FREDERICK DOUGLASS TO WILLIAM THOMAS¹William Thomas (1789–1882) was the great-grandson, and bore the name, of William Thomas, a merchant adventurer of London who traded with the Pilgrims of the American colonies. His father, Joshua Thomas, served in the Revolutionary War as an aide-de-camp of General John Thomas of Kingston. Joshua married Isabella Stevenson of Boston, and they had three children: John Boles, William, and Joshua B. William graduated from Harvard in 1807 and went on to study law with his father in Plymouth, Massachusetts. In 1816 he married Sarah Warren Sever, and they had a daughter, Ann Sever Thomas. William practiced law in Plymouth and edited the Old Colony Memorial for several years while writing editorials for the North American Review. He was also well known for his abolitionist views and friendship with Garrison, Phillips, and Douglass. William Thomas to Douglass, 6 April 1877, Miscellaneous Manuscripts, Plymouth Historical Society; Boston Daily Advertiser, 22 September 1882.

Washington[,] D.C. 9 April 1877.

WM THOMAS ESQ.

MY DEAR SIR,

I have received during the past few weeks many kind notes of congratulation upon my appointment & confirmation as U.S. [M]arshal of the District of [Co]lumbia, but I have received none which I value more highly
or have read with more satisfaction than yours. Please accept my thanks
for your letter & remember me kindly to those dear grand children.²Ann Sever Thomas Whitman (1817–55) married William H. Whitman of Plymouth, probably around 1848. Ann and William had three children, Isabella (b. 1849), Elisabeth (b. 1851), and William (b. 1853). Both Isabella and Elisabeth were living with their grandfather, William, as late as 1880. It appears that neither of them ever married, and they continued living with each other in Plymouth until at least 1930, both retaining the name Whitman. After Ann’s death, William Jr. continued to live with his father, who remarried sometime between 1855 and 1860. In 1888, William Jr. married a woman named Alice from New Orleans and listed himself as a cotton merchant. 1860 U.S. Census, Massachusetts, Plymouth County, 33; 1880 U.S. Census, Massachusetts, Plymouth County, 502D; 1900 U.S. Census, Massachusetts, Plymouth County, B12; Find a Grave (online). I
well remember their noble mother. I see her as she appeared five & thirty
years ago.

I give you joy that so much of her remains at your fireside in the persons of your grand-daughters to cheer you in your advanced age.—Your
letter viewed in connection with your years, is a marvel. There are no
marks of eighty nine years upon it. You seem about as well preserved as
was Humboldt³Alexander von Humboldt (1769–1859), German (Prussian) geographer, studied mineralogy at the University of Frankfurt and at the University of Gottingen and then worked for the Prussian government as the superintendent of mines. From 1799 through 1803, Humboldt traveled extensively in the Americas, where he studied the natural world and developed his holistic theory of nature, which integrated the study of biology, geology, geophysics, archaeology, and meteorology. The work resulting from his travels and extensive study was published in thirty-three volumes collectively titled Le voyage aux régions équinoxiales du Nouveau Continent (1805–34). Humboldt continued to travel in Mexico, Peru, and Cuba, enhancing human knowledge of the natural world. Living to age ninety, he was regarded as one of the founders of modern empirical scientific methods as well as the founder of the modern science of geography. Gerard Helferich, Humboldt’s Cosmos: Alexander von Humboldt and the Latin American Journey That Changed the Way We See the World (New York, 2004); The McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia of World Biography, 12 vols. (New York, 1973), 3: 1100–03. at your age. How glad I should be to see you and talk over
the age of events through which we have passed & the world of people
we have known in common. Although I am little, if any, over sixty, I have
lived more than many who have lived longer. Once a slave—then a man
now a marshal!—

I do not forget that in my upward march from slavery to freedom,
from chattleship to manhood, I have been greatly assisted by the Harlows,⁴The Harlow family had resided in Plymouth since the middle of the seventeenth century. The family of Ephraim Harlow (1770–1858) was known for its abolitionist persuasions, and Ephraim was an early agent in the American Anti-Slavery Society. Most of Ephraim’s daughters married into other local abolitionist families in the area. Zilpha married Nathaniel Bourne Spooner and became a nurse during the Civil War. Though she died young, Desire Harlow was noted by the Liberator for her faithful and spirited dedication to abolitionism. One story has it that as children, the Harlows walked about Plymouth with wooden boxes collecting money for the Juvenile Anti-Slavery Society as early as 1829. Andrea M. Daly, Self Guided Tour: Abolitionists of Plymouth (Bradenton, Fla., 2015), 15–16; Kara Wilson, “Discovering Plymouth Through Women’s Stories,” Worcester’s Women’s History Project, wwhp.org; Find a Grave (online).
the Spooners,⁵An allusion to the family of Bourne Spooner (1790–1870). Spooner was a Massachusetts abolitionist who founded and operated the Plymouth Cordage Company. On account of his philanthropic nature and strong character, Spooner was well liked by both his fellow abolitionists and his employees. Spooner was a strong advocate for the abolitionists, organizing meetings and inviting many into his home. William Lloyd Garrison and Wendell Phillips enjoyed his company. Spooner was an avid, well-known storyteller, and he often regaled guests late into the night. William Lloyd Garrison spoke at his funeral. D. Hamilton Hurd, comp., History of Plymouth County, Massachusetts, with Biographical Sketches of Many of Its Pioneers and Prominent Men (Philadelphia, 1884), 187; Garrison and Garrison, William Lloyd Garrison, 3: 313, 412, 4: 254; Abby Morton Diaz, “A Plymouth Pilgrimage,” New England Magazine, 7: 14, 17 (September 1889); Merrill and Ruchames, Garrison Letters, 6: 55. the Kendalls,⁶The Kendall family played an important role in the antislavery movement in Plymouth. The Reverend James Kendall (1769–1859) was the pastor of Plymouth’s First Church, which was affiliated with the Unitarians. He allowed the basement of the church to be used for lectures and fairs to raise money for the antislavery movement. His daughter Julia Kendall (1825–74) was noted for having joined the Juvenile Anti-Slavery Society in the 1830s and serving as a civil war nurse. William Richard Cutter, Genealogical and Personal Memoirs Relating to the Families of Boston and Eastern Massachusetts, 3 vols. (New York, 1908), 1:314; Hannah Anderson Ropes, Civil War Nurse: The Diary and Letters of Hannah Ropes, ed. John R. Brumgardt (Knoxville, Tenn., 1993), 54. the Russells,⁷There were a number of Russell families in eastern Massachusetts with strong ties to the abolitionist movement. The wealthy carriage manufacturer and Congregationalist church elder George W. Russell of Worcester served as a vice president of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society in 1836–37 and later published a weekly newspaper, the Massachusetts Abolitionist. He also represented Plymouth County in the state assembly in 1838 and again in 1855. Russell was an early member of both the Free Soil and Republican parties. The Congregationalist minister Philemon R. Russell (1807–83) of Watertown was a founding member of the New England Anti-Slavery Society in 1832 and lectured for the American Anti-Slavery Society in 1838–39. Thomas Russell (1825–87), a lawyer from Plymouth noted for his antislavery views, had the privilege of bringing Douglass’s confirmation of Lincoln’s issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation on New Year’s Eve Day 1863. Russell and his wife were friends of John Brown and had sheltered him in their home for a week in 1857 to prevent his apprehension by federal marshals. The Thomas Russells visited Brown in his Charlestown, Virginia, jail cell the day before he was executed. Caleb A. Wall, Reminiscences of Worcester from the Earliest Period, Historical and Genealogical (Worcester, Mass., 1877), 286; William Lincoln, History of Worcester, Massachusetts: From Its Earliest Settlement to September 1836 (Worcester, Mass., 1837), 317; Charles Nutt, History of Worcester and Its People, 2 vols. (New York, 1919), 2: 725, 804; Merrill and Ruchames, Garrison Letters, 2: 13, 310, 5: 478. the Mortons,⁸Edwin Morton (1832–1900) was an occasional poet and active abolitionist from Massachusetts. After graduating from Harvard in 1855, Morton easily found employment as a tutor. One of his first clients was Gerrit Smith. While in Smith’s employment, Morton became acquainted with John Brown and was present when Brown presented his audacious plan to capture Harpers Ferry to his closest friends on 22 February 1859. To escape the possibility of having to testify against Brown and his accomplices, Morton fled to Europe in 1859 and remained there until the following year. Because of ill health, Morton could not join the Union war effort, and remained on the home front. Edwin’s brother Ichabod was also a noted abolitionist and temperance crusader in Plymouth. Ichabod’s daughter Abigail carried the abolitionist torch into the next generation and from an early age was part of the Juvenile Anti-Slavery Society in Plymouth in the 1830s. Boston Transcript, 1, 2 April 1904; Edward J. Renehan, Jr., The Secret Six: The True Tale of the Men Who Conspired with John Brown (New York, 1995), 127, 141–45, 205–06; Rossbach, Ambivalent Conspirators, 124, 139, 141–42, 199, 220, 241; Franklin Sanborn, “John Brown and his Friends,” Atlantic Monthly, 30: 50–61 (July 1872); Abby Morton Diaz, “Antislavery Times in Plymouth,” New England Magazine, 20: 225 (April 1899); “Edwin Morton” (obituary), Harvard Graduates Magazine, 8: 561 (June 1900). the Stephenses⁹The Stephens family played key roles in the founding of the antislavery movement in Plymouth. Abigail Morton recalled that it was in the home of her Aunt Phebe (Stephens) Cotton that the Plymouth Anti-Slavery Society was inaugurated. Sarah Stephens served as the secretary for the women’s branch of the group, and her father, Lemuel (b. 1786), husband of Sally Morton, was instrumental in organizing the men’s branch of the society. It is also claimed that the Stephens home served as a station for runaway slaves on the Underground Railroad. Daly, Self Guided Tour, 2; Merrill and Ruchames, Garrison Letters, 3: 571–72; Diaz, “Antislavery Times in Plymouth,” 20: 225.
& the Thomases¹⁰The Thomas family of eastern Massachusetts included many early Harvard graduates and Revolutionary War veterans. John Boies Thomas (?–1852) was a subscriber to the Liberator from the paper’s inception and made his home central to the abolition movement in Plymouth. Thomas was also president of the Old Colony National Bank of Plymouth, a member of the state constitutional convention of 1820, and a militia colonel, seeing service in 1814. His widow, Mary Howland Thomas, was also an ardent abolitionist and Underground Railroad agent. Francis R. Stoddard, Jr., “Old Thomas House at Plymouth,” Massachusetts Magazine: Devoted to Massachusetts History, Genealogy, and Biography, 3: 271 (October 1910). of Plymouth—Plymouth kindly heard the story of the
wrongs of my people from my [illegible] lips & cheered me with its sympathy when all was dark & cheerless in the land. I shall never forget this.

You will be glad to know that though the local opposition to my appointment to the Marshalship of the National Capital was fierce & bitter,
I now discern no trace of it in the conduct of those with whom my office

brings me in contact. My life has been thus far largely devoted to the work
of removing prejudice, and I suppose it will be so to the end.

Very truly & gratefully yours

FREDERICK DOUGLASS

ALS: Miscellaneous Manuscripts, Plymouth Historical Society, Plymouth, Massachusetts.