Thomas P. White - now I have to truly take my head out of the sand

I have been checking out the records of Danbury, Ct. researching a maternal branch of my tree. I found a couple juicy stories, one of which I have posted on this blog.

Earlier this morning, while looking at the same branch, I started down a rabbit hole regarding the Spanish American War and a volunteer army heading down to Cuba. The newspaper articles are too long to transcribe here, but maybe one day I will recount the story.

Back to the Danbury records. 

Twice I have seen the birth records of a person before whose name comes the descriptor 'negro'. Here is the record that got me to write today.

I modified this image from something I found on Ancestry - Ancestry.com. Connecticut Town Birth Records, pre-1870 (Barbour Collection) [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2006.Original data:White, Lorraine Cook, ed. The Barbour Collection of Connecticut Town Vital Records. Vol. 1-55. Baltimore, MD, USA: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1994-2002.

And here is the image of the 1790* census with Thomas P. White being the only person on the page who listed an enslaved person. Do we assume that enslaved person is Jenny? And if so, where is her son Benhadaa?

I have started a tree on Ancestry with Benhadaa as the home person and I hope to find more information about him and his mother. I am pretty sure I know how the father fits into my tree, but there are a couple Thomas P.'s, so I need to do more checking. I haven't got the answer yet because I wanted to write this discovery before I finished the research.

Searching the entire Danbury census, I found there were 23 enslaved people in Danbury at the time. And, interestingly, there is a column heading: "All Other Free Persons" and in that column there are 20 people enumerated.

In two cases these free people are living with white families. And we assume this because the families made up of "all other free people"  use the descriptor 'negro' after the name is listed. (Here we see an obvious incidence of white privilege.... one is assumed to be white unless you are called out as otherwise....)

In Danbury of 1790

    - 2 slaves and 1 Free non-white person is living with John Trobridge

    - 1 Free non-white person is living with Samuel H. Phillips

    - 5 free people living with a family headed by Cato negro

    - 5 free people living with a family headed by Limri negro

    - 2 free people living with a family headed by Jubi negro

    - 2 free people living with a family headed by Cato negro

Of course I can't be sure I am not making an assumption that the 2 people who are living with white families are not indigenous people. I do, assume, that it is probably pretty safe to assume that they are of either mixed English-African heritage or African heritage. 

But of course by this time the American Revolution has been fought and won.

I heard on the radio the other day about a man named Venture Smith. (Here is the wikipedia entry about him.) He was a man who was captured in Guinea, West Africa as a child and bought his freedom and that of his family. He recounted his own autobiography. In the radio story I heard someone suggest wouldn't the world be a much better place if America had ended slavery during the time of the American Revolution rather than allowing the practice to continue another 100 years. More information about Mr. Smith can be found here.

NPR did a story on Thomas Jefferson and his stance on slavery. Essentially the author of a book on Jefferson and Sally Hemings - Annette Gordon-Reed - indicated that Jefferson knew slavery would rip the country apart, but did not take on the task of dismantling it. The podcast is worth the listen. Professor Gordon-Reed is a professor at Harvard Law School.

I said that I had to take my head out of the sand because I can no longer deny that my family owned enslaved people. (In the past I have had to acknowledge that my family benefited from the labor of enslaved people.) Right here is the evidence. And I only recently learned that Abraham Lincoln did not free the enslaved people of the north, only from those states that fought against the north.

As I drafted this post I learned that Prince, a "negro" son born to Ebenzer Russell White died at age 17, so I suspect there are no descendants of his that I can find. But that is two White brothers who conceived sons (raped might be more accurate) with enslaved women.

    * image copied from here: Year: 1790; Census Place: Danbury, Fairfield, Connecticut; Series: M637; Roll: 1; Page: 45; Image: 418; Family History Library Film: 0568141

Joseph Moss White and his scandal

Who knows how much of this story is embesllished. It was publised 4 years after the death of said Joseph Moss White. It is a delightfully horrible, or horribly delightful, tale. There is another news story I need to trasscribe which has difference figures - multiplied by ten! So, instead of $45,000, it was $400,000 provided to the young Mr. White. 

I tried to find 40 rues des Cosseles in Paris and no such address - at least not now. 

And Stydd House.... there were references to it on Google, but it wasn't quite clear, so I gave up without more information. 

And what is Colon? I don't know. 

From The Weekly Times-Democrat (New Orleans, Louisiana 26 February 1892) 

GAY LIVES ABROAD 

TWO NEW YORKERS WHO SQUANDERED FORTUNES 

The Rapid Career of Young Joseph Moss White - He was wayward from childhood and left a record in every city in Europe 

New York, February 17th - there have been many rich young New Yorkers who have plunged into gay life in a wholesale manner and cause no end of talk while they were doing it. There was never much talked about the life led in Europe by Joseph Moss White and Harvey Spencer, Jr., And yet it was more extraordinary than that of any other young Americans who have made a stir abroad. Whilel New York heard little of them, their names were familiar in London, Paris, Vienna and even the Far East. A good many years ago Eli White was at the head of a large hat manufacturing establishment in New York. He made money and judiciously invested it in real estate. It was never necessary for his son Joseph Moss White to do any work, and he never did any. He wanted to make a good marriage and he succeeded. He married Matilda Wolfe Bishop, the sister of David Wolfe Bishop and the cousin of Catherine Wolfe. The marriage caused a bitter quarrel between the bride and her family. Joseph Moss White died before the only son of the marriage was born. The son was named after the father and he is the hero of the story. Mrs. White had a considerable fortune in her own name. 

When in his childhood, the posthumous boy was wayward. there was nothing wicked in his nature, but he was always getting into scrapes. He was prepared for Princeton, where he remained about two years. His wildness caused his mother to send him abroad under the care of a tutor, the Rev. Samuel J. McPherson. The young man led the reverend gentleman a mad dance over the continent. While he was abroad Eli White, the grandfather, died, leaving the young man $15,000 which caused surprise. The old gentleman did not like the manner in which the young man had acted. The bulk of the great fortune was divided between his children, John Jay White, who lives at Fifth Avenue and Forty-second Miss Susan White, who lives in Kensington, London, and young White's mother, who received her husband's share. Miss White was fond of the youthful Joseph, she thought he had been unfairly treated, and so she settled $45,000 upon him.

About this time White's chief end in life seemed to be to fall in love with every pretty girl he met. He was usually engaged to three charming young women at one time in his own social circle, besides having many liaisons with women beneath it. He was always bubbling over with animal spirits and wine.

 SPENCER COMES IN.

In 1881, while he was in his uncle's house at Lenox, he met Harvey Spencer, a young man of fine family, fine manners and fine clothes. Spencer belonged to the Spencers of Guilford, Connecticut. When Joseph White met Harvey Spencer the latter was known and every fashionable house in New York. He was said to be the best dancer in society and a thorough man of the world. Two years before he had gone to Hong Kong, China, to make his fortune. He did not make it, but he did lose his health. Spencer and White became fast friends directly. Mr. Bishop encouraged the friendship. One reason was that Spencer's shattered health made it impossible for him to go into excesses. But he could not curb White. The young man contracted a passion for Marion Whitehorn and brandy, which nearly resulted in his ruin. The young woman was extremely pretty and thoroughly bad. White had met her in Crane’s resort in West Thirtieth Street. Her real name was Mary Flenner, and she claimed to be the divorced wife of a gambler. The young woman exercised a powerful influence over White, whose mind and body began to give way because of excessive brandy drinking.

It became necessary to take vigorous measures. Mr. Bishop asked Mr. Spencer if he would not lend his assistance. The first step was to get White away from the woman. The plan agreed upon was virtually a kidnapping. Mr. Bishop wanted to pay all the expenses. White was spirited away to Washington first. It was at times necessary to detain him by force in order to prevent him returning to New York. He was virtually insane. Then the young man was brought to Jersey City, placed on a steam tug and taken to Staten Island, where he was transferred to the steamer Alva bound for Haiti and Colon. In the meantime detectives were searching high and low for White at the insistence of Marion Whitehorn, who claimed that her husband had been kidnapped. At Colon, White and Spencer were met by Allan Pinkerton, the detective, who directed them to sail for England on the steamer Moselle. The vessel put up for a few days at St. Thomas where the voyagers were met by a man named Field, who came at the insistence of the so-called wife. Field interested the United States Consul in the case and managed to see White. The young man wanted to return to the woman, but Spencer managed to get the charge away safely. On the long voyage White was weaned away from brandy, and he began to improve.

The two young men journey through England and the Continent and then went to India and the Far East. They also visited Australia. When White became of age he threw money to the winds. When he was in the clutches of Marion Whitehorn Mr. Bishop induced him to place the principle of his fortune in trust until he was 25, so that it should not be squandered. Subsequently, just before the kidnapping, he signed without reading the document making the trust deed cover his entire life. When the young men started from New York Mr. Bishop agreed to allow them $4,000 a year. This was inadequate. When White improved the whole income was given to him. The legitimate income ranged from $20,000 to $23,000 a year. White had become so attached to Spencer that he proposed that they live together and share the income. They lived at a tremendous rate. In Paris they had a beautifully furnished hotel at No. 40 Rue de Cosseles, and their cook was said to be the best in Paris. They had a fine country place in Hampshire, England, called Stydd House, where they kept eighteen horses and a retinue of servants. They also maintained a sailing yacht and a steam yacht. For the latter they paid $30,000. At a New Year's banquet given in Paris in 1888 White caught a cold, which developed into dry pleurisy. White was seized with a coughing fit, the abscess burst and White died of suffocation. He was then 28 years old. The will provided that all outstanding debts in the names of White and Spencer should be paid out of the estate, and that a sufficient sum should be placed in trust to yield Spencer $10,000 a year. Spencer had the body embalmed, and 10 days later he started with it to America. He was met at the pier by Mr. Bishop, who told him that White’s will was useless, as he had no property to bequeath, having surrendered at all to his mother. Spencer says that Mr. Bishop had the body secretly buried the next morning, without letting him or any of White’s friends know anything about it.

At the time of White’s death there were $45,000 of debts. Of this Spencer claims to have paid off $26,000. Next Friday the case will go on. It is said Spencer will begin a fight to have the will carried out in spite of the release he gave. Counsel for White’s mother says Spencer is unprincipled in his demands for money.