[Gutenberg 46526] • The Black Swan at Home and Abroad / or, A Biographical Sketch of Miss Elizabeth Taylor Greenfield, the American Vocalist

Miss Elizabeth Taylor Greenfield, or the “Black Swan,” to adopt her musical agnomen, was born at Natchez, Mississippi. She was born in bondage. Her father was a full African; white and Indian blood flowed in her mother’s veins.

When but one year old her mistress, Mrs. Elizabeth Greenfield, removed to Philadelphia, and joined the Society of Friends, manumitting the few slaves whom she had not previously accompanied and comfortably settled in Liberia. Several of these would not be separated from their beloved and venerated mistress, and among them her especial favourite, the gifted subject of these pages.

In 1844 her mistress died, at the advanced age of nearly one hundred years, and in her will Elizabeth was remembered by a substantial legacy, sufficient to make her comfor for life; but the will was contested, and yet remains the subject of judicial investigation.