Horace Mann and Colored Schools

December 24, 1847

An article critical of Mann, who, it claims, has not given aid to the campaign for equal school rights for colored children.  He has not helped either in Nantucket or in Boston, to change practices which keep colored children from going to school with white children.   “All this exits in Boston. … Against it Horace Mann has yet to utter his first word.”

Lucretia Mott

December 3, 1847 

From the Baltimore Cor. of Era. is an article telling of her seventy day trip, away from her home in Philadelphia, during which she has traveled at least twenty-four hundred miles, and attended seventy-one meetings.  “She is suffering from a most painful neuralgic affection, caused by an overworking of her brain.”

Anti-Slavery Sewing Circles

December 3, 1847

“This is the season when Sewing Circles should flourish most ….Sewing Circles are among the best means for agitating and keeping alive the question of anti-slavery.  …. Some one of the members generally reads an anti-slavery book or paper to the others during the meeting, and thus some who don’t get a great deal of anti-slavery at home have an opportunity of hearing of it at the circle.”

Danish Abolition of Slavery

November 19, 1847

Notice that a Royal Decree has been issued “proclaiming the abolition of slavery in the Danish colonies”, by King Christian.  “All slaves under sixteen years of age, are declared absolutely free, from the 18th of September.  Those above that age, are to be held in conditions of apprentices for four years from that time.”… Comment, signed by “Q”:  “Four years is too much of life to be taken from a man.  We wish he had dissolved the whole enchantment at once….”

Henry Wright to Elizabeth Pease, about Garrison

October 29, 1847

Henry Wright describes at length the poor health of Garrison, after visiting him in Cleveland.  “You will see little from his pen in the Liberator for some time.”  Wright also says that he is going to Buffalo, to be present at the Liberty Party Convention. “I go not there to join the Convention but as a looker-on.  I abjure allegiance to a constitution that sanctions slavery or war. It has no authority over me, and I shall embrace every opportunity to make it and the government that is based upon it, the scorn of mankind.”

National Anti-Slavery Bazaar

October  22, 1847 

An announcement of the 14th bazaar, to be held during Christmas and New Year’s Week, in Boston.  Signed by thirty-one women”, it assures that contributions will  be “spent in Propagandism: for we strike openly, boldly, strongly,  and successfully too, as our fourteen years of labor prove, at the root of the system we mean to  abolish.”  The intent is to raise $10,000.

George Thompson elected to Parliament

October  22, 1847

Here is notice of Thompson’s election to Parliament, with 3000 more votes than his opponent.

Jonathan Walker and 66 emancipated slaves in Boston

October 15, 1847

In a letter Walker refers to 66 slaves, emancipated by the will of Carter H. Edloe, deceased, of Virginia.  They have been brought to Boston on a ship commanded by a Capt. Wixon.  They had been emancipated in a will of 1844.  “One of the liberated slaves has been with me a little more than a week, and to all appearances is well behaved, industrious, and of excellent disposition.  I have also aided in obtaining (I think) a good situation at this place for two others.”  Walker indicates that he encloses a copy of the will.

Garrison’s health

October 15, 1847

Here is a note that Garrison has been very ill, but is now considered “out of danger”; his homeward journey will be postponed until next month.

Garrison ill

September 24, 1847

Notice that Garrison had been detained in Cleveland because of illness, but indicates that his convalescence proceeds, and that he will begin homeward journeys in another week.  His New York engagements will not be met, but Douglass will be present at those occasions.