was Mary and her daughters, and maybe even her sisters, who cooked for the slaves hidden in the basement at 70 Warren Street. They probably also washed and repaired fugitive slaves’ clothes, helped out with childcare, comforted frightened fugitive slaves, and did other things that were typically defined as “women’s work.” I am so thankful for this photo. I may not have a photo of Mary, but praise God I have this remembrance of her and the important work that she was doing along with Jacob and the rest of my ancestors. Praise God indeed.

On a whim, I then went to the Schomburg Center for Research and Black Culture to see if I could find even more info on Jacob’s Underground Railroad activities. I came across The Black Abolitionist Papers, an account of Black abolitionists from the 1830s until the Civil War. In this multi-volume set, I found the names of both my Thompson and King ancestors. Regarding Jacob D. King, I found the following:

 

From The Black Abolitionist Papers

According to the Weekly Anglo-African newspaper, Jacob was a treasurer in a Relief Association which was a local organization, that assisted fugitive slaves on the Underground Railroad.

Weekly Anglo-American Newspaper, 10/15/1859

 

From the time Jacob built his UGRR house in 1830 until the 1860s, Jacob was non-stop in his abolitionist activities. I should also add that, in the article above, Thomas Washington was Jacob’s son-in-law, the husband of his daughter Martha. Hence, King black abolitionism was a family affair

Jacob passed away at 74 years old on 5/3/1880 and is buried in Woodland Cemetery  in Newark. He devoted more than half his life to fighting against the evils of slavery. He is a man who should definitely be remembered.