Holiday 2008 • Vol. 9, No. 5-6

Crossing Borders: Slavery in Two New England Families

by Rev. David Allen Pettee

IN FEBRUARY 2006, I STUMBLED UPON AN ONLINE version of the 1774 Rhode Island census at Ancestry.com. Recalling that my ancestor Edward Simmons lived in eighteenth-century Newport, I searched for his name. To my surprise, his household included four slaves: one male over sixteen, two males under sixteen, and one female above sixteen.[1] Research at the Newport Historical Society uncovered at least five other slaveholding Newport ancestors.

I began aggressively researching my family history for evidence of any further involvement in the slave trade. I found the name of another Newport ancestor, John Robinson, in the manifest of a slave ship. Seeking to make sense of this disturbing legacy, I traveled to Ghana’s Cape Coast Castle, a slave fortress visited by Robinson in the 1740s. Bearing witness at the site, I came to understand the brutal reality of the transatlantic slave trade in a manner I never before had imagined. Upon my return, Keith W. Stokes, local African- American historian, urged me to undertake a more difficult challenge to more fully understand accountability: find a descendant of an African enslaved by Edward Simmons. I doubted that such a feat was possible, and others discouraged what they thought would be a fruitless search.

Edward Simmons died in Newport on September 2, 1803, nineteen days after the death of his son Jonathan.[2, 3] While studying the inventory of Jonathan Simmons, I noticed that on March 4, 1804, one Cuff Simmons had billed the estate for $6.43.[4] Cuff is a variant of Kofi , an African first name. (In the Akan day-naming tradition of Ghana, a boy named Cuff would have been born on Friday.) As slaves were commonly assigned surnames of their owners, I wondered if Cuff might have been enslaved by Edward Simmons. Edward was apparently the only Simmons slaveholder in Newport from 1780 to 1800 — one slave in the 1782 Rhode Island census and one again in the 1790 and 1800 federal censuses.[5, 6, 7]

Newport vital records do not reference Cuff Simmons. However, the Newport Mercury ran the following obituary on March 4, 1842: “Cuff Simmons,(colored) aged about 70 years.”[8] Able to narrow Cuff ’s birth to 1772 or 1773, I searched the records of Dr. Ezra Stiles, minister of the Second Congregational Church in Newport, where Edward Simmons had been a member. Stiles kept an annual listing of the size of each family in his parish during the 1770s. The last child of Edward and Mary Simmons was born — and died — in 1768. I expected to see an increase in the household of Edward Simmons in 1772 or 1773.

In January 1771 and December 1772, Stiles noted four members in the Simmons household.[9, 10] Then, on December 31, 1773, Stiles recorded an increase of three (to seven).[11] In 1773, at least eighteen slave vessels made port in Newport.[12] The increase in the Simmons household in 1773 conflated with the two male slaves under sixteen in the 1774 census and strongly suggested that one of these males was Cuff Simmons.

No manumission papers have been found for Cuff Simmons, and he was not mentioned in Edward Simmons’s will or inventory. Since Cuff was not named in the 1800 federal census, I think he probably either purchased or was given his freedom after the 1800 federal census enumeration and before the death of Edward Simmons in September 1803. In early nineteenth- century Rhode Island, slaves sometimes bought their freedom. Many Africans in New England, slaves since infancy, as expected learned a trade or skill. Cuff Simmons became a chimney sweep as an adult. [13]

Probably after Cuff Simmons became free, he married Hope (Wanton?). In 1803, Cuff was thirty and Hope was thirty-four. On June 15, 1825, Cuff Simmons swore under oath that Burden Simmons, a seaman, had been born in Newport “on or about the 30th day of August 1803.”[14] Although kinship between Burden and Cuff Simmons has not been proved, I believe they were father and son. Cuff Simmons was first listed by name in the 1810 federal census, as head of a household of seven persons of color in Newport.[15] In the 1820 federal census, Cuff was head of a household of three: Cuff, Hope, and a free colored female between fourteen and twenty-six.[16] Was Burden Simmons at sea in 1820? Was this latter woman Burden’s wife? By 1830 Cuff was a widower whose household also included a free colored male and female between twenty-four and thirty-six and two free colored males under ten. Were the two other adults Burden Simmons and his wife? Was one child Burden’s son, Edward, whom I was to discover next?

Another Edward Simmons, a black painter, married Elizabeth Noel Weeden in Newport on June 6, 1846.[17] An 1850 Newport map revealed Edward Simmons was residing on the parcel of land previously owned by Cuff Simmons, nearly adjacent to a parcel of land owned by Robert M. Simmons, son of Jonathan Simmons.[18] According to the 1860 federal census, this Edward Simmons was born about 1822.[19] Since Cuff ’s land and house had devolved to Edward Simmons, the latter was probably the son of Burden Simmons and grandson of Cuff Simmons. As in 1830, the 1840 federal census shows two free colored males of Edward’s age residing in Cuff Simmons’s household.[20, 21]

Clues demonstrating ongoing association between Cuff Simmons and descendants of my ancestors, Edward and Jonathan Simmons, can be found in Newport deeds. Jonathan Simmons owned land abutting that of an early Newport freeman of color, Bacchus Coggeshall, whose property would pass through descendants of Cuff Simmons. On December 15, 1818, Ann Coggeshall, widow of Bacchus Coggeshall, bequeathed in her will “unto my beloved niece Hope Simmons Wife of Cuff Simmons my house where I now live with all the land thereunto belonging or appertaining together with all my removables.”[22]

The Rhode Island Republican of March 30, 1830, ran a small obituary: “In this town [Newport] on Saturday evening last, after a lingering illness which she bore with Christian resignation, Hopey (woman of color) wife of Cuff Simmons, aged 61 years.”[23] Six months later, on August 11, 1830, Cuff Simmons sold a portion of the land he had inherited from his wife Hope to brothers Richard and George C. Shaw.[24] The Shaw brothers were sons of Asa Shaw and kinsmen of the white Simmons family. In 1805 Asa Shaw had purchased land from Elizabeth Simmons, widow of Jonathan Simmons.[25]

Cuff Simmons died intestate in Newport on March 12, 1842.[26] The court assigned Robert M. Simmons (son of Jonathan Simmons) and the above Richard Shaw to be the sureties. Gideon Palmer, Jr. (son of Gideon and Elizabeth [Simmons] Palmer and grandson of Jonathan Simmons) and George C. Shaw were assigned by the court to complete the inventory of Cuff ’s estate. The choice of these four men suggests that descendants and kinsmen of Edward and Jonathan Simmons were known to be familiar with Cuff Simmons.[27]

Jonathan Simmons named his three sons Edward, Henry, and John. Edward Simmons, the black painter, also named his three sons Edward, Henry, and John. The painter may have been trying to give his three sons standing in Newport, and the association between the white and the black Simmons families may have been mutually respectful.

The painter Edward Simmons died after the 1860 federal and before the 1865 Rhode Island census.[28, 29] His widow Elizabeth was head of a household that included her four children in 1870.[30] Her only daughter, Anna E. Simmons, married Charles Frederick Douglass Fayerweather, son of George and Sarah Ann Major (Harris) Fayerweather of Kingston, Rhode Island.[31] In 1833, Sarah Harris began her journey toward becoming a noted abolitionist when she approached Prudence Crandall about entering the latter’s school for girls in Canterbury, Connecticut.[32, 33]

Twice before 1945, heirs of Elizabeth Simmons sold parcels of family land in Newport that had bounded lands “now or formerly of Bacchus Coggeshall.”[34, 35] With information from these deeds, tracing descendants of Edward and Elizabeth Simmons to the present day proved relatively easy. Despite confidence in my research, I wanted to avoid making contact with a living descendant of Cuff Simmons and later learning I had somehow made a mistake. In spring 2007, I contacted two independent genealogists, Maureen Taylor and Alicia Crane Williams, and sought their expert opinion. When both affirmed that my research seemed sound, I felt comfortable enough to take the final step and approach one of Cuff Simmons’s descendants.

By cross-referencing the 1930 federal census with the 2006 Jamaica, New York, phone book, I found the widow of Cuff Simmons’s great-great-great-grandson Alton Roosevelt Nelson, Jr., exactly where I expected and hoped.[36] (I knew that a branch of the family had settled in Jamaica in the 1920s and remained within the same neighborhood.) I shared in a handwritten letter what I had learned. After two weeks of no reply, I placed a follow-up call. Patricia Mann, the daughter of the woman I had written, answered the phone. After stammering through the purpose of my call (her mother had thrown my letter away because she didn¹t know who I was), I asked Patricia if she had ever heard of Cuff Simmons. She knew his name but not much about him.

The only oral history that Patricia could later recall was a comment from her grandmother that the family was descended from a Mayflower passenger. I knew Patricia’s black Simmons descent very well, but had found no evidence to confirm this claim. Then I remembered that my ancestor Edward Simmons was a descendant of Mayflower passengers John Alden, William Mullins, and Richard Warren! Was Cuff Simmons possibly Edward Simmons’s son? I could not answer this question through DNA testing.

I flew to Patricia’s New York home in early July 2007 to meet and discuss our shared history. As suggested above, she knew very little of her family history and nothing of her descent from the remarkable Sarah Harris. I was initially quite nervous about being a target of anger, since Patricia’s ancestor had been enslaved by mine. Instead, I was graciously welcomed and on Columbus Day 2007, our families gathered in Newport for the first time since Cuff ’s death in 1842. We were given a tour of historical African-American community sites by Keith W. Stokes, the historian who had inspired this genealogical pilgrimage. Our day together was powerful and transformative, and we will continue to explore our shared family history.

Although segregation and systemic racism has made the public record of early New England African- Americans nearly invisible, the use of other less utilized sources can offer much unexpected information. In addition, a growing body of successful efforts by descendants of slaveholders to find and “reach out” to descendants of enslaved Africans has helped reconcile family histories involving slavery. The reception is often quite positive! I have twice met with others pursuing such truth and reconciliation work through an initiative at Eastern Mennonite University, known as “Coming to the Table” (see www.emu.edu/cjp/coming tothetable/ for more information).

Finally, to honor the bicentennial anniversary, on January 1, 2008, of abolition of the American slave trade, I particularly urge everyone with early New England ancestry to be willing to explore the historical relationship of various of our ancestors to the institution of slavery. Slavery was central to the New England economy for more than two centuries, and thus we are all inheritors of this complicated legacy.

Notes 1 1774 Rhode Island Census, Newport, 21, at the Newport Historical Society.

2 Rhode Island Republican, September 10, 1803, 3.

3 Rhode Island Republican, August 20, 1803, 3.

4 Newport Land Evidence 4:197.

5 1782 Rhode Island Census, Little Compton, p. 111, at the Rhode Island Archives.

6 1790 U. S. Census, Newport, R.I., roll M637_10, p. 180. Viewed at Ancestry.com.

7 1800 U. S. Census, Newport, R.I., roll M32_46, p. 291. Viewed at Ancestry.com.

8 Newport Mercury, March 12, 1842: 3.

9 The Literary Diary of Ezra Stiles, D.D., LL.D, vol. 1, January 1, 1769–March 13, 1776 (New York: Scribner & Sons, 1901), 82.

10 Ibid, 328.

11 Ibid, 430.

12 Jay Coughtry, The Notorious Triangle: Rhode Island and the African Slave Trade, 1700–1807 (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1981), 258–59.

13 Occupations: Craftsmen in Newport And Other Information About the Town’s Inhabitants, George H. Richardson Scrapbook, #982, p. 52, at the Newport Historical Society.

14 Impressment Papers, at the Newport Historical Society.

15 1810 U. S. Census, Newport, R.I., roll M252_59, p. 45.

Viewed at Ancestry.com.

16 1820 U. S. Census, Newport, R.I., roll M33_116, p. 172. Viewed at Ancestry.com.

17 Newport Mercury, June 6, 1896, “Fifty years ago.”

18 Newport Town Hall, 1850 Map.

19 1860 U.S. Census, Newport, R.I., roll M653_1204, p. 319. Viewed at Ancestry.com.

20 1830 U. S. Census, Newport, R.I., roll M19_167, p. 43. Viewed at Ancestry.com.

21 1840 U. S. Census, Newport, R.I., roll M704_504, p. 167. Viewed at Ancestry.com.

22 Newport Probate Records, 5: 485.

23 R.I. Republican, March 30, 1830, 3.

24 Newport Land Evidence, 17: 504–5.

25 Newport Land Evidence, 9: 385–86.

26 Newport Mercury, March 12, 1842, 3.

27 Newport Probate Records, 13: 99.

28 1860 U. S. Census, Newport, R.I., roll M653_1204, p. 319. Viewed at Ancestry.com.

29 1865 Rhode Island Census, Newport, First District, Second Ward, p. 93, at the Rhode Island Archives.

30 1870 U. S. Census, Newport, R.I., roll M593_1472, p. 433. Viewed at Ancestry.com.

31 1880 U. S. Census, Newport, R.I., E. D. 91, roll T9_1210, p. 131.4000, Enumeration District 91. Viewed at Ancestry.com.

32 Glee F. Krueger, “A Canterbury Tale: Sarah Ann Major Harris and Prudence Crandall,” in Textiles in Early New England: Design, Production, and Consumption, Peter Benes, ed., Dublin Seminar for New England Folklife Annual Proceedings 1997 (Boston: Boston University, 1999), 233–35.

33 Carl R. Woodward, “A Profile in Dedication, Sarah Harris and the Fayerweather Family,” The New England Galaxy

15 (Summer 1973): 1.

34 Newport Land Evidence, 119:139.

35 Newport Land Evidence, 147:11.

36 1930 U. S. Census, Queens, Queens, New York, E. D. 70, roll 1598, p. 194. Viewed at Ancestry.com.

REV. DAVID PETTEE is a member of NEHGS and works for the Unitarian Universalist Association in Boston. In 2002, during research on Unitarian minister and early NEHGS member Rev. John Turner Sargent, David uncovered unpublished vital records in Sargent’s journal. Rev. Pettee helped arrange publication of “Records of the Suffolk Street Chapel, Boston, 1837–1845” in the Register in 2003. On May 16, 2008, Rev. Pettee was a guest on WBUR Boston’s “On Point” radio program, hosted by Tom Ashbrook. Patricia Mann joined them by telephone from New York. To listen to this conversation, visit the audio archives at www.onpointradio.org.