Rosetta Douglass to Frederick and Anna Murray Douglass, September 24, 1862
Salem[, N.J.] 24 Sept[ember] 1862[.]
My DEAR FATHER AND MOTHER
I anxiously awaited an answer to my last letter and last evening was
greeted with one,1Douglass’s letter to his daughter has not survived. it found me in a new home. Father your conjectures were right—when you supposed my home with Uncle2A reference to Perry Wilmer. was growing unpleasant—My reason for not saying much of them [earlier] was because I could not speak of them as I had done and I did not wish to utter any more complaints—for two reasons, 1st because I told you much of my disappointment in Philadelphia, that I thought if I began to utter morefrom here you would begin to think me a great fault finder, and 2d I was anxious to obtain this situation since I was from home to make a beginning when if I should come home and I should want to get another place would have money to start out with without calling on you for I thought if I was not successful after having asked you to give me a little start you would not feel like risking again so that I was determined to make one desperate effort even if I did undergo a few hardships, though when I begin to enumerate these trials they will appear trifling to those you have undergone. I am now with a family of the name of Gibbs3Rosetta Douglass was probably boarding in Salem with the family of Joseph Gibbs (c. 1831-?), an African American born in Maryland, who worked as a steward. In 1860, Gibbs’s household included not only his wife, Sarah (c. 1834-?), and their infant, but also Anna M. Brown (ca. 1810) and her daughter Tacy (c. 1848-?). 1860 U.S. Census, New Jersey, Salem County, 64-65. friends of Mrs Reckless!4Amy Hester Reckless. During my stay in Uncle’s family they never exacted board from me not from the time I went there until I left when I had money the most of it went in the family. [I]f I had not done so I should many times have gone supperless to bed as Uncle is busy paying for his house and his family were obliged to just live on as little as possible. When I went there I found they had but one towel and every body used it I could not get use to that, I bought three towels. I found that while I was going to bed the rest remained in the dark and as I usually take my time when I am in my room I was often hurried so that I bought myself Candles which the family used also: and so I went on getting little things when I had money only saving enough for myself to buy my paper and ink and postage stamps and thread, this I considered with what saving I could do would go towards my board. [S]ee the money that I made in my little school last summer amounted to nearly ten dollars. [A]ll went in the family except what I spent for my paper and stamps, so that I feel I have been more a help than a hindrance to them with the $10— you sent, and they tell I have done more for them than Uncle’s own daughters, that is the reason I did not say anything about that, viz. the board money. But towards the end my reasons for becoming disconsolate are these, Uncle’s wife was repeatedly
asking me questions about my former habits. [S]he had heard I was not altogether what I should be, I was driven from my home on account of my growing intimacy with men,5Stories about Rosetta, especially regarding her supposed “growing intimacy with men,” and the possibility that such behavior was the real motivation behind Rosetta’s leaving her parents’ home in Rochester, were more than likely sparked by rumors that began circulating following Louise Tobias Dorsey’s public outburst on that subject months earlier in Philadelphia. The resulting gossip probably contributed to Rosetta’s decision to seek employment in Salem, New Jersey. The move apparently failed to silence the rumors, and the stories continued to spread. Rosetta Douglass to FD, 4 April 1862, General Correspondence File, reel 1, frames 713-17, FD Papers, DLC; Sterling, , 138-39. and again on account of my quarrelsome disposition towards my mother that there was some minister had come from Rochester who was acquainted knew of you having been obliged to send me away, and some Lucy Oliver6Although Rosetta identified the source of those rumors about her that originated in New Bedford as coming from “some Lucy Oliver,’ efforts to discover anyone by that name living in either New Bedford or Bristol County, Massachusetts, at the time in question bear questionable results. Given Rosetta’s apparent unfamiliarity with “Lucy Oliver,’ it is possible that she might have confused the name. There were two women named Oliver living in New Bedford in 1862. Born in Massachusetts, Lucy A. Oliver (c. 1822-81) was the wife of Aberdeen Oliver, an English-born stevedre and the mother of six. A dressmaker, Sarah A. Oliver (c. 1837-?) and her husband, Richard W. Oliver, a barber, were both black natives of Virginia. (New Bedford, Mass., 1859), 135; 1860 U.S. Census, Massachusetts, Bristol County, 71, 144 ; 1865 Massachusetts State Census, Bristol County, New Bedford, 65.from New Bedford had said I was in New Bedford living at our Martha Fletchers'7An African American native of New Bedford, Massachusetts, Martha Bailey Fletcher (c. 1811-75) was a confectioner by trade. The daughter of Abram and Rebecca Bailey, she married David S. Fletcher, a founding member of the antislavery New Bedford Union Society, in 1839. A widow by 1841, Martha Bailey Fletcher opened her home at 19 North Street to noarders, one of whom is known to have been William Wells Brown's daugher Josephine. 1840 U.S. Census, Massachusetts, Bristol County, 230; , 3 vols. (Boston, 1932), 2:38; Kathryn Grover, (Amherst, Mass., 2001), 122; Sterling, , 144-46. but had gone astray from there and my father had come and removed me, he had taken much pains with my education having taken me to England for that purpose. This part of the story I knew who was meant Wm Brown’s daughter8Known as Josephine Brown, Elizabeth Josephine Brown (1839-74) was the youngest daughter of William Wells Brown and his first wife, Elizabeth Schooner. Josephine was born in Buffalo, New York, but after her parents separated in 1847, she and her older sister Clarissa were taken by their father to New Bedford, Massachusetts, where they were enrolled in public school and placed in the home of a local black family. By 1850, Josephine was living with Martha Bailey Fletcher. The following year, William Wells Brown arranged to have his daughters join him, briefly, in England before placing them in a boarding school in Calais, France. In 1853 both sisters passed the Home Colonial School examination and were admitted to the Preceptor’s College in London, where they trained to become schoolteachers. A year later, Josephine (then only age fifteen) was mistress of the East Plumstead School in Woolwich, England, where she was in charge of over one hundred pupils. In 1855, she left her teaching position and returned to the United States (she was escorted on the trip by Horace Greeley), where she joined her father, who had moved to Boston. In the months that followed, Josephine Brown accompanied her father on the lecture circuit, and that December she published Biography of an American Bondsman, a biography of her father that she had begun writing while a student in Calais. In 1856, after a brief lecture tour of her own, Josephine Brown is thought to have returned to England, but at the time of her death, she was staying in Cambridge, Massachusetts (where her father and step-mother lived), and was known as Mrs. E. Josephine Brown Campbell. 1850 U.S. Census, Massachusetts, Bristol County, 230; William L. Andrews, (New York, 1991), xxxiv-xxxv; Sterling, , 144-47; (online). I supposed the girl meant. I was questioned had I been in New Bedford, did I know the Fletcher’s, I told them yes New Bedford was by birth place but I left when but little more than a baby. I knew of Mrs Fletcher that she was a lady of respectability living there but I was too small to have any recollection of her, That was enough I had been in New Bedford [illegible] of Mrs Fletcher the fact is not beleived that I left a mere child and the story goes, I wanted the school and I became a little frightened about these stories but did not heed them much as those circulating them I cared little for until some of the Quakers getting hold of some little came and questioned me, where was thee born? [W]as thy father married to Perry’s sister9Presumably Anna Murray Douglass. before he left Slavery? [A]nd many more inquisitive questions. One day a lady and daughter called and talked about many things questioning mostly about my school in Claysville as those in that district were very low indeed the daughter said I wonder at thee going there to teach them. I told her I did not feel the least ashamed of the task admitting that they were of course much neglected and were quite low and degraded. She curled her lip she said I would not care to go to school with such children and would not be engaged in teaching there[.] She could not do it she was sure. I was, quite indignant then and I tried to show as well as I could that much of degradation was owing to The white’s, much was said on both sides. A week or so afterwards Uncle who having heard the conversation repeated by some one came home and told me he had not liked it. I asked why, but he could say no more he did not think it was proper to say such things to persons who were our friends and a number of things he said were not worth while to mention for I know he did not understand me or the Quakers whose name are Gibbons.10Probably members of the family of Anna Denn Gibbons (1811-92). Following the death of her husband, William Gibbons, Anna returned to Salem in the 1840s. The Denn and Gibbons families were Quakers, and Anna Gibbons’s mother had at one time been recognized as a minister in the Society of Friends by the Salem meeting. By 1862, Anna Denn Gibbons’s household would have included her daughter Susan Gibbons as well as her sisters Susan Denn and Mrs. Rachel Denn Griscom. 1850 U.S. Census, New Jersey, Salem County, 132; 1870 U.S. Census, New Jersey, Salem County, 176; Thomas Shourds, (Bridgeton, N.J., 1876), 236; , 2 vols. (New York, 1900), 2:27. I told him I should certainly say what I thought when people speak so Carelessly of Slavery. Well he says you cannot speak here I saw he was cross and said many things concerning these stories about me that I need not mention here, but I certainly did not wish to hear them and as soon as I could conveniently proceeded to go to my room, when
his wife!11Elizabeth Wilmer. jumped up and dodged me first one way and then another to prevent my going up stairs, I seated myself and waited patiently her [illegible] and seized another opportunity and started up when she followed accusing me of closing my door in her face and shook her fist in my face saying what she should do if I did it again. I knew I closed the door but she had seated herself then and was dressing her baby and knowing just how she was to the door, I laughed and said you seem determined to have a little row with me Aunt Lizzy for I left you to escape and you have followed me here. I thought I had made a pretty mistake in the character of the household and if it were not that I was soon to be employed I would not have staid. I remained until now which is three weex Since The above happened she did not wish me to go off then although I spoke of doing so as she said Uncle had promised himself if I left he should report it that I was saucy and was quite unruly and as he went among those who had shown a friendly interest for me she [illegible] I had better leave quietly. I yeilded though I blamed her for many things that was said that day and for Uncle’s singular behavior for some time for I began to distrust her over fondness for me. During this time three weeks she after persisting on my staying was more exacting and overbearing than ever and last sunday coming in my bed room for something she on going down stairs left my door open after I heard the bottom door close I closed mine returned to my seat and scarcely seated before she was up and by me shaking her fist in my face accusing me of closing the door in her face again, lately it has been a great way with her to shake her fist in my face. I left her and went down stairs out of her way she followed I said nothing to her. I started up again she followed and prevented me I went out doors and staid and determined to find a place to board. I have done so, Monday she shook me as if I were a child and threatened to pitch me out doors and my washing after me I was washing preparing to leave, I washed took my things [illegible] [letter fragment ends here]
ALf: General Correspondence File, reel 1, frames 736-40, FD Papers, DLC.