Part 11 (1/2)

Charleston, South Carolina, furnished a good example of a center of unusual activity and rapid strides of self-educating urban Negroes

Driven to the point of doing for theanized in 1810 the ”Minor Society” to secure to their orphan children the benefits of education[1] Bishop Payne, who studied later under Thoanization Other colored schools were doing successful work

Enjoying these unusual advantages the Negroes of Charleston were early in the nineteenth century ranked by some as economically and intellectually superior to any other such persons in the United States A large portion of the leading mechanics, fashi+onable tailors, shoe manufacturers, and mantua-makers were free blacks, who enjoyed ”a consideration in the community far more than that enjoyed by any of the colored population in the Northern cities”[2] As such positions required considerable skill and intelligence, these laborers had of necessity acquired a large share of useful knowledge The favorable circuroes in certain liberal southern cities like Charleston were the cause of their return from the North to the South, where they often had a better opportunity for mental as well as econoroes fro the first decade of the nineteenth century, is a case in evidence[4]

[Footnote 1: Siister_, vol xlix, p 40]

[Footnote 3: _Notions of the Aht, _Views of Society and Manners in As of the race in the District of Colu educational progress When thite teachers, Henry Potter and Mrs Haley, invited black children to study with their white pupils, the colored people gladly availed thes, the first to establish a real school for Negroes in Georgetown, soon discovered that she had their hearty support She had pupils from all parts of the District of Colu, Maryland The tuition fee in soh, but many free blacks of the District of Columbia were sufficiently well established to ressthis period was of e to educate their children[2]

[Footnote 1: _Special Report of the US Com of Ed_, 1871, pp 195 _et seq_]

[Footnote 2: _Special Report of the US Coroes, however, were learning to do more than e Bell, Nicholas Franklin, and Moses Liverpool, former slaves, built the first colored schoolhouse in the District of Colue, these men could not teach thee of the school[1] It was not a success Pupils of color thereafter attended the school of Anne Maria Hall, a teacher froe County, Maryland, and those of teachers who instructed white children[2] The aroes of the District of Colued by the first failure to provide their own educational facilities The Bell School which had been closed and used as a dwelling, opened again in 1818 under the auspices of an association of free people of color of the city of Washi+ngton called the ”Resolute Beneficial Society” The school was declared open then ”for the reception of free people of color and others that ladies and gentle, writing, arithrammar, or other branches of education apposite to their capacities, by steady, active and experienced teachers, whose attention is wholly devoted to the purpose described”

The founders presues thus presented to them either by subscription to the funds of the Society or by sending their children to the school Since the improvement of the intellect and the morals of the colored youth were the objects of the institution, the patronage of benevolent ladies and gentlereeable occurrences no writing was to be done by the teacher for a slave, neither directly nor indirectly to serve the purpose of a slave on any account whatever”[3] This school was continued until 1822 under Mr Pierpont, of Massachusetts, a relative of the poet

He was succeeded two years later by John Adaro to teach in the District of Columbia[4]

[Footnote 1: _Ibid_, 196]

[Footnote 2: _Ibid_, 197]

[Footnote 3: _Daily National Intelligencer_, August 29, 1818]

[Footnote 4: _Special Report of the US Com of Ed_, 1871, p 198]

Of equal importance was the colored ses Like her, he taught first in Georgetown He began his advanced work near the Treasury building, having an attendance of probably one hundred and fifty pupils, generally paying tuition The fee, however, was not coht for about two years, and then was succeeded by John Prout, a colored man of rare talents, who later did roes to Africa before they had the benefits of education[1] The school was then called the ”Columbian Institute” Prout was later assisted by Mrs Anne Maria Hall[2]

[Footnote 1: _Ibid_, 1871, p 199]

[Footnote 2: Other schools of i up from year to year As early as 1824 Mrs Mary Wall, a roes and received so many applications that many had to be refused Fro ere James Wormley and John Thomas Johnson Another school was established by Thouished Maryland faton before the War of 1812 and began teaching those who came to him when he had a schoolhouse, and when he had none he went fro even under the trees to teach wherever he found pupils ere interested See _Special Report of the US Com of Ed_, 1871, pp 212, 213, and 214]

Of this self-educative work of Negroes some of the best was accomplished by colored women With the assistance of Father Vanloe of the Holy Trinity Church, Maria Becraft, the most capable colored woman in the District of Columbia at that time, established there the first seun to teach in a less desirable section, but i character of this girl, Father Vanlo on Fayette Street where she taught until 1831 She then turned over her seirls she had trained, and became a teacher in a convent at Baltiood results were obtained by Louisa Parke Costin, a member of one of the oldest colored fa to diffuse the knowledge she acquired from white teachers in the early mixed schools of the District, she decided to teach She opened her school just about the ti his reputation as an educator She died in 1831, after years of successful work had crowned her efforts Her task was then taken up by her sister, Martha, who had been trained in the Convent Seminary of Baltimore[2]

[Footnote 1: _Ibid_, p 204]

[Footnote 2: _Special Report of the US Com of Ed_, 1871, p 203]

Equally helpful was the work of Arabella Jones Educated at the St

Frances Acadelish branches and fluent in French She taught on the ”Island,” calling her school ”The St Agnes Academy”[1] Another worker of this class was Mary Wormley, once a student in the Colored Felass This lady began teaching about 1830, getting solishman[2] The institution passed later into the hands of Tho the incumbency of whom the school was closed by the ”Snow Riot” This was an atteressive Negroes of the District of Columbia Their excuse for such drastic action was that Benja a restaurant in the city, hadremarks about the wives of the white mechanics[3] John F Cook, one of the most influential educators produced in the District of Coluht at Lancaster, Pa

[Footnote 1: _Ibid_, p 211]

[Footnote 2: _Ibid_, p 211]

[Footnote 3: _Special Report of the US Com of Ed_, p 201]

While the colored schools of the District of Coluroes then in charge of them were too ambitious, too well-educated to discontinue their work The situation, however, was in no sense encouraging With the exception of the churches of the Catholics and Quakers who vied with each other ina benevolent attitude toward the education of the colored people,[1] the churches of the District of Coluroes once sat in the same seats hite persons, were on account of this riot closed to the darker race[2]

This expulsion however, was not an unmixed evil, for the colored people theer nu[3]