In Pursuit of Knowledge. Kabria Baumgartner
Calvin Goddard put it plainly: the Black Law denied African Americans “of all opportunity to acquire that knowledge and those habits which [could] render them good citizens, useful to each other and their native country.”126 The assertion of black female citizenship by Prudence’s legal team laid bare this crucial question: What constituted citizenship in early America, particularly for women and African Americans? Years later, in 1848, James Kent affirmed black citizenship, regardless of status, arguing that “the privilege of voting, and the legal capacity for office, are not essential to the character of a citizen.”127 Prudence and her allies and students might have agreed: common humanity, peace, love, and forgiveness constituted good citizenship. African American female students at Canterbury possessed a desire for knowledge and acted in a loving way, which reflected their character. This stood in stark contrast to their detractors, who turned to acts of violence that ought to have thrown their own citizenship into question.
As the Crandall case wound its way through the court, African American women students continued to board at the school and attend classes. When Charles Stuart, a white Bermuda-born abolitionist, visited in June 1834, he observed that the school was “in a very flourishing and happy condition, although still occasionally subject to annoyance.”128 These annoyances were actually incidents of violence and harassment directed at Prudence Crandall as well as the school’s teachers and students. That same month William Burleigh, one of the teachers, was assaulted with eggs; he was later arrested for violating the Black Law; and a one-pound stone was hurled through one of the school’s windows, landing in a student’s room.129 Earlier that year, on January 28, a fire broke out at the seminary. No one was hurt, but Chauncey Cleveland charged Frederick Olney, an African American man who had performed odd jobs at the school, with arson. Three African American female students testified at Olney’s trial; Maria Robinson, Amy Fenner, and Henrietta Bolt recounted his work at the schoolhouse, particularly on the day in question. Given the thin evidence in the case, Olney was found not guilty.130
Because Canterbury had proven to be an unwelcome site for her seminary, over a year earlier Prudence had contemplated a move to Reading, Massachusetts, and May had received a letter from the townspeople there, who were “willing to have [Prudence’s] school established.”131 It is unclear why Prudence did not relocate her school there, but her personal life changed when she married Calvin Philleo, a widowed white Baptist minister from New York, on August 12, 1834. Calvin Philleo became increasingly involved in the seminary. First the couple tried to broker a deal to relocate the school to another part of Canterbury, but the local governing board ignored the offer. Prudence next set her sights on Philadelphia. Lydia White, cofounder of the Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society and proprietor of a free labor goods business, had visited the Canterbury Female Seminary that August 1834 and may have alerted Prudence to the possibilities available in the City of Brotherly Love. Later that month Prudence and her husband traveled to Philadelphia, where they met with the activists James Forten, Charlotte Vandine Forten, and Lucretia Mott, among others.132 During this visit, Prudence devised a plan to establish a school for black children and recruited fifty boys and girls.133 The idea of an African American female seminary in Philadelphia apparently fell by the wayside. It may have been reasoned that focusing solely on African American women’s education was too limited, especially when qualified teachers were needed to staff Philadelphia’s black schools. Most critical at that moment was keeping the project of African American education alive. In the end, given Philadelphia’s ongoing problems with racial violence in the summer of 1834, Prudence felt that relocating her school there was not a viable option.134
Meanwhile in Connecticut, the Canterbury controversy had ignited spirited debates about colonization and radical abolition among the inhabitants of Windham County. At its fourth annual meeting on July 4, 1834, the Windham County Colonization Society, which Judson attended, resolved to do more to spread colonization, including increasing the number of auxiliary societies. But it was the local antislavery movement that grew. The following month, the Anti-Slavery Society of Plainfield and its vicinity (including Canterbury) formed with forty-three members, a number that nearly tripled weeks later. A New England antislavery convention report claimed that “much alarm was manifested at [this] rapid spread of Abolitionism.”135
On July 28, 1834, the Connecticut Supreme Court issued its decision in the Crandall case, voting three to one to dismiss the charges, thus overturning the lower court’s ruling. Justice Williams wrote the majority opinion, citing a technicality, and Daggett was the lone dissenter. The inconclusive legal outcome of the case only fanned the flames. The Vermont Chronicle put it succinctly: “Mr. Judson and his associates must endure Miss Crandall’s school till they can go through the whole process again—at least.”136
The prospect of another trial coupled with the growth of the antislavery movement in Connecticut may well have pushed Prudence’s opponents over the edge. Possibly responding to all that the Canterbury Female Seminary represented and the inconclusive legal outcome, a group of men attacked the school building in September 1834. They smashed most of the windows, leaving the building, in one anonymous student’s words, “almost untenantable.” This student remained grateful, though, that her “lot was no worse,” which may mean that the men had not physically harmed her or any of her classmates.137 That night Calvin Philleo went to Judson’s house across the street from the school to tell him of the attack and to ask if anyone had witnessed anything, but Judson was dismissive. Feeling she had no choice, Prudence asked Samuel J. May to do what she could not: tell the students that the school had to close for their protection and safety. May later wrote of the events, “I felt ashamed of Canterbury, ashamed of Connecticut, ashamed of my country, ashamed of my color.”138
Though their education was abruptly halted, these young African American women still championed Christian love. Not only were they steadfast in their faith in God and their love for each other, but they also remained committed to extending that love to their neighbors. After all, the Bible stated that love was a Christian principle (1 John 3:23). These women entered the school in love and parted in love, remembering the biblical definition of goodness (Romans 12:9). In a short essay, one student shared her memories of female friendship at the seminary, where “love was without dissimulation.” She credited May with helping her to develop morally and intellectually. By embodying Christian values, he had taught her a lot about religion: “With him I saw religion, not merely adopted as an empty form, but a living, all-pervading principle of action. He lived like those who seek a better country: nor was his family devotion a cold pile of hypocrisy, on which the fire of God never descends. No, it was a place of communion with heaven.” This student’s reflection revealed her understanding of Christianity. On the one hand, Judson and other opponents favored prejudice, rage, and violence; they acted unjustly. On the other hand, May, Crandall, and her students believed in peace, thus upholding an ethic of Christian love.139
Years later this ethic of Christian love still governed the actions of some former students. One from Hartford, with the initials E.F., penned a temperance song that was sung at the Colored Temperance Convention in Middletown, Connecticut, in May 1836.140 Harriet Rosetta Lanson vowed to devote her life to doing God’s work. She joined the temperance movement and began to prepare for a career as a Sabbath school teacher. She gave speeches, most likely at church services, where she encouraged parents to guide children and youth. “Pour in the oil of counsel, and guide their tottering steps to tread the upward path to virtue,” she urged. Upon her death from consumption on November 8, 1835, Simeon Jocelyn remembered her as a faithful young Christian woman who sought to “kindle a love for virtue” among African American youth.141 Her piety manifested in her commitment to her own education and that of others.142
Following Prudence’s example, radical abolitionists began to develop educational initiatives for African American children and youth. In an 1841 letter to the editor of the Philanthropist, Davis Day, a young African American man who attended Oberlin College, linked moral and intellectual improvement to women’s influence, arguing, “The elevation of our race, depends in a great degree upon the talents and education of our females.” Day spoke of the critical need for educated African American teachers in black communities in Ohio; ignoring African American women’s education undermined the struggle for black freedom.143 The American Anti-Slavery Society, established in December 1833, passed resolutions that supported Prudence’s