list of slaves sold by georgetown university

Copyright 2023 America Press Inc. | All Rights Reserved. Georgetown is not the first or only university to own slaves. The grave of Cornelius Hawkins, one of 272 slaves sold by the Jesuits in 1838 to help keep what is now Georgetown University afloat. To pay that debt, the university sold 272 slaves the very people that helped build the school itself. [36], Soon after the sale, Roothaan decided that Mulledy should be removed as provincial superior. A problem can is not solved without first recognizing it, discussing it and taking steps to rectify the long term damage that continues to this day. Drawing from campus-based research projects sponsored by the Association of American Colleges and Universities and the Center for Urban Education at the University of Southern California, this invaluable resource provides real-world steps that reinforce primary elements for examining equity in student achievement, while challenging educators to specifically focus on racial equity as a critical lens for institutional and systemic change. ", What We Know: Report to the President of The College of The Holy Cross 2016, "Historical Timeline: Events Affecting the GU272 from the 1838 Sale to the Present", "Bill of Sale from the Heirs of Jesse Batey to Washington Barrow, January 18, 1853", "Bill of Sale for Land and People from Washington Barrow to William Patrick and Joseph B. Woolfolk, February 4, 1856", "Bill of Sale for Land and 138 People from William Patrick and Joseph Woolfolk to Emily Sparks, Widow of Austin Woolfolk, July 16, 1859", "Henry Johnson's Sales of Enslaved Persons, 18441851", Report of the Working Group on Slavery, Memory, and Reconciliation 2016, "University Requests Change in Use for Ryan Hall and Mulledy Hall", "Renovation of Former Jesuit Residence Beginning May 19", "Slavery's Remnants, Buried and Overlooked", "Georgetown University to rename two buildings that reflect school's ties to slavery", "Announcing the Working Group on Slavery, Memory & Reconciliation", "Concrete Expressions of Georgetown's Jesuit Heritage: A Photographic Sampler of Campus Buildings and the Jesuits for Whom They are Named From the University Archives", "Heeding Demands, University Renames Buildings", "Mulledy Name To Be Removed From BrooksMulledy Hall", "President's Response to Report of the Mulledy/Healy Legacy Committee", "Georgetown Apologizes, Renames Halls After Slaves", "Georgetown Apologizes for 1838 Sale of More Than 270 Enslaved, Dedicates Buildings", "Georgetown University Plans Steps to Atone for Slave Past", "For Georgetown, Jesuits and Slavery Descendants, Bid for Racial Healing Sours Over Reparations", "Georgetown Students Agree to Create Reparations Fund", "Catholic Order Pledges $100 Million to Atone for Slave Labor and Sales", "Saving Souls and Selling Them: Jesuit Slaveholding and the Georgetown Slavery Archive", "Foundation and First Administration of the Maryland Province, Part I: Background", "Catholic Slaveowners and the Development of Georgetown University's Slave Hiring System, 17921862", Report of the Working Group on Slavery, Memory, and Reconciliation to the President of Georgetown University, The Lost Jesuit Slaves of Maryland: Searching for 91 people left behind in 1838, What We Know: Report to the President of The College of The Holy Cross, Slavery, History, Memory, and Reconciliation Project, Video of Isaac Hawkins Hall dedication ceremony from C-SPAN, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=1838_Jesuit_slave_sale&oldid=1141447737, This page was last edited on 25 February 2023, at 03:24. [41] The Jesuits never received the total $115,000 that was owed under the agreement. The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II An astonishing book. As a Georgetown employee, Jeremy Alexander watched as the university grappled with its haunted past: the sale of slaves in 1838 to help rescue it from financial ruin. IMPORTANT PRIVACY NOTICE & DISCLAIMER: YOU HAVE A RESPONSIBILITY TO USE CAUTION WHEN DISTRIBUTING PRIVATE INFORMATION. By the 1830s, however, their physical and religious conditions had improved considerably. From these estates, the Jesuits traveled the countryside on horseback, administering the sacraments and catechizing the Catholic laity. [72][70] Georgetown also made a $1million donation to the foundation and a $400,000 donation to create a charitable fund to pay for healthcare and education in Maringouin, Louisiana. In April 2017, Georgetown renamed buildings that had honored university leaders responsible for selling those enslaved Africans to Louisiana plantations. While it would seem as if there would be some mention of this in history, it remained largely unknown. Eventually, Roothaan removed Thomas Mulledy as provincial superior for disobeying orders and promoting scandal, exiling him to Nice for several years. One-hundred-seventy-eight years ago, Georgetown University was free to everyone who was able to attend; it was also massively in debt. She feels great sadness as she envisions Cornelius as a young boy, torn from everything he knew. A Reflection for Friday of the First Week of Lent, by Jill Rice. From Equity Talk to Equity Walk: A Guide for Campus-Based Leadership and Practice is a vital wealth of information for college and university presidents and provosts, academic and student affairs professionals, faculty, and practitioners who seek to dismantle institutional barriers that stand in the way of achieving equity, specifically racial equity to achieve equitable outcomes in higher education. Our membership program offers special benefits to college students including: * Unlimited FREE Two-Day Shipping (with no minimum order size), * Exclusive deals and promotions for college students, Georgetown University confronts its history with slavery. Now that we have this data, my hope is that we can use it to open doors and make connections. Thomas R. Murphy, a historian at Seattle University who has written a book about the Jesuits and slavery. That man, Thomas Mulledy, then the president of Georgetown University, had sold 272 slaves to pay off a massive debt strangling the university. Some tips for making the most of your twilight years. [48] It is one of the most well-documented slave sales of its era. You are here: blueberry crumble cake delicious magazine; hendersonville nc city council candidates 2021; list of slaves sold by georgetown university . Meanwhile, Georgetowns working group has been weighing whether the university should apologize for profiting from slave labor, create a memorial to those enslaved and provide scholarships for their descendants, among other possibilities, said Dr. Rothman, the historian. THEY NEED TO BE FOUND AND LINKED. Thomas Lilly reported. But the decision to sell virtually all of their enslaved African-Americans in the 1830s left some priests deeply troubled. [24] He located two Louisiana planters who were willing to purchase the slaves: Henry Johnson, a former United States Senator and governor of Louisiana, and Jesse Batey. [3], Much of this land was put to use as plantations, the revenue from which financed the Jesuits' ministries. [17], Mulledy and McSherry became increasingly vocal in their opposition to Jesuit slave ownership. Keynote || Radcliffe Institute WELCOME Lizabeth Cohen, Dean, Radcliffe Institute, and Howard Mumford Jones Professor of American Studies, Harvard University OPENING REMARKS (12:07) Drew Gilpin Faust, President and Lincoln Professor of History, Harvard University KEYNOTE (15:51) Ta-Nehisi Coates, Journalist; National Correspondent, the Atlantic: Author, Between the World and Me (Spiegel & Grau, 2015) and The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood (Spiegel & Grau, 2008) Conversation between Ta-Nehisi Coates and Drew Gilpin Faust (34:37). GU272 descendent Carolyn Smith gestures toward gravestones of descendants of enslaved people in Houma, La. Alfred "Teen" Blackburn (1842-1951), one of the last living survivors of slavery in the United States who had a clear recollection of it. [5] In October of that year, Mulledy succeeded McSherry, who was dying, as provincial superior. Many have been located; however, it is difficult to determine exactly how many were exploited by the University in this financial transaction. [24] When he returned in November to gather the rest of the slaves, the plantation managers had their slaves flee and hide. By the end of December, one of Mr. Cellinis genealogists felt confident that she had found a strong test case: the family of the boy, Cornelius Hawkins. Their panic and desperation would be mostly forgotten for more than a century. Now they are real to me, she said, more real every day.. March 24, 2017. To pay that debt, the Jesuits who ran the school, under the auspices of the Maryland Province of the Society of Jesus, sold 272 slaves -- the very people that helped build the school itself.. [29] The slaves Mulledy gathered were sent on the three-week voyage aboard the Katherine Jackson,[27] which departed Alexandria on November 13 and arrived in New Orleans on December 6. This has made people reluctant to see the past and this has had a long term harm by remaining hidden and allowed to fester. He listened . Jesuit priests in Maryland sold 272 slaves to Louisiana plantations in 1838 to fund Georgetown . Georgetown was a prominent Jesuit priests. The name had been passed down from generation to generation in her family. The Jesuits ultimately received payment many years late and never received the full $115,000. The hope was to eventually identify the slaves descendants. Behind her are sugar plantations and the sugar mill where her ancestors worked. But the popes order, which did not explicitly address slave ownership or private sales like the one organized by the Jesuits, offered scant comfort to Cornelius and the other slaves. The researchers have used archival records to follow their footsteps, from the Jesuit plantations in Maryland, to the docks of New Orleans, to three plantations west and south of Baton Rouge, La. History has attempted to take the sting out of it which is impossible. Maryland Province Archives at Lauinger Library at Georgetown University, A passage from the Rev. Check out some of the. American Ancestors announced the new GU272 Memory Project website on Wednesday (June 19), the anniversary of Juneteenth, the day in 1865 when some American slaves learned they had been freed. In the case of Amazon, please use our links whenever you shop. [32] An unknown number of slaves may also have run away and escaped transportation. A Reader on Slavery, Memory, and Reconciliation A microcosm of the history of American slavery in a collection of the most important primary and secondary readings on slavery at Georgetown University and among the Maryland Jesuits Georgetown Universitys early history, closely tied to that of the Society of Jesus in Maryland, is a microcosm of the history of American slavery: the entrenchment of chattel slavery in the tobacco economy of the Chesapeake in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries; the contradictions of liberty and slavery at the founding of the United States; the rise of the domestic slave trade to the cotton and sugar kingdoms of the Deep South in the nineteenth century; the political conflict over slavery and its overthrow amid civil war; and slaverys persistent legacies of racism and inequality. They could then make 40% on the labor of the slave and pay the bank 8%. The remainder of the slaves were accounted for in three subsequent bills of sale executed in November 1838, which specified that 64 would go to Batey's plantation named West Oak in Iberville Parish and 140 slaves would be sent to Johnson's two plantations,[27] Ascension Plantation (later known as Chatham Plantation) in Ascension Parish and another in Maringouin in Iberville Parish. After the sale, Cornelius vanishes from the public record until 1851 when his trail finally picks back up on a cotton plantation near Maringouin, La. [5], On June 19, 1838, Mulledy, Johnson, and Batey signed articles of agreement formalizing the sale. Limit 20 per day. this helps us promote a safe and accountable online community, and allows us to update you when other commenters reply to your posts. [18], The Maryland Jesuits, having been elevated from a mission to the status of a province in 1833,[17] held their first general congregation in 1835, where they considered again what to do with their plantations. We can't do it without youAmerica Media relies on generous support from our readers. This was a great cause of the wealth of the slaveowners who took advantage of land stolen from the original owners, the Native Americans who had lived here for centuries. Documents provide the factual framework, but people supply the human story.. Please contact us at members@americamedia.org with any questions. Thomas F. Mulledy and the Rev. In November, the university agreed to remove the names of the Rev. ). Maxine Crump, 69, a descendant of one of the slaves sold by the Jesuits, in a Louisiana sugar cane field where researchers believe her ancestor once worked. It was his Catholicism, born on the Jesuit plantations of his childhood, that would provide researchers with a road map to his descendants. The Jesuits decided that the elderly would not be sold south and instead would be permitted to remain in Maryland. The truth was closer to home than anyone knew", "272 Slaves Were Sold to Save Georgetown. [63][38], The College of the Holy Cross in Massachusetts, of which Mulledy was the first president from 1843 to 1848, also began to reconsider the name of one of its buildings in 2015. Wondering why we ask for your email, or having trouble registering. To comment or make suggestions on future posts, use Contact Us. Dubuisson described how the public reputation of the Jesuits in Washington and Virginia declined as a result of the sale. History must be faced in order to heal and move forward! That alumnus, Richard J. Cellini, the chief executive of a technology company and a practicing Catholic, was troubled that neither the Jesuits nor university officials had tried to trace the lives of the enslaved African-Americans or compensate their progeny. An inspector scrutinized the cargo on Dec. 6, 1838. She prides herself on being unflappable. Now, with racial protests roiling college campuses, an unusual collection of Georgetown professors, students, alumni and genealogists is trying to find out what happened to those 272 men, women and children. Georgetown is not the only institution that has prospered on the backs of enslaved people. [34] During the controversy, Mulledy fell into alcoholism. William McSherry, the college presidents involved in the sale, from two campus buildings. Anyone can read what you share. (The two men would swap positions by 1838.). (RNS) A genealogical association has launched a new website detailing the family histories of slaves who were sold to keep Catholic-run Georgetown University from bankruptcy in . They also knew that life on plantations in the Deep South was notoriously brutal, and feared that families might end up being separated and resold. Although modern slavery is not always easy to recognize, it continues to exist in nearly every country. In addition to becoming physically dilapidated, all but one of the plantations had fallen into debt. The records describe runaways, harsh plantation conditions and the anguish voiced by some Jesuits over their participation in a system of forced servitude. [4][a] Several of the Jesuits' slaves unsuccessfully attempted to sue for their freedom in the courts in the 1790s. If you login and register your print subscription number with your account, youll have unlimited access to the website. [70], The Corporation of Roman Catholic Clergymen was created in 1792 to preserve the property of the. He was not yet five feet tall when he sailed onboard the Katharine Jackson, one of several vessels that carried the slaves to the port of New Orleans. They worried that new owners might not allow the slaves to practice their Catholic faith. The date when the last slaves were freed in Texas 18 months after they had officially freed at the end of the Civil War. [35] He ordered McSherry to inform Mulledy that he had been removed as provincial superior, and that if Mulledy refused to step down, he would be dismissed from the Society of Jesus. Other slaves were sold locally in Maryland so that they would not be separated from their spouses who were either free or owned by non-Jesuits, in compliance with Roothaan's order. The plantation would be sold again and again and again, records show, but Corneliuss family remained intact. WASHINGTON The human cargo was loaded on ships at a bustling wharf in the nations capital, destined for the plantations of the Deep South. They were looking to buy slaves in the Upper South more cheaply than they could in the Deep South, and agreed to Mulledy's asking price of approximately $400 per person. In 1851, Thompson purchased the second half of Johnson's property, so that by the beginning of the Civil War, all the slaves sold by Mulledy to Johnson were owned by Thompson. [42], Before the abolition of slavery in the United States in 1865, many slaves sold by the Jesuits changed ownership several times. This resulted in families being split for economic reasons with no consideration of human relationships. Georgetown owned these human beings and they had been used to build the institutions physical buildings, tend farms and perform hard labor under rigid control. In 1844, Henry Johnson sold a share of Chatham and would eventually sell the remainder of his land and enslaved people to John R. Thompson in 1851. It is better to prevent than to attempt to remedy. This sale was overseen by Provincial Superior William McSherry and Friar Thomas Mulledy. [43][44] In 1856, Washington Barrow sold the slaves he purchased from Batey to William Patrick and Joseph B. Woolfolk of Iberville Parish. [37], Before Roothaan's order reached Mulledy, Mulledy had already accepted the advice of McSherry and Eccleston in June 1839 to resign and go to Rome to defend himself before Roothaan. Share with your friends! Upon receipt of these 51, Johnson and Batey were to pay the first $25,000. Through the project, genealogists have discovered 8,425 descendants of enslaved people sold in 1838. But few were lucky enough to escape. Advertisement In Bayonne-Johnson's hands,. While they continued to support gradual emancipation, they believed that this option was becoming increasingly untenable, as the Maryland public's concern grew about the expanding number of free blacks. A photograph of Frank Campbell, one of 272 slaves sold to keep Georgetown University afloat, was found in a scrapbook at Nicholls State University in Louisiana. [27] Johnson allowed these slaves to remain in Maryland because he intended to return and try to buy their spouses as well. We see that slavery was MUCH more than depriving people of their liberty and theft of their services, it was the cruel and long lasting emotional devastation of selling away loved ones, taking indecent liberties, cruel and inhumane treatment and so much more. But when Ms. Riffel, the genealogist, told her where she thought he was buried, Ms. Crump knew exactly where to go. 51 slaves were to be sent to Alexandria, Virginia, then shipped to Louisiana. Some of that money helped to pay off the debts of the struggling college. The notation betrayed no hint of the turmoil on board. Only 206 of the 272 slaves were actually delivered because the Jesuits permitted the elderly and those with spouses living nearby and not owned by Jesuits to remain in Maryland. [8] These consisted primarily of the plantations of White Marsh in Prince George's County, St. Inigoes and Newtown Manor in St. Mary's County, St. Thomas Manor in Charles County, and Bohemia Manor in Cecil County. To this day the search continues. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/17/us/georgetown-university-search-for-slave-descendants.html. Isaac Hawkins was the first enslaved person listed in the 1838 sale document. His owner, Mr. Batey, had died, and Cornelius appeared on the plantations inventory, which included 27 mules and horses, 32 hogs, two ox carts and scores of other slaves. Ms. Crump is a familiar figure in Baton Rouge. Cardinal McElroy responds to his critics on sexual sin, the Eucharist, and LGBT and divorced/remarried Catholics, Worried you retired too early? 272 Slaves Were Sold to Save Georgetown. Interview: Whats it like to photograph Pope Francis? -- Georgetown University has announced that descendants of 272 slaves, from whose sale the school profited in 1838, will receive "an advantage in the admissions process" as part of a larger . In 1838, the Jesuit priests who ran the countrys top Catholic university needed money to keep it alive. The students organized a protest and a sit-in, using the hashtag #GU272 for the slaves who were sold. At Georgetown, slavery and scholarship were inextricably linked. We ask readers to log in so that we can recognize you as a registered user and give you unrestricted access to our website. Despite coverage of the Maryland Jesuits' slave ownership and the 1838 sale in academic literature, news of these facts came as a surprise to the public in 2015, prompting a study of Georgetown University's and Jesuits' historical relationship with slavery. [28] Most of the slaves who fled returned to their plantations, and Mulledy made a third visit later that month, where he gathered some of the remaining slaves for transport. [33], Almost immediately, the sale, which was one of the largest slave sales in the history of the United States,[28] became a scandal among American Catholics. 2023 A Month of Tribute to 31 Women We Should All Know, Rosewood A Typical Race Riot in America. You can either click on the link in your confirmation email or simply re-enter your email address below to confirm it. At the time, the Catholic Church did not view slaveholding as immoral, said the Rev. Please see also: Slaves Transported on the Katherine Jackson of Georgetown, Arriving New Orleans 6 Dec 1838, Source: "List of slaves on each estate to be sold," Box 40, Folder 10, Maryland Province Archives[2], Categories: Ascension Parish, Louisiana, Slave Owners | Ascension Parish, Louisiana, Slaves | Iberville Parish, Louisiana, Slave Owners | Iberville Parish, Louisiana, Slaves | Georgetown University, Washington, District of Columbia | Georgetown University Slaves | District of Columbia, Slave Owners | District of Columbia, Slaves | Maryland, Slaves | Maryland, Slave Owners, WIKITREE HOME | ABOUT | G2G FORUM | HELP | SEARCH. people, women and others in the Catholic Church, Cardinal Cupich: Critics of Pope Francis Latin Mass restrictions should listen to JPII. [7], By 1824, the Jesuit plantations totaled more than 12,000 acres (4,900 hectares) in the State of Maryland, and 1,700 acres (690 hectares) in eastern Pennsylvania. There is joy in that, she said, exhilaration even. Slaves and the products they produced were responsible for well over 50% of the entire GNP of the United States. Ashby's account book at Newtown.For a spreadsheet with all the data transcribed, seeGSA5. [46] Due to financial difficulties, Johnson sold half his property, including some of the slaves he had purchased in 1838, to Philip Barton Key in 1844. Cardinal McElroy on radical inclusion for L.G.B.T. Father Mulledy took most of the down payment he received from the sale about $500,000 in todays dollars and used it to help pay off the debts that Georgetown had incurred under his leadership. [70], In 2019, undergraduate students at Georgetown voted in a non-binding referendum to impose a symbolic reparations fee of $27.20 per student. [13], Beginning in 1800, there were instances of the Jesuit plantation managers freeing individual slaves or permitting slaves to purchase their freedom. In 2017, Georgetown University held aday of remembranceduring which the president of the Jesuit order apologized to more than 100 descendants attending a contrition liturgy. This is not a disembodied group of people, who are nameless and faceless, said Mr. Cellini, 52, whose company, Briefcase Analytics, is based in Cambridge, Mass. [31][b] There are several reasons many slaves were left behind. We pray with you today because we have greatly sinned and because we are profoundly sorry.. While the plantations were initially worked by indentured servants, as the institution of indentured servitude began to fade away in Maryland, African slaves replaced indentured servants as the primary workers on the plantations. Dr. Rothman, the Georgetown historian, heard about Mr. Cellinis efforts and let him know that he and several of his students were also tracing the slaves. Expanding Practitioner Knowledge for Racial Justice in Higher Education From Equity Talk to Equity Walk offers practical guidance on the design and application of campus change strategies for achieving equitable outcomes. Moreover, men and women held in bondage were also part of the day-to-day operation of Georgetown College in its early decades. [15] Alice Clifton (c. 1772-unknown), as an enslaved teenager, she was a defendant in an infanticide trial in 1787. Twenty-seven years earlier, a document dated June 19, 1838, showed that Maryland Jesuit priests sold 272 slaves to the owners of Louisiana plantations. Michelle Miller reports. For the eighth year, the Forum was hosted by The Atlantic in partnership with the Aspen Institute. Ms. Crump, a retired television news anchor, was driving to Maringouin, her hometown, in early February when her cellphone rang. These are real people with real names and real descendants.. In total, there are 167 countries that still have slavery and around 46 million slaves today, according to the 2016 Global Slavery Index.. For Black History Month 2021, we focused on Black Medical Achievements, Inventors and Scientists.To see those posts, click here.

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