| Notes |
- "Jane and Isaac Cyrus were free blacks among 172 other free blacks and thousands of slaves in Page County in 1833. Over time, they had 15 children--including twin sons named for Isaac and his brother Jacob. The sons were carpenters-joiners. The son Jacob married Lucy Broadus sand they in turn, had Charles, Mary, John and Bertha." --Delnora originally shared this on 10 Jun 2012. https://www.ancestry.com/mediaui-viewer/collection/1030/tree/177271836/person/282328626865/media/851569ee-3e2e-42cf-bc38-ce6a7cfa492a?_phsrc=ZaV1033&usePUBJs=true
1833. I live at the foot of a mountain in Page County, Virginia. When I rise, I wash off with cold water brought up from the spring the evening before. I move quickly so I can get to work before it’s too light. Don’t want to waste time, want everything to go smoothly. We’re digging potatoes in the back garden, up against the mountain where all the root vegetables are planted.
We our own land, but some of us are “bound out”-working for the big farmers. It’s how we buy land, its sometimes how we buy our freedom . Mostly, the 176 free blacks1 in Page County are making it. It’s beautiful country, but life is hard. Some part of the hard has to do with having to be careful…people might think we belong to someone too…and snatch us up. And, there is that space we don’t talk about much, you know, the space between us-free and slave. How did I get here, them there? How did the other 1742 free blacks get free in Shenandoah County on the other side of this mountain?
By the time the sun is up, most of our free men have gone to work at Philip Long’s, George Price’s, John Brubaker’s, or Henry Forvier’s farms alongside the slaves.3 They’ll all work til sunset. Living here in what they will later call the “near North”, life is different from one on a large plantation. We don’t grow tobacco around here-that’s further South, never mind cotton. Some of the free men of color, as they are sometimes called, get mill work, some are carpenters or joiners and apprentices. Carl Cyrus is a teamster, Washington and Frank Broadus, tanners. Hamp Broadus helped put the railroad through Harrisonburg and later he’ll be able to sell land to Henry Johnson for their home place. Some say Hamp makes money just by buying places now and selling them later. Don’t know how he figured out to do all that-but those Broadus’ are a smart lot. They also know to make the most out of that name-especially since it’s real prominent over in Caroline County and other parts. Can’t help but wonder how Lucy Broadus and all ten members of her family became “Smiths” when the County Commissioner of Revenue was making a list of free blacks earlier this year.4 Was it to make sure they didn’t get shipped back to Africa with other free blacks?
Maybe our lives have a different quality because of the Quakers and Mennonites. They even share a worship place-- sometimes the Mennonites use Mauck’s Meeting House in Hamburg, sometimes the Baptists use it, but still, a lot of them have slaves.
After a hard day’s work in the field, I look forward to having something good to eat-even though it is tiring-the wood may already be cut and stacked, but I still have to set up the hearth and fry those apples and bacon. Tonight we also have some leftover cornbread and catfish Isaac caught Sunday. With all the wild turkey, rabbits, deer and game in the mountain, we eat well all year long.
I like the evening best after all else is done. I can just sit and rock a little while and listen to the night sounds. The crickets and frogs down by the river are so loud that when I was little I imagined they were growing into giants and would soon carry me off. My granny said it wouldn’t be long before I’d have my own family--and then I wouldn’t be sitting around dreaming much because my hands would be occupied all the time. She was right. Back then I thought Isaac was real sweet. He thought I was too. I had my first child when I was 13.
1850: Virginia is not comfortable with so many free blacks all over the place. So many? About 300 in Page County. In fact, Virginia is willing to help send free blacks to the west coast of Africa. Over 83% of the black people of Page County or 1,427 black people are enslaved5 . It could be worse. Not one Indian is left. The “Native” Americans are all gone. They moved with the frontier-the last families left when the frontier moved over these mountains west and south fifty years back. Besides that, they were on the wrong side of the British-American War of 1812. They paid big for that loss. Many times over.
This shipping out talk has been going on awhile. Virginia’s law people asked the Washington law people way back in 1816 to settle free blacks somewhere else. The subject came up not long ago when I was helping with salt curing some meat over at Saul Gibbonds6. There are a lot of slaves over there-mostly men. Talking low about leaving. They heard about a Colonization Board in Richmond-and were worried about getting caught up in a shipment. Ain’t that something. I told them they had less to worry about than me. They have more “value” as slaves, after all, they are somebody’s property and nobody wants to ship out their property. But someone like me? All us free people are worrisome, visual reminders of folks chasing “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
So I keep working and thinking. Nobody can legally ship slaves in anymore-they only way to get more slaves is to buy, breed or kidnap them. I worry most about that cause I have six children of my own now and one on the way and chillrun can’t fight off a kidnapper easy or explain that they are “ really free” if they not.
Isaac, my husband, he’s a carpenter and he’s real good. Don’t bother nobody. Just does his work. I mostly stay at home, but I hear things. I take it all in. That’s how we make it. That’s how we make it.
1852: Heard 69 free persons of color over 10 years of age and 49 under ten were shipped on the “Linda Stewart”7 from Norfolk and some place called Baltimore. The State Auditor okayed payment of $285 for the shipment. Also heard about a meeting where the Colonization Board was going to consider payment of $1,100 for 22 free Negroes to Liberia.8 That’s a lot of money. They must really want us gone. I wonder how often these meetings take place? The Auditor for the County says there are 343 free blacks9 in Page County now.
1860: Not as many slaves around here anymore--437.10 Some have worked their way free. Others are just…gone. Over 1000 since 1850. Where? Just about as many free people of color as enslaved are left. Isaac and I did our part: all told, we had 15 Cyrus children.
Ever since that John Brown stirred up folks and then got himself hung last year for that raid at Harper’s Ferry arsenal, people have been nervous. White and black. When white folks get jumpy, black folks get scarce. He had a plan-but nothing worked out right. No telling what might happen now. There’s talk of some of the deep south states setting up on their own. If I could see into the future, I’d know it would only be a year before we were at war with one another-what Northerners call the Civil War-and that troops from both sides would be riding all through these mountains. I’d know that within three years the President would declare slaves free in the fall away states, in five years it would be over-and the long promised freedom for all would be a reality-at least on paper.
If I could see into the future, I’d relish knowing my children’s children would go to school in a little one-room school house here in Salem. They would learn to read and write using McGuffey readers five months of the year.11 If I could see into the future, I’d say the barriers between those of us free and those of us enslaved, would evaporate and that equally, we’d seek our destinies in faraway places like Hagerstown, MD and Wheeling, W. VA. We would venture out west to Springfield and Columbus, Ohio or north to Pittsburgh, Harrisburg or Philadelphia. Some would go to the capital in Washington, D.C. All would carry with them forever, a part of the home place, a part of the Blue Ridge, a part of the Marksville District, Salem, Hamburg, Leakesville, Alma communities of Luray, Virginia.
…The family of the real Isaac and Jane Cyrus lived in Page County, Virginia between 1813 and the 1870s; one of their twin sons, Jacob, married Lucy Broadus and their children included Charley, Mary, John and Bertha. Liberties have been taken in reconstructing parts of their lives.
Notes:
11833 Page County List of Free Negroes and Mulattoes, p. 5 Archives of the Library of Virginia, Richmond, VA
21833 Shenandoah List of Free Negroes, p. 10 Archives of the Library of Virginia, Richmond, VA
3Schedule 2, Some owners-Slave Inhabitants in District 49, Page County, July 8-Oct 5, 1850, Archives of the Library of Virginia, Richmond, VA
41833 Page County List of Free Negroes and Mulattoes, p 4, Archives of the Library of Virginia, Richmond, VA
5Schedule 2, Slave Inhabitants in District 49, Page County, July 8-Oct 5, 1850, Archives of the Library of Virginia, Richmond, VA
6Schedule 2, an owner -Slave Inhabitants in District 49, Page County, July 8-Oct 5, 1850, Archives of the Library of Virginia, Richmond, VA
7Auditors Records Dec. 1852, Nov., 1851 Colonization Board, Archives of the Library of Virginia, Richmond, VA
8Auditors Records, November 15, 1853Auditors Records, Colonization Board, Archives of the Library of Virginia, Richmond, VA
91852 List of Free Negroes & Mulattoes Within the County of Page for 1852 for the Auditor (Alphabetical)
10Schedule 2, Slave inhabitants in District 1, Page County, June 10-Sept 19th, 1860, Archives of the Library of Virginia, Richmond, VA
11The Virginia Public School Register, Salem School No. 7, Marksville District (1886 Term: Nov 22 1886-April 20, 1887; 1887: Oct 31-1887- 3, 30, 1888).
|
[7]
