Amelia Green

Amelia Green, a Free Woman of New Bern by Jan Parys

Devastated by the Tuscarora War, 1711–1713, New Bern settlers needed help. They were aided by immigrants from England, Switzerland, the German Palatinate, and France. Slaves also arrived from Africa, and African slavery became a source of labor. Many godly people like the Quakers wanted emancipation for everyone so they helped the slaves obtain freedom.


Like most African-Americans Amelia Green wanted freedom from slavery for her family after she bought it for herself. Amelia petitioned the NC legislature successfully to free her family members. Amelia bought her freedom from Robert Schaw, a plantation owner in the Wilmington, NC, area. He was married to Anne Vail of the New Bern Vail family. Amelia’s children were listed as mulatto indicating they had a white father. There was a local Wilmington area planter named Richard Green and Richard is the name of her first son.

In her September, 1796 petition to the Craven County courts, she stated that all but two of her children, two daughters, had been able to acquire their own freedom by “the fruits of their own industry and meritorious behavior.” In 1796 she tried to emancipate her sixteen year-old daughter, Princess Ann Green. Five years later, she petitioned to emancipate her daughter Nancy Handy and talked of her own aging and not expecting to live much longer.

She lived twenty years longer and saw family members become owners of both real estate and human property. Amelia Green was a remarkable woman who lived in New Bern, North Carolina after she was free.

She became a landowner and the in-law of one of the largest African American slaveholders in the American South, John Carruthers Stanly. The house where Green spent the final decades of her life working to reassemble a family that had been separated because of slavery still stands in New Bern. It is located at 310 George Street. Her home, also known as the Green-Hollister House, was purchased in 1800 by John Carruthers Stanly for Amelia, his wife’s grandmother, to save it from the tax collector.

Located at 411 Johnson Street, the John R. Green House stayed in the family until 1842. The Green family owned a family pew in Christ Episcopal Church, the same church as the John Wright Stanly family. John Green earned his living as a tailor. Amelia was a laundry woman. Green’s story is one of struggle and hard work to be free from slavery, first for herself and then her immediate family members. She accomplished much at almost unimaginable levels for a woman, especially a slave woman.



Sources: Bob Arnebeck, A Shameful Heritage, Washington Post Magazine, January 18, 1889; Roger Davis and Wanda Neal- Davis , Chronology: A Historical Review, Major Events in Black History 1492 thru 1953; Patricia M. Samford, Historic Bath State Historic Site, (draft to be submitted to the North Carolina Historical Review, March 2006 and New Bern’s African American Guide to African American History (a map and explanations).

Easter and Cedar Grove Cemetery

Easter and Cedar Grove Cemetery
What does Cedar Grove Cemetery have to do with Easter? They both are involved with tombs. The difference is one, the Cemetery, has bodies, mainly decayed bodies in the tombs. However, Easter celebrates the empty tomb for Jesus Christ rose from the tomb and His tomb is still empty. Some Christians prefer to call Easter, Resurrection Day.
At a presentation on February 24, 2011, information regarding the symbols was shared with a packed library auditorium. The Cemetery has a symbol for resurrection according to the Earl of Craven Questers and it is a sunrise. Ivy carved on a stone meant everlasting life. An open book meant the departed soul was wise. A sleeping lamb signified children. Roses meant beauty. Anchors were for hope in the 18th and 19th century. The dove meant promise and the harp, harmony. Other symbols appear on stones and plagues.
The Questers are preserving the tombs, mausoleums and other graves. Out of about four thousand graves only approximately one thousand are identified. The others are in need of cleaning and even the tombstones are decaying. To get money for the preservation the Questers are giving tours every Saturday from April to November weather permitting. Volunteers are needed to help clean tombstones and some students from Brinson Elementary worked on cleaning a couple of dozen stones. Tickets for tours may be bought at the cemetery or at the New Bern Historical Society office on Pollock Street. Names and family searches will help those looking for ancestors in New Bern with cleaner stones.

Nat Turner

Nat Turner changed history. He scared most of the slaveowners.
Before Nat Turner's rebellion, North Carolina was quite lenient with slaves. Then Virginia and South Carolina officials really complained and slaves appeared to be more inclines to want their freedom as opposed to more dependency in the past.
Answers.com says, "Nat Turner was a black preacher who led an 1831 uprising in Southampton County, Virginia in which at least 55 whites were killed by a group of about 50 slaves. Turner was a deeply religious man who claimed to have visions and directives from God. On the night of 21 August 1831 he led four other slaves (Henry, Hark, Nelson and Sam) on a murderous spree near the town of Jerusalem, killing men, women and children in their beds. By the next day his mob had grown to at least 40 or 50, but the local militia confronted and captured most of them. Turner escaped, but was eventually captured in October and tried. He was hanged and skinned 11 November 1831. Before he was executed, he described his actions to Thomas R. Gray, and 'The Confessions of Nat Turner' was later widely published in newspapers. Turner's failed rebellion led to hundreds of blacks being murdered by white vigilante mobs, and spurred a new set of strict codes that limited the activities of slaves."

Nat Turner's Rebellion

Nat Turner
Before Nat Turner's rebellion, North Carolina was quite lenient with slaves. Then Virginia and South Carolina officials really complained and slaves appeared to be more inclines to want their freedom as opposed to more dependency in the past.
Answers.com says, "Nat Turner was a black preacher who led an 1831 uprising in Southampton County, Virginia in which at least 55 whites were killed by a group of about 50 slaves. Turner was a deeply religious man who claimed to have visions and directives from God. On the night of 21 August 1831 he led four other slaves (Henry, Hark, Nelson and Sam) on a murderous spree near the town of Jerusalem, killing men, women and children in their beds. By the next day his mob had grown to at least 40 or 50, but the local militia confronted and captured most of them. Turner escaped, but was eventually captured in October and tried. He was hanged and skinned November 11, 1831. Before he was executed, he described his actions to Thomas R. Gray, and 'The Confessions of Nat Turner' was later widely published in newspapers. Turner's failed rebellion led to hundreds of blacks being murdered by white vigilante mobs, and spurred a new set of strict codes that limited the activities of slaves."
Labels: North Carolina history slavery Nat Turner Virginia Southhampton County

Charles Chesnutt

From Dr. Kelley Griffith of Greensboro, NC: "Many works of fiction are by African Americans. One of them, Charles Chesnutt's The Marrow of Tradition, is about the race "riot" of 1898 or so. Do you know this work? Although it's a work of fiction, the events really took place. Chesnutt does an excellent job of representing the various groups of people, black and white, involved. I wouldn't claim that this is a great novel, like Moby Dick, but it's engaging and thoughtful. The conflict marked the beginning of heavy-handed Jim Crow in N.C. A place worth visiting--far from you but fairly close to me--is the Booker T. Washington National Monument. It's a small national park in a beautiful rural setting in southern Virginia (near Smith Mountain Lake, on the way to Roanoke), a working farm where Washington lived until he was 6. He writes about it in Up from Slavery."

Charles Chesnutt

From Dr. Kelley Griffith of Greensboro, NC: "Many works of fiction are by African Americans. One of them, Charles Chesnutt's The Marrow of Tradition, is about the race "riot" of 1898 or so. Do you know this work? Although it's a work of fiction, the events really took place. Chesnutt does an excellent job of representing the various groups of people, black and white, involved. I wouldn't claim that this is a great novel, like Moby Dick, but it's engaging and thoughtful. The conflict marked the beginning of heavy-handed Jim Crow in N.C. A place worth visiting--far from you but fairly close to me--is the Booker T. Washington National Monument. It's a small national park in a beautiful rural setting in southern Virginia (near Smith Mountain Lake, on the way to Roanoke), a working farm where Washington lived until he was 6. He writes about it in Up from Slavery."

New Bern Clergyman shows what's in a name

Drury Lacy The clerical family man.

Bill Hand wrote: "Drury Lacy is my favorite name in all of New Bern history. It suggests a character of dry wit and sophistication, while in slant-rhyme with 'Drury Lane' oozes a fine irony: Drury Lane being, in that day, the very soul of carnality as London's Broadway; Drury Lacy being the very soul of spirituality as an educated and dedicated man of God." Bill notices "his deep devotion to his family." "Drury was one of those Virginia boys, born in 1802 to a prominent clergyman and professor of the same name in Prince Edward County." (He went to) Union Theological Seminar- Presbyterian (In) Sept., 1833 (he went) to New Bern. (He) brought (his) wife and child; (A) second child James Horace, (was born in)
1835.