The Struggle for Equality: Abolitionists and the Negro in the Civil War and Reconstruction

MANUSCRIPTS

The manuscript collections of individual abolitionists yielded rich results. The William Lloyd Garrison Papers, BPL, the largest and best organized collection of abolitionist letters in existence, contain the correspondence of a great many abolitionists besides Garrison’s. The Garrison Family Papers, sc, include a large number of letters, clippings, and scrapbooks relating to the Garrison family. The William Lloyd Garrison Papers, NYHS, the Wendell Phillips Garrison Papers, HU, the Garrison Family Papers, RU, and the Fanny Garrison Villard Papers, HU, contain additional material of value.

The papers of many other Garrisonian abolitionists have been preserved. There are small collections of Susan B. Anthony’s letters in the LC, NYHS, and sc. The Lydia Maria Child Papers, Cornell, contain many important letters from Mrs. Child to personal friends. Additional letters can be found in the Child-Whittier Correspondence, LC, the Child-Shaw Correspondence, NYPL, the Lydia and David Child Papers, BPL, the Child Papers, Radcliffe Women’s Archives, and the Child Papers, Wayland (Mass.) Historical Society. The large collections of Moncure Conway Papers, CU, Anna Dickinson Papers, LC, and Sydney Howard Gay Papers, CU, are indispensable for an understanding of these three important Civil War figures. The J. Miller McKim Papers, Cornell, include letters from several abolitionists to McKim and letterbook copies of McKim’s correspondence as secretary of the American Freedmen’s Aid Commission and of the American Freedmen’s Union Commission, 1865-68. The J. Miller McKim Papers, BPL, the J. Miller McKim Papers, NYPL, the McKim-Maloney-Garrison Papers, NYPL, and the Charles Follen McKim Papers, NYPL, contain additional material on the activities of McKim and his fellow abolitionists. The Samuel May, Jr., Papers, BPL, include a great deal of correspondence relating to the organizational aspects of the Garrisonian movement. The Samuel J. May Papers, BPL, consist of letters from Samuel May, Jr., to his elder cousin, Samuel J. May. The Mary E. Estlin Papers, BPL, contain many letters from Garrisonian abolitionists to Mary Estlin, an English abolitionist. There are collections of the letters of Stephen S. Foster and Abby Kelley Foster in the AAS and the Worcester Historical Society. The Josephine S. Griffing Papers, CU, contain a small number of valuable letters relating to Mrs. Griffing’s social welfare work among the freedmen of Washington. The small collections of Oliver Johnson Papers, VHS, Lucretia Mott Papers, sc, Wendell Phillips Papers, LC, Parker Pillsbury Papers, sc, the Quincy-Webb Correspondence, BPL, and the Edmund Quincy Papers, MHS, yielded some relevant information. The Elizabeth Cady Stanton Papers, LC, the Theodore Tilton Papers, NYHS, and the Weston Papers, BPL, include many important letters. The Records of the Board of Managers of the Massachusetts and New England Anti-Slavery Societies, bound MS volume, BPL, contain the minutes of the executive committee meetings of these two societies.

Non-Garrisonian abolitionists also diligently preserved their papers. The small collection of Francis W. Bird Papers, HU, contains several letters from Charles Sumner. The extensive Cheever Papers, AAS, include the letters and diaries of George and Henry Cheever, and many of the records of the Church Anti-Slavery Society. The James Freeman Clarke Papers, HU, and the Frederick Douglass Papers, Douglass Memorial Home, Anacostia Heights, Washington, D.C., were of limited value. The William Channing Gannett Papers, RU, include diaries, letters, and memoranda concerning Gannett’s work among the Port Royal freedmen. The Thomas Wentworth Higginson Papers, HU, consist of diaries, journals, and scrapbooks as well as letters. The large collection of Samuel Gridley Howe Family Papers, HU, is restricted, and the author was able to consult only those letters to Howe from persons outside his family. The Sumner-Howe Correspondence, HU, contains letters from Charles Sumner to Samuel Gridley Howe. The Samuel Johnson Papers, Essex Institute, Salem, Mass., the Joshua Leavitt Papers, LC, the Loring Moody Papers, BPL, the John Pierpont Papers, Pierpont Morgan Library, the Franklin Sanborn Papers, Concord (Mass.) Public Library, and the Sanborn Papers, LC, were of minor value. The huge and well-indexed collection of Gerrit Smith Papers, SU, contains hundreds of letters from abolitionists during the 1860’s. Two smaller collections of Gerrit Smith Papers are housed in the NYHS and the NYPL. The Lewis Tappan Papers, LC, contain letters to Tappan, journals, and letterbook copies of letters from Tappan. The William W. Thayer MS autobiography, LC, contains some interesting information on George L. Stearns and the Right Way. The John G. Whittier Papers, Essex Institute, and the Whittier Papers, NYPL, were of limited importance. The Elizur Wright Papers, LC, include many relevant letters. The Miscellaneous Manuscript Collections of the LC, NYHS, and NYPL, and the Alfred Williams Anthony Autograph Collection, NYPL, contain several letters of abolitionists.

The papers of leading Republican politicians yielded considerable material relating to the abolitionists. The John A. Andrew Papers, MHS, and the large but unindexed collection of Benjamin Butler Papers, LC, were of limited importance. The Salmon P. Chase Papers, LC, on the other hand, are completely indexed, easy to use, and proved fruitful. The Joshua Giddings-George Julian Correspondence, LC, includes many letters from abolitionists to Julian. The Horace Greeley Papers, NYPL, and the Andrew Johnson Papers, LC, contain only a small number of abolitionist letters, but the Abraham Lincoln Papers (Robert Todd Lincoln Collection), LC, were unexpectedly rich in abolitionist materials. The Charles Sumner Papers, HU, include a very large number of important letters from abolitionists. The Thaddeus Stevens Papers, LC, and the Henry Wilson Papers, LC, were of limited value.

PUBLISHED CORRESPONDENCE, COLLECTED WRITINGS AND SPEECHES

Herbert Aptheker, ed., Documentary History of the Negro People in the United States (New York, 1951) contains many valuable items on the activities of Negro leaders during the 1860’s. William H. Burleigh, Poems by W. H. Burleigh. With a Sketch of His Life by Celia Burleigh (New York, 1871) is useful for biographical information about this abolitionist poet. Jesse A. Marshall, ed., The Private and Official Correspondence of Gen. Benjamin F. Butler during the Period of the Civil War (5 vols., Norwood, Mass., 1917) includes several abolitionist letters. Lillie B. C. Wyman and Arthur Crawford Wyman, Elizabeth Buffum Chace, 1806-1899 (2 vols., Boston, 1914) is especially valuable for its large number of letters from various abolitionists to Mrs. Chace. Harriet W. Sewall, ed., Letters of Lydia Maria Child (Boston, 1883) is poorly edited but helpful. Edward Everett Hale, ed., James Freeman Clarke: Autobiography, Diary, and Correspondence (Boston, 1891) is useful and informative. Philip S. Foner, The Life and Writings of Frederick Douglass (4 vols., New York, 1950-55) is invaluable. Vols. Ill and IV cover the period of the Civil War and Reconstruction. They contain private correspondence, speeches, and published writings. Ray Allen Billington, ed., The Journal of Charlotte Forten (New York, 1961 [1953]) is a superbly edited journal of a young northern Negro who came to the South Carolina sea islands to teach the freedmen. Sarah Hopper Emerson, Life of Abby Hopper Gibbons, Told Chiefly Through Her Correspondence (2 vols., New York, 1896-97) is a poorly organized but nevertheless valuable compilation. Gilbert Haven, National Sermons, Speeches, and Letters on Slavery and Its War … (Boston, 1869) sets forth the views of this radical, red-headed abolitionist clergyman. Laura E. Richards, ed., Letters and Journals of Samuel Gridley Howe: The Servant of Humanity (Boston, 1909) contains helpful information on the founding of the Emancipation League and the work of the American Freedmen’s Inquiry Commission. John Jay, Slavery and the War (New York, 1868) is a collection of twenty-one pamphlets, speeches, and public letters by Jay during the war and early reconstruction years. Roy P. Basler, ed., The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln (9 vols., New Brunswick, N.J.) contains information on Lincoln’s relations with certain abolitionists. Elizabeth W. Pearson, ed., Letters from Port Royal, Written at the Time of the Civil War (Boston, 1906) is an indispensable source of information on the activities of the Gideonites. Wendell Phillips, Speeches, Lectures, and Letters, 1st Series (Boston, 1863) contains addresses by Phillips from 1837 to 1863. His Speeches, Lectures, and Letters, 2nd Series (Boston, 1891) includes speeches made from 1865 to 1881. By far the greater portion of Phillips’ utterances on the Negro question, especially after 1863, are not published in these volumes. A. W. Stevens, ed., Enfranchisement and Citizenship, Addresses and Papers of Edward L. Pierce (Boston, 1896) includes several articles and reports by Pierce on freedmen’s education. Mrs. William S. Robinson, ed., “Warrington” Pen-Portraits: A Collection of … the Writings of William S. Robinson (Boston, 1877) contains important excerpts from the diaries, letters, and articles of this Massachusetts free-soiler and abolitionist. Theodore Stanton and Harriot Stanton Blatch, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, as Revealed in Her Letters, Diary, and Reminiscences (2 vols., New York, 1922) includes many letters unavailable elsewhere. Gerrit Smith, Speeches and Letters of Gerrit Smith … on the Rebellion (2 vols. in 1, New York, 1864-65) contains Smith’s wartime published letters and speeches from 1863-65. Charles Sumner, The Works of Charles Sumner (15 vols., Boston, 1870-73) include a considerable amount of material on Sumner’s relations with abolitionists. Rupert S. Holland, ed., Letters and Diary of Laura M. Towne, Written from the Sea Islands of South Carolina, 1862-84 (Cambridge, Mass., 1912) is useful for a portrayal of everyday life on the South Carolina sea islands. John Albree, ed., Whittier Correspondence from Oakknoll (Salem, Mass., 1911) contains several Whittier letters dealing with the issues of war and reconstruction. John G. Whittier, Anti-Slavery Poems: Songs of Labor and Reform (vol. Ill of his Poetical Works, Riverside ed., Boston, 1888), and Whittier, The Conflict with Slavery (vol. Ill of his Prose Works, Riverside ed., Boston, 1889) contain Whittier’s antislavery poems and prose writings from this period.

GOVERNMENT PUBLICATIONS AND ARCHIVES

The various issues of the Congressional Globe, House Miscellaneous Documents, House Executive Documents, House Reports, and the corresponding documents of the Senate were consulted where relevant. Edward McPherson, The Political History of the United States of America during the Great Rebellion (Washington, 1865), and The Political History of the United States of America during the Period of Reconstruction (Washington, 1871) contain reports, letters, orders, messages, public statements, and summaries of congressional action that are invaluable guides to the activities of the government. McPherson was clerk of the House of Representatives and had access to all government publications in the preparation of these volumes. James D. Richardson, ed., The Messages and Papers of the Presidents (20 vols., Washington, 1897-1913), and The United States Statutes at Large were also consulted. War of the Rebellion: … Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies (128 vols., Washington, 1880-1901) contain a great deal of information on Negro soldiers and military administration of freedmen’s affairs. Special Report of the Commissioner of Education on the Condition and Improvement of Public Schools in the District of Columbia … (Washington, D.C., 1871) is useful as a source of information about public education for Negroes in all the states as well as in the District of Columbia. Government publications and records concerning freedmen’s education are overwhelming. They include several hundred linear feet of Freedmen’s Bureau records in the National Archives, the annual reports of the commissioners and the superintendents of education of the Freedmen’s Bureau, and various congressional and Treasury Department reports.

NEWSPAPERS

A. Abolitionist Newspapers

The National Anti-Slavery Standard, published weekly in New York, was the most important single source for this study. Oliver Johnson was editor-in-chief of the Standard until May 1865. Edmund Quincy was associate editor during the same period, and wrote most of the leading editorials. Parker Pillsbury and George W. Smalley took over as editors in May 1865. Smalley resigned early in 1866, and Pillsbury stepped down as editor soon afterward because of a disagreement with Phillips on the woman suffrage question. Aaron M. Powell succeeded Pillsbury as editor, and Phillips served as associate editor. Phillips wrote most of the leading editorials, and the paper was entirely under his influence after 1865. The Standard’s circulation was never very large—it averaged less than 3,000 during the 1860’s—but its influence was much greater than its circulation would indicate, especially after Phillips became associate editor. After the adoption of the Fifteenth Amendment in 1870 the Standard changed its name to The National Standard. At the beginning of 1872 it became a monthly instead of a weekly. The National Standard was merged with the National Temperance Advocate in 1873.

The Liberator was the most famous of all abolitionist newspapers. During the war Garrison wrote only about half of the weekly editorials. Charles K. Whipple and Samuel May, Jr., wrote most of the others and supervised much of the makeup work on the paper. Its circulation fluctuated between 2,500 and 3,000 during the war, but like the Standard its influence reached far beyond its circulation. Garrison terminated the Liberator at the end of 1865, exactly 35 years after he had begun publishing it.

For the early years of an important antislavery newspaper, see Louis Filler, “Liberalism, Anti-Slavery, and the Founders of the Independent,” New England Quarterly, XXVII (Sept. 1954) 291-306. Under Theodore Tilton’s editorship the Independent, published weekly in New York, was almost as much an abolitionist paper as the Standard or the Liberator. From the spring of 1863, when Tilton took over as editor, until the early 1870’s the circulation of the Independent hovered around the 70,000 mark. In 1864-65 Wendell P. Garrison served as assistant editor of the Independent. Oliver Johnson was managing editor from 1865 through 1870. In addition, several abolitionists contributed regular or occasional columns to the Independent. Tilton resigned from the editorship at the end of 1870, winding up a brilliant eight-year career as editor of one of the most influential radical journals in the land.

The weekly Boston Commonwealth was founded in August 1862, as the semiofficial organ of the Emancipation League. It was financed at first primarily by George Stearns. Moncure Conway and Frank Sanborn served as dual editors of the Commonwealth until April 1863, when Conway went to England and Sanborn took over as editor-in-chief. The Commonwealth became the spokesman for the old John Brown abolitionists and radical Republicans of Massachusetts. Charles W. Slack became editor in October 1864, and continued in that position until his death in 1885. The circulation of the Commonwealth seldom rose higher than 5,000. Most of the time during Reconstruction the paper was less radical than the Standard or the Independent. Slack held several political offices in Massachusetts after the war, and he could not afford to be too far in advance of his party.

The Principia was a weekly paper edited in New York by William Goodell. It served as the semiofficial organ of the Radical Abolitionist party and the Church Anti-Slavery Society. Goodell was an uninspiring writer and the Principia a rather dull paper. Its circulation was small, and Goodell was forced to suspend publication temporarily several times during the war and scrape up more money to keep his paper going. The Principia was suspended permanently in 1866.

In Rochester Frederick Douglass published his own newspaper, Douglass’ Monthly, until August 1863. The paper was the spokesman for northern Negroes and for the Douglass wing of the abolitionist movement. Another Negro newspaper was the Anglo-African, edited in New York by Robert Hamilton and James McCune Smith. The Anglo-African represented more narrowly than Douglass’ Monthly the interests of northern Negroes, especially of New York City Negroes, and was a little bit out of the main current of abolitionism. The paper was suspended in 1865 after the death of Smith. I. Garland Penn, The Afro-American Press and Its Editors (Springfield, Mass., 1891) supplies background information on the personalities of the Negro press during the Civil War era.

In May 1861, James Redpath began publishing in Boston a weekly newspaper called The Pine and Palm, organ of Redpath’s Haitian Emigration Bureau. The paper advocated traditional abolitionist doctrines plus voluntary emigration of American Negroes to Haiti. The Pine and Palm folded in October 1862, when the Haitian Emigration Bureau was dissolved.

In November 1865, George Stearns published the first issue of a Negro suffrage weekly newspaper called the Right Way, edited by Alpheus Crosby and William W. Thayer. Stearns financed the free distribution of 60,000 copies weekly until May 1866, when he began charging a subscription fee of $1 per year. Circulation promptly dropped to 30,000, where it remained until the paper was terminated after the passage of the first Reconstruction Act in March 1867.

The Revolution, a weekly newspaper published in New York, 1868-1870, and edited by E. C. Stanton and Parker Pillsbury, was the militant organ of the woman suffrage wing of the abolitionists.

Two religious journals edited by abolitionists during the 1860’s were the American Baptist, a small Baptist weekly edited in New York by Nathan Brown; and Zion’s Herald, published in Boston as the official organ of the New England Methodist Conference. Gilbert Haven became editor of Zion’s Herald in 1867, and continued in that post until 1872; this journal had a circulation of 16,000.

Most of the larger freedmen’s aid societies published monthly or quarterly journals recording their activities and exhorting the faithful to contribute more money. The three most important such journals were the American Missionary Magazine, organ of the A.M.A., published monthly throughout the Civil War and Reconstruction; the American Freedman, monthly organ of the American Freedmen’s Union Commission during its three-year existence, 1866-69; and The Freedmen’s Record, organ of the New England Freedmen’s Aid Society, published monthly from 1865-1868 and quarterly thereafter until it ceased publication in 1874.

B. Nonabolitionist Newspapers

The daily issues of the New York Tribune constituted one of the more important sources for this book. The Tribune published many speeches, letters, and articles by abolitionists, and occasionally printed news stories and editorials about antislavery leaders. From 1862 to 1866 the Tribune was, in part, an extension of the personality and ideas of its managing editor, Sydney Howard Gay. Gay resigned in 1866, but the Tribune continued to be a valuable source of information and opinion about radical activities after that time. Ralph Ray Fahrney, Horace Greeley and the Tribune in the Civil War (Cedar Rapids, Iowa, 1936), Harry W. Baehr, The New York Tribune since the Civil War (New York, 1936), and Glyndon G. Van Deusen, Horace Greeley, Nineteenth Century Crusader (Phila., 1953) furnish useful background information about the Tribune. Louis M. Starr, Bohemian Brigade: Civil War Newsmen in Action (New York, 1954) includes an excellent discussion of Gay’s connection with the Tribune.

The New York Times was the most important single source for the opinions of moderate Republicans about the abolitionists and their ideas. The excellent index of the Times from 1863 onward made it possible to find many valuable editorial comments and news stories about the abolitionists and the radicals. Although generally aligning itself with moderate Republicans, the Springfield Republican carried a weekly column by William S. Robinson (“Warrington”) throughout the entire Civil War and Reconstruction period, and Franklin Sanborn was a member of the Republican’s editorial staff from 1868 to 1872.

Scattered issues of the following newspapers and periodicals were also consulted for information relating to the abolitionists: the Boston Advertiser (moderate Republican); the Boston Courier (Whiggish); the Boston Herald (Democratic); the Boston Journal (Republican); the Chicago Times (Copperhead Democratic); the Chicago Tribune (Republican, tending to radicalism); the Cincinnati Gazette (Republican, leaning toward radicalism); the Cleveland Leader (Republican); the Columbus Crisis (Copperhead Democratic); the Continental Monthly (emancipationist); Harper’s Weekly (Republican); the Nation (Republican); the New York Evening Post (moderate Republican); the New York Herald (maverick Democratic and independent); the New York World (Democratic); the Philadelphia Press (Republican); the Washington Chronicle (Republican); and the Worcester Spy (radical Republican).

PAMPHLETS, BROADSIDES, SPEECHES, BOOKS, AND OTHER ABOLITIONIST PUBLICATIONS

The Annual Reports of the American Anti-Slavery Society for 1860 and 1861 (they were discontinued after 1861) contain information on the abolitionists’ attitude toward the Republican party, the election of 1860, and the secession crisis. The Proceedings of the American Anti-Slavery Society at Its Third Decade Anniversary Meeting in Philadelphia, December 3 and 4, 1863 (New York, 1864), includes much useful material on the abolitionists during the war. William Lloyd Garrison, The Abolitionists, and Their Relation to the War (Pulpit and Rostrum, nos. 26 and 27, New York, 1862), pp. 31-54; Wendell Phillips, The Philosophy of the Abolition Movement (New York, 1860); and Phillips, The War for the Union (New York, 1862) set forth the Garrisonian position toward the Republican party and the war. The Annual Reports of the Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society, 1860-1869, provide a useful compendium of the year-by-year reaction of abolitionists to the events of the Civil War and Reconstruction.

Abolitionists’ wartime pamphlets and books about West Indian emancipation are listed in footnote 2, Chapter VII of this book. The Annual Reports of the American Missionary Association, the New England Freedmen’s Aid Society, the National Freedmen’s Relief Association, and other freedmen’s aid societies document the yearly activities in the field of freedmen’s education.

The number of pamphlets, broadsides, printed letters and other published material produced by individual abolitionists during the Civil War and Reconstruction is immense. Gerrit Smith alone was the author of more than 40 broadsides and printed letters in the 1860’s, which have been bound and deposited with the Gerrit Smith Papers, SU. Speeches or sermons by such men as Wendell Phillips and George Cheever were frequently published in pamphlet form. For a useful although primitive bibliography of pamphlet material the reader is referred to John Russell Bartlett, The Literature of the Rebellion (Boston, 1866), which lists more than 6,000 titles, including hundreds of abolitionist items.

No effort will be made here to list every pamphlet or broadside consulted in the research for this book. Many of these items are cited in the footnotes. The following discussion will be confined to items of particular importance, interest, or relevance. John W. Alvord, Letters from the South, Relating to the Condition of the Freedmen, addressed to Major General O. O. Howard (Washington, 1870) were written while Alvord, superintendent of education for the Freedmen’s Bureau, was on a tour of the South in 1869-1870. Two books by the Negro abolitionist, William Wells Brown—The Black Man, His Antecedents, His Genius, and His Achievements (Boston, 1863), and The Rising Son (Boston, 1874)—argue the case for the Negro’s innate equality with the white man. David Lee Child, Rights and Duties of the United States Relative to Slavery under the Laws of War … (Boston, 1861) was an important exposition of the government’s power over slavery in wartime. Three books by Moncure Conway presented moving pleas for emancipation and equal rights: The Rejected Stone: or Insurrection vs. Resurrection in America (Boston, 1861); The Golden Hour (Boston, 1862); and Testimonies Concerning Slavery (2nd ed., London, 1865). The Emancipation League published the replies to its questionnaire on the condition and needs of freedmen within Union lines in a pamphlet entitled Facts Concerning the Freedmen, Their Capacity and Their Destiny (Boston, 1863). William Channing Gannett, “The Freedmen at Port Royal,” North American Review, CI (July 1865), 1-28 is an excellent article by a participant in the Port Royal experiment, setting forth soberly and incisively the difficulties and achievements of the freedmen’s aid enterprise. Most of the chapters in Thomas Wentworth Higginson’s classic Army Life in a Black Regiment (East Lansing, 1960, with an introduction by Howard Mumford Jones [1st ed., Boston, 1869]) had appeared as articles in the Atlantic Monthly from 1864 to 1867. Samuel Gridley Howe, The Refugees from Slavery in Canada West (Boston, 1864) is an interesting book growing out of Howe’s research among Canadian Negroes for the Freedmen’s Inquiry Commission. James Miller McKim, The Freedmen of South Carolina … (Phila., 1862) is a brief but shrewd appraisal of the possibilities of freedmen’s education by one of the leading abolitionist workers in the cause. Mary Traill Spence Putnam, Record of an Obscure Man (Boston, 1861) argues eloquently for the nobility of the African race. Linda W. Slaughter, The Freedmen of the South (Cincinnati, 1869), by a teacher of the A.M.A., is polemical, zealous, but nevertheless useful.

Charles Stearns, The Black Man of the South, and the Rebels (New York, 1872), a very revealing book, recounts the experiences of an abolitionist who went South after the war with the intention of buying and reselling land to the freedmen. George L. Stearns published two pamphlets in 1865 containing speeches by Phillips, Douglass, William D. Kelley, Henry Ward Beecher, and others urging Negro suffrage and equal rights: The Equality of All Men before the Law (Boston, 1865); and Universal Suffrage, and Complete Equality in Citizenship, The Safeguards of Democratic Institutions (Boston, 1865). Harriet Beecher Stowe, “The Education of Freedmen,” North American Review, CXXVIII (June 1879), 605-15, CXXIX (July 1879), 81-94 is a convenient and able summary of the record of the freedmen’s aid societies. Theodore Tilton, The Negro (New York, 1863) is a poetic and moving statement of the essential equality of the Negro race. William Whiting, The War Powers of the President, and the Legislative Powers of Congress in Relation to Rebellion, Treason, and Slavery (1st ed., Boston, 1862), the foremost statement of the war power argument, went through 42 subsequent editions, with additions, revisions, and changes in title.

MEMOIRS, AUTOBIOGRAPHIES, AND REMINISCENCES

There is a plethora of memoirs by abolitionists and antislavery leaders. Most of them conceal more than they reveal. Only those that were helpful in the preparation of this study will be listed here.

Elizabeth Botume, First Days Amongst the Contrabands (Boston, 1893) is an excellent book of reminiscences written by one of the best teachers at Port Royal. William Wells Brown, My Southern Home (Boston, 1880) is the somewhat episodical and sensationalist autobiography of an ex-slave who became a leader in the abolitionist movement. James Freeman Clarke, Anti-Slavery Days (New York, 1884) is anecdotal in nature, but supplies an occasional insight of value. Levi Coffin, Reminiscences (Cincinnati, 1880) includes much useful information on Coffin’s wartime efforts in behalf of freedmen’s relief in the West. Moncure D. Conway, Autobiography, Memoirs and Experiences (2 vols., Boston, 1904) is important for an understanding of this southern-born abolitionist. Frederick Douglass, Life and Times of Frederick Douglass (Hartford, 1884) is somewhat disorganized, and less helpful than had been anticipated. James R. Gilmore, Personal Recollections of Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War (Boston, 1898) contains useful information on the New York Tribune, Sydney Gay, and the Continental Monthly during the war. Two books of autobiographical and biographical sketches by Thomas Wentworth Higginson—Cheerful Yesterdays (Boston, 1898) and Contemporaries (Boston, 1899)—include several chapters about the abolitionist movement and the Civil War. Oliver Johnson, William Lloyd Garrison and His Times (2nd ed., Boston, 1885) is a valuable account of the Garrisonians by one of Garrison’s closest associates. George W. Julian, Political Recollections, 1840 to 1872 (Chicago, 1884) provided some insights on the relation of abolitionists to radical Republicans. John Mercer Langston, From the Virginia Plantation to the National Capital (Hartford, 1894) is long-winded but useful. Samuel J. May, Some Recollections of Our Anti-Slavery Conflict (Boston, 1869) is a carefully written and important book, of limited value for the period after 1861. Joseph Whiting Parker, “Memoirs,” typescript of MS written in 1880, supplied to the author by Parker’s granddaughter, Mrs. Perce J. Bentley, is rambling and frequently inaccurate, but is nonetheless a valuable account of a Boston abolitionist who had lived in the South briefly before the war, and returned there after the war as a representative of New England Baptist freedmen’s aid societies. George W. Smalley, Anglo-American Memories, 1st Series (London, 1911) contains a few anecdotes about Wendell Phillips. Lillie B. C. Wyman, American Chivalry (Boston, 1913) is also valuable for personal anecdotes about Phillips and other abolitionists.

BIOGRAPHIES

Henry Greenleaf Pearson, The Life of John A. Andrew (2 vols., Boston, 1904) is a comprehensive and valuable work containing much information about Andrew’s antislavery career and his relations with the abolitionists. Ida H. Harper, The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (3 vols., Indianapolis, 1898-1908) prints several letters which are unavailable elsewhere. Alma Lutz, Susan B. Anthony, Rebel, Crusader, Humanitarian (Boston, 1959) is an accurate and readable biography, although sometimes overly sympathetic to Miss Anthony. Octavius B. Frothingham, Memoir of William Henry Channing (Boston, 1886) quotes liberally from Channing’s diaries and letters. Robert M. York, George B. Cheever, Religious and Social Reformer, 1807-1890 (Orono, Me., 1955) is informative and accurate. Mary Elizabeth Burtis, Moncure Conway (New Brunswick, N.J., 1952) is a readable but sometimes inaccurate biography. Frank A. Rollin, Life and Public Services of Martin R. Delany (Boston, 1868) is a eulogistic but useful study of a Negro abolitionist. Giraud Chester, Embattled Maiden: The Life of Anna Dickinson (New York, 1951) is well written and informative, although undocumented. It should be supplemented for the Civil War years by James Harvey Young, “Anna Elizabeth Dickinson and the Civil War: For and Against Lincoln,” MVHR, XXI (June 1944), 59-80. Benjamin Quarles, Frederick Douglass (Washington, 1948) is a sound and valuable biography. William H. Pease, “William Channing Gannett, A Social Biography,” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Rochester, 1955 is a good study of one of the younger abolitionists who went to Port Royal in 1862.

Wendell P. Garrison and Francis J. Garrison, William Lloyd Garrison (4 vols., Boston, 1885-89), though marked by filial piety, is the basic source for an understanding of the Garrisonian abolitionist movement. The authors not only traced Garrison’s life in great detail, but brought together and published excerpts from hundreds of his letters and editorials. Two recent biographies, Walter M. Merrill, Against Wind and Tide: A Biography of William Lloyd Garrison (Cambridge, Mass., 1963), and John L. Thomas, The Liberator: William Lloyd Garrison (Boston, 1963) supersede earlier studies of Garrison.

Catherine H. Birney, The Grimké Sisters: Sarah and Angelina Grimké … (Boston, 1885) is old but serviceable. William Haven Daniels, Memorials of Gilbert Haven (Boston, 1880) is eulogistic, but valuable because of the many letters which it publishes. Carl Wittke, Against the Current, The Life of Karl Heinzen (Chicago, 1945) is an important study of this little-known German-American abolitionist. Mary Thacher Higginson, Thomas Wentworth Higginson (Boston, 1914) is better than the usual family biography. It should be supplemented by Tilden Edelstein, “Strange Enthusiasm: Thomas Wentworth Higginson, 1823-1877,” Ph.D. dissertation, Johns Hopkins University, 1961, and Anna Mary Wells, Dear Preceptor, The Life and Times of Thomas Wentworth Higginson (Boston, 1963). C. Carroll Hollis, “R. J. Hinton, Lincoln’s Reluctant Biographer,” The Centennial Review of Arts § Sciences, V (Winter 1961), 65-84 is an excellent biographical article, although unfortunately it is undocumented. John White Chadwick, Sallie Holley, A Life for Liberty (New York, 1899) is valuable for the many letters it prints. Harold Schwartz, Samuel Gridley Howe: Social Reformer (Cambridge, Mass., 1956) is accurate and helpful, but thin. Carol Brink, Harps in the Wind: The Story of the Singing Hutchinsons (New York, 1947) is an excellent biography of a family of musical abolitionists. Ira V. Brown, “Miller McKim and Pennsylvania Abolitionism,” Pennsylvania History, xxx (January 1963), 56-72, presents a skeletal outline of McKim’s career.

Irving H. Bartlett, Wendell Phillips: Brahmin Radical (Boston, 1961) is a first-rate piece of work and supersedes all earlier biographies of Phillips, including Oscar Sherwin’s Prophet of Liberty: The Life and Times of Wendell Phillips (New York, 1958) which is poorly written, uncritical, and unoriginal. Richard Hofstadter, “Wendell Phillips: The Patrician as Agitator,” in The American Political Tradition and the Men Who Made It (Vintage ed., New York, 1958), 137-63 is a stimulating and suggestive essay.

Abe C. Ravitz, “John Pierpont: Portrait of a Nineteenth Century Reformer,” Ph.D. dissertation, NYU, 1955, was moderately useful. Benjamin B. Hickok, “The Political and Literary Career of F. B. Sanborn,” Ph.D. dissertation, Michigan State University, 1953, is disappointing on the Civil War and Reconstruction years. Octavius B. Frothingham, Gerrit Smith (New York, 1879) is valuable chiefly for the letters and writings of Smith which it publishes. A more complete study of Smith is Ralph Volney Harlow, Gerrit Smith: Philanthropist and Reformer (New York, 1939). Alma Lutz, Created Equal: A Biography of Elizabeth Cady Stanton (New York, 1940) is less satisfactory than the same author’s study of Susan B. Anthony. Frank P. Stearns, The Life and Public Services of George Luther Stearns (Phila., 1907) is uncritical, but constitutes a vital source for an understanding of this important abolitionist, and prints many letters unavailable elsewhere. Larry Gara, “William Still and the Underground Railroad,” Pennsylvania History, XXVIII (Jan. 1961), 33-44 and Alberta S. Norwood, “Negro Welfare Work in Philadelphia, Especially as Illustrated by the Career of William Still,” M.A. thesis, University of Pennsylvania, 1931, provide helpful information on this Philadelphia Negro abolitionist. Edward L. Pierce, Memoir and Letters of Charles Sumner (4 vols., Boston, 1877-94) is a detailed and eulogistic study, containing many Sumner letters. It has been largely superseded for the pre-Civil War period by David Donald, Charles Sumner and the Coming of the Civil War (New York, 1960). Benjamin Thomas, Theodore Weld: Crusader for Freedom (New Brunswick, N.J., 1950) is an excellent biography, treating fully Weld’s return to the platform during the Civil War. A series of articles by Charles Kassel in Open Court, XXXIV (Sept. 1920), 564-69, XXXVII (Mar. 1923), 167-75, XXXVIII (July 1924), 406-18, XXXIX (Sept. 1925), 563-76, XLI (Apr. 1927), 239-56, and XLIII (Jan. 1929), 35-50 (Feb. 1929), 94-106 constitute the basic biographical sources for Edwin M. Wheelock, a New Hampshire abolitionist who lived in the South during and after the war. Samuel T. Pickard, Life and Letters of John Greenleaf Whittier (2 vols., New York, 1894) includes information on Whittier’s wartime activities. Phillip Wright and Elizabeth Wright, Elizur Wright: The Father of Life Insurance (Chicago, 1937) is a rather disappointing study of this interesting abolitionist.

MONOGRAPHS, ARTICLES, AND OTHER WORKS

Several studies touch lightly upon the subject of the abolitionists and the Negro in the 1860’s. William G. Cochrane, “Freedom without Equality: A Study of Northern Opinion and the Negro Issue, 1861-1870,” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Minnesota, 1957, is superficial and thin, but not without value. Two histories of the antislavery movement which deal briefly with abolitionism in the early war years are Dwight L. Dumond, Antislavery: The Crusade for Freedom in America (Ann Arbor, 1961), a polemical and uncritical work; and Lawrence Lader, The Bold Brahmins: New England’s War against Slavery, 1831-1863 (New York, 1961), which deals only with New England abolitionists and is inadequately researched. Benjamin Quarles, The Negro in the Civil War (Boston, 1953) is a readable and worthwhile study. The same author’s Lincoln and the Negro (New York, 1962) glosses over some of the anti-Lincoln sentiment among radical Negroes, while William O. Douglas, Mr. Lincoln and the Negroes: The Long Road to Equality (New York, 1963) is thin and not profound. Margaret Shortreed, “The Anti-Slavery Radicals, 1840-1868,” Past and Present, no. 16 (Nov. 1959), 67-87 is a Marxist interpretation of the revolutionary aspects of the antislavery movement. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage, History of Woman Suffrage (6 vols., New York, 1881-1922), vol. II, contains information on the activities of women abolitionists during the war and Reconstruction. Edith Ellen Ware, Political Opinion in Massachusetts during the Civil War and Reconstruction (New York, 1916) and T. Harry Williams, Lincoln and the Radicals (Madison, Wis., 1941) are important for an understanding of the political milieu in which the abolitionists operated.

Most of the northern Protestant denominations included a number of abolitionists among their leaders. The activities of these evangelicals are touched upon in Chester F. Dunham, The Attitude of the Northern Clergy toward the South, 1860-1865 (Toledo, 1942); Ralph E. Morrow, Northern Methodism and Reconstruction (East Lansing, 1956); William Warren Sweet, The Methodist Episcopal Church and the Civil War (Cincinnati, 1912); and Lewis G. Vander Velde, The Presbyterian Church and the Federal Union, 1861-1869 (Cambridge, Mass., 1932).

The basic studies of the 1860 election are Emerson D. Fite, The Presidential Campaign of 1860 (New York, 1911), which surveys all parties, and Reinhard H. Luthin, The First Lincoln Campaign (Cambridge, Mass., 1944), which concentrates primarily on the Republicans. Two excellent studies of the North during the secession winter are David M. Potter, Lincoln and His Party in the Secession Crisis (New Haven, 1942), and Kenneth M. Stampp, And the War Came: The North and the Secession Crisis, 1860-61 (Baton Rouge, 1950), both of which mention briefly the role of the abolitionists. Dwight L. Dumond, ed., Southern Editorials on Secession (New York, 1931) and Howard C. Perkins, ed., Northern Editorials on Secession (2 vols., New York, 1942) are valuable compilations of editorial opinion on the crisis. The Perkins volumes contain a great deal of material on the antiabolitionist attitudes of the northern conservative and Democratic press.

On the question of the Negro’s racial potential, William S. Jenkins, Pro-Slavery Thought in the Old South (Chapel Hill, 1935), Guion G. Johnson, “A History of Racial Ideologies in the United States with Reference to the Negro,” MS in the Schomburg Collection of the NYPL, Arthur Young Lloyd, The Slavery Controversy, 1831-1860 (Chapel Hill, 1939), and William R. Stanton, The Leopard’s Spots: Scientific Attitudes Toward Race in America, 1815-59 (Chicago, 1960), provide the necessary background for an understanding of the abolitionists’ attitude toward this issue. The anti-Negro, antiabolitionist sentiments of the northern workingman and Democrat are ably discussed in Williston Lofton, “Northern Labor and the Negro during the Civil War,” JNH, XXXIV (July 1949), 251-73; Albon P. Man, Jr., “Labor Competition and the New York Draft Riots of 1863,” JNH, XXXVI (1951), 375-405; and Emma L. Thornbrough, “The Race Issue in Indiana Politics during the Civil War,” Indiana Magazine of History, XLVII (June 1951), 165-88. For a sample of the many studies of wartime efforts to colonize the Negro abroad, see footnote 4, Chapter VII of this book.

There are several able monographs and articles which deal with the freedmen’s aid enterprise. Augustus F. Beard, A Crusade of Brotherhood, A History of the American Missionary Association (Boston, 1909), although old and eulogistic, is nevertheless valuable for an understanding of the A.M.A.’s work. George R. Bentley, A History of the Freedmen’s Bureau (Phila., 1955) supersedes earlier studies of the Bureau, and contains helpful information on the relation of the Bureau to the freedmen’s aid societies. Ira V. Brown, “Lyman Abbott and Freedmen’s Aid, 1865-1869,” JSH, xv (Feb. 1949) provides useful insights into the postwar activities of the freedmen’s associations. Richard Bryant Drake, “The American Missionary Association and the Southern Negro, 1861-1888,” Ph.D. dissertation, Emory University, 1957, is an excellent study, indispensable for an understanding of the A.M.A. Luther P. Jackson, “The Educational Efforts of the Freedmen’s Bureau and Freedmen’s Aid Societies in South Carolina, 1862-1872,” JNH, VIII (Jan. 1923), 1-40, is a thorough study, written from the Negro’s point of view. Julius H. Parmelee, “Freedmen’s Aid Societies, 1861-1871,” in Negro Education: A Study of the Private and Higher Schools for Colored People in the United States; U.S. Department of Interior, Bureau of Education Bulletin, 1916, no. 38, pp. 268-95 (Washington, 1917), is crammed full of facts, and supplies a framework for the study of freedmen’s education. William H. Pease, “Three Years Among the Freedmen: William C. Gannett and the Port Royal Experiment,” JNH, XLII (Apr. 1957), 98-117 discusses the experiences of a young Gideonite. Willie L. Rose, “Rehearsal for Reconstruction: The Port Royal Experiment,” Ph.D. dissertation, Johns Hopkins University, 1962, is an outstanding piece of work, indispensable for anyone interested in the Port Royal enterprise. This dissertation has recently been published by the Bobbs-Merrill Co. Henry Lee Swint, The Northern Teacher in the South, 1862-1870 (Nashville, 1941), although marred by a slight pro-southern bias and a certain superficiality, remains required reading for anyone working in this field. Bell Wiley, Southern Negroes, 1861-1865 (New Haven, 1938) contains a section on the transition of the Negro to freedom, written from the point of view of the southern white.

John Hope Franklin, The Emancipation Proclamation (New York, 1963) provides a detailed story of the formulation and execution of that historic edict. On the Negro as a soldier the standard work is Dudley T. Cornish, The Sable Arm: Negro Troops in the Union Army, 1861-1865. Cornish’s excellent bibliography lists additional secondary material on Negro troops. Ira V. Brown, “Pennsylvania and the Rights of the Negro, 1865-1887,” Pennsylvania History, XXVIII (Jan. 1961), 45-57, ably describes the efforts of abolitionists and Negroes to desegregate transportation facilities in Pennsylvania. Leon F. Litwack, North of Slavery (Chicago, 1961) is an excellent study of northern discrimination against the free Negro before the Civil War. John G. Sproat, “Blueprint for Radical Reconstruction,” JSH, XXIII (Feb. 1957), 25-44, is an able article discussing the work of the American Freedmen’s Inquiry Commission. Martin Abbott, “Free Land, Free Labor, and the Freedmen’s Bureau,” Agricultural History, xxx (1956), 150-56, portrays the efforts of the Bureau to settle freedmen upon land of their own. LaWanda Cox, “The Promise of Land for the Freedmen,” MVHR, XLV (Dec. 1958), 413-40, is a very good article discussing the various wartime proposals for providing the freedmen with land. Edwin D. Hoffman, “From Slavery to Self-Reliance,” JNH, XLI (Jan. 1956) recounts the fate of the freedmen who were assigned lands along the South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida coast under Sherman’s Order no. 15. Patrick W. Riddleberger, “George W. Julian: Abolitionist Land Reformer,” Agricultural History, V (July 1955), 108-15, summarizes Julian’s efforts to obtain confiscation-homestead legislation for the freedmen.

Ruhl Jacob Bartlett, John C. Frémont and the Republican Party (Columbus, 1930) includes a helpful account of Frémont’s candidacy for the presidency in 1864. William F. Zornow, Lincoln and the Party Divided (Norman, Okla., 1954) is the best general account of the election of 1864. Important works on Reconstruction include Howard K. Beale, The Critical Year: A Study of Andrew Johnson and Reconstruction (2nd ed., New York, 1958); LaWanda Cox and John H. Cox, Politics, Principle, and Prejudice, 1865-1866 (New York, 1963); Leslie H. Fishel, Jr., “Northern Prejudice and Negro Suffrage, 1865-1870,” JNH, XXXIX (Jan. 1954), 8-26; William B. Hesseltine, Lincoln’s Plan of Reconstruction (Tuscaloosa, Ala., 1960); Joseph B. James, The Framing of the Fourteenth Amendment (Urbana, Ill., 1956); Charles H. McCarthy, Lincoln’s Plan of Reconstruction (New York, 1901); and Eric L. McKitrick, Andrew Johnson and Reconstruction (Chicago, 1960). John G. Sproat, “Party of the Center: The Politics of Liberal Reform in Post-Civil War America,” Ph.D. dissertation, U. of Cal., 1959, portrays the growing dissatisfaction of several liberals with Reconstruction after 1867. Jacobus Ten-Broek, The Antislavery Origins of the Fourteenth Amendment (Berkeley, 1951) gives the legal and legislative background of the equal protection and other important clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment. The standard work on the 1868 election is Charles H. Coleman, The Election of 1868: the Democratic Effort to Regain Control (New York, 1933), which deals primarily with the Democratic party. Republican activities are treated in William B. Hesseltine, Ulysses S. Grant, Politician (New York, 1935). John M. Mathews, Legislative and Judicial History of the Fifteenth Amendment (Baltimore, 1909) is old and inadequate. It should be supplemented by William Gillette, “The Power of the Ballot: the Politics of the Passage and Ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment,” Ph.D. dissertation, Princeton University, 1963.

* For the sake of brevity the following abbreviations are used to designate the repositories of manuscript collections: AAS (The American Antiquarian Society, Worcester, Mass.); BPL (The Boston Public Library); CU (Columbia University Library); Cornell (Cornell University Library); HU (Houghton Library, Harvard University); LC (Library of Congress); MHS (Massachusetts Historical Society); NYHS (New York Historical Society); NYPL (New York Public Library); RU (Rochester University Library); SC (Smith College Library); SU (Syracuse University Library); VHS (Vermont Historical Society). The following abbreviations are used to designate periodicals: JNH (Journal of Negro History); JSH (Journal of Southern History); MVHR (Mississippi Valley Historical Review).