It was a warm Saturday morning in early Spring and workers were dismantling the old Bethel A.M.E. Church that had stood since 1805. The congregation had raised the funds to build a larger church to accommodate the growing number of worshippers.
Unfortunately, the workers were making a terrible mistake. They were sawing away the heavy beams that held up the southern half of the church’s roof and the entire southern wall of the large structure. A narrow alley separated the southern wall from three tenements that were home to scores of Black family members. The church wall fell collapsing and burying the apartment buildings. Three people were killed, and scores were severely wounded. Those who lost their lives were buried at Bethel Burying Ground. (1)
The above illustration is a likeness of Bethel Church as it stood in 1841. The red arrow points to the southern wall. The black arrow points to the beginning of the tenements. Ms. Hannah Harrison was in her apartment doing laundry when her building collapsed. She was forty years of age. Tragically, her eleven-year-old son David was with her and was killed. We do not know where seven-year-old Mary Evans was when she was killed. The newspapers reported that there was a group of children playing in the alley shortly before the accident. She could have been one of that group.
The city coroner ruled the incident an accident and no criminal charges were brought. (2)
The ten-month-old son of John and Rachel Colgate died this date, June 20th, in 1847 with “convulsions” as the official cause of death. The attending physician does not state the cause of the convulsions. Philadelphia Board of Health records show Cholera, respiratory diseases, and Marasmus (failure to thrive) as the highest causes of death for children under one-year-old in 1847 Philadelphia.
According to the 1847 Philadelphia African American Census and the 1850 Federal Census, John and Rachel Colgate had five children in addition to the baby. At the time of the baby’s death, John, Sr. was forty-two years old years old and employed as a porter. Ms. Colgate was thirty-seven years old and self-employed as a dressmaker. Their children were Samuel (20 y/o), Rachel, Jr. (17 y/o), Rebecca (13 y/o), and Hester and John, Jr. would have both been approximately eleven-years old. Baby Colgate had attended the 6th and Lombard Infant School before he died.
The Census shows that Samuel worked as a “boatman” on the Delaware River and Rachel worked as a dressmaker, likely with her mother. Rebecca may have been employed as a domestic. All of the family members could read and write and were members of the Bethel AME Church congregation. Rachel and John Colgate owned their home. There was no remaining mortgage and they had “personal property” valued at $750 which is estimated to be approximately $27,800 in modern currency. Their financial situation is highly unusual for a Black family at this period. They were members of a beneficial social society (savings fund) affiliated with their church. The Colgate family was righteous members of the Black community living in a violent racist city. (1)
The “South Street corridor” of the nineteenth century was the heart of Philadelphia’s African American community. Neighborhoods, such as the Colgates’, abutted the corridor and held some of the highest percentages of Black residents in the city. All these neighborhoods were the targets of every race riot of the 1830s and 1840s. Blacks were murdered, and homes, businesses, churches, and meeting halls were destroyed.
The red pin on the map above illustrates the location of the Colgates’ home at 904 Bonsall Street (now Rodman). The red arrow shows the location and proximity of the ‘South Street Corridor.’ It was the center of Black “community life” and home to many Black businesses, schools, and entertainment centers. It is likely that the Colgate women worked as dressmakers on South Street, only a short block away.
The ten-month-old son of Rachel and John Colgate died on a summer day that suddenly turned “raw and rainy.” He was buried, with dignity, by his family at Bethel Burying Ground.(2)
(1) On Bonsall Street (now Rodman), the Colgates’ neighbors were the LeCounts, Bolivars, Proctors, and Durhams. All Black families who were vital in the building of Black educational, cultural, business, religious, and civil rights institutions in 19th Century Philadelphia. Many of these family members were interred at Bethel Burying Ground. The street itself was lined with “fine dwellings of three and four stories, fronted with white marble” with doors of carved wood. Ornamental trees lined the clean sidewalks where, on occasion, passersby would be serenaded by a young person on the family piano (Press, 4 Sept 1860, p. 1). People strolling on Bonsall Street could also be serenaded by Elizabeth Greenfield, aka “The Black Swan.” Formerly enslaved, she became an internationally renowned singer and much sought-after vocal coach.
This is a 1965 photograph of the 900 block of Rodman Street (formerly Bonsall). I believe the Colgates’ home was located on the rubble-strewn vacant lot.
Fifty-eight-year-old Rachel Dawson died this date, May 3rd, in 1839 of Tuberculosis (Consumption) and was buried at Bethel Burying Ground. According to the 1838 Philadelphia African American Census, Ms. Dawson was employed as “own w,” which I believe means “own work.” Ms. Dawson and her husband appear to have owned a tenement building with a large number of families renting rooms. I believe her work was managing the family business.
The 1838 Census is the only information I could find on the family. It was a family of four. Three adults and a child. The adults were not born in Pennsylvania and it appears the child was native to the state. At least two of the adults were formerly enslaved. One was manumitted and the other’s freedom was purchased for $250 or approximately $8,300 in modern currency.
Mr. Dawson’s age is unknown. He was employed as a “glass paper” maker. This material was a sandpaper-like material. Instead of being embedded with sand, it was embedded with finely grounded glass. It was grueling, dirty, dangerous work. Twelve-hour shifts were common with men toiling amid clouds of fine sticky glass dust clogging the lungs.
The Dawsons owned their home on Paper Alley in the center of the city near what is now Philadelphia’s City Hall. The value of their building was reported at $12,600 or approximately $331,600 in modern currency. The balance of their mortgage was $3,300 or approximately $86,900. This is a highly unusual situation, especially given this is a Black blue-collar working family.
I was not able to find any information on the Dawson family after the death of Ms. Dawson. It could mean they left Philadelphia for somewhere safer. A year before the death of Ms. Dawson, an organized white mob burned down a hall that was hosting a revolutionary meeting of Black and white men and women advocating for the end of slavery and equal rights for women. Pennsylvania Hall was destroyed along with damage to an orphanage for Black children and several Black churches. The Pennsylvania legislature had been moving to disenfranchise African-Americans in Pennsylvania for the last several years. Years of terror were just beginning. (1)
Rachel Dawson died on an early day in May and was buried at Bethel Burying Ground. The Dawson family attended services at Bethel A.M.E. Church, according to the 1838 Census.
Twenty-eight-year-old Robert Swails died on the 31st of March in 1849 of Tuberculosis (consumption) and was buried at Bethel Burying Ground. He is not recorded in any local or federal census and is in only one city directory listing in 1848 as a self-employed barber. His profession in 1849 was very different than it is today.
In addition to cutting hair, the 19th-century barber was also a dentist and surgeon. They were the neighborhood emergency room where broken bones were set, wounds were stitched and bandaged, boils lanced, and painful teeth pulled. The skill it took to be a barber was something that a Black man could have learned while enslaved. The young enslaved Black man would have been apprenticed to a white barber and, after a while, would return to the plantation to service the master and fellow bondsmen. It is unknown if Mr. Swails fell into this category.
The red arrow on the map above shows the approximate location of Mr. Swails’s home and business on Market Street above 13th Street in center city Philadelphia. It was a busy business neighborhood, located just across from the large Pennsylvania Freight Depot with hundreds of Black men working day and night as porters and mechanics. South Penn Square, half a block away, was the crossroads to the city and the future home of Philadelphia City Hall. Mr. Swails’s success may have been his demise. His work required very close contact with his clients and that may have been the source of the Tuberculosis that killed him.
Mr. Swails died on a warm day in March where the temperature reached a balmy seventy-three degrees. According to Philadelphia Board of Health records, he was one of twenty-five Philadelphians to succumb to tuberculosis that week. He was buried at Bethel Burying Ground, with dignity, likely by family and friends.
It is said that a person dies twice. Once when the body dies and the second time when the person’s name is said for the last time. Please say his name.
Forty-year-old Jacob “Jesse” Howard died on January 29, 1840, of Tuberculosis (Consumption) and was buried at Bethel Burying Ground. As you can see in the above documents the attending physician was told by the family the deceased’s name was “Jesse.” While the manager of the cemetery was informed that his Christian name was “Jacob.”
Mr. Howard and his unnamed spouse lived in a dead-end alley full of collapsing rotting buildings, often visited by the city’s medical coroner who witnessed the effects of body and soul-crushing poverty. Shirker’s Alley was frequently mentioned in the local newspapers as a hellhole of alcoholism, violence, and the deadly airborne diseases of overcrowding and no sanitation. For the privilege of living in a room, not much more than a closet, they paid $1 a week. They owned only a paltry $20 in personal property, according to the 1838 Philadelphia African American Census, while the average Black family-owned $138 in cash and property such as a stove or furniture.
In the map above, the black circle indicates the location of Shirker’s Alley, just west of the intersection of 5th and Shippen Streets in the Moyamensing District of the County of Philadelphia. Only a short distance away is Bethel A.M.E. Church, illustrated by the orange arrow.
Like many Black Philadelphians, the Howards were not born in Pennsylvania. The city had become a haven for the formerly enslaved from Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia. Those following the North Star, geographically and symbolically, found a home in Philadelphia. However, oppression and racism did not cease at the border. Black men and women were relegated to work in an apartheid system with lower wages than their white neighbors. Mr. Howard was employed as a laborer while Ms. Howard was employed at “various jobs,” according to the 1838 Census.
There are no mentions of Mr. Howard in the city directories or censuses. Given their financial situation and where they were forced to live, it is likely that they were not in Philadelphia very long before his death. It appears that the burial costs may have been paid by one of the eighty Black beneficial (charity) societies in the city. One or more of the societies may also have provided assistance to the new widow. There is a complete list of the organizations in the endnotes. The entire summary of the 1838 Philadelphia African American Census can be viewed at – https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=loc.ark:/13960/t6ww7g80h&view=1up&seq=7.
Mr. Howard died in late January 1840. It was a cold day but the first day above freezing in a long time. Both the Delaware and Schuylkill Rivers were frozen ice. (The National Gazette, 30 Jan 1840, p. 2.)
Mr. Howard was buried, with dignity, by his spouse and friends at Bethel Burying Ground.
Fourteen-year-old Mary Louisa Custis died on December 19th, 1841 of Tuberculosis (Phthisis) and was buried at Bethel Burying Ground. She was born in Virginia and brought to Philadelphia when she was three years old in 1830. We don’t have any more information on her and, depending on when she became ill, she may have worked as a domestic or in the home. Tragically, Mary Louisa was not the first child or the last child her parents would lose to illnesses. From existing records, at least four other children of Sarah and Lewis Custis passed away.(1)
Sarah Custis was forty years old when her daughter Mary Louisa died. Mr. Custis was forty-two years old. Both were born in Virginia, according to the 1850 U.S. Census. The family did not participate in either the 1838 or the 1847 Philadelphia African American Censuses. The males in the family never reported their names, addresses, or occupations to the numerous city directories over the decades. This may indicate that the Custis family was formerly enslaved and had been passengers on the liberating Underground Railroad.
The 1850 Census also reported two other family members. George Custis was thirty years old, born in Virginia, and employed as a coachman and William Custis was twenty years old, born in Virginia, and also employed as a coachman. The family patriarch, Lewis Custis, was employed as a shoemaker. There were no children recorded.
According to several physicians that authored the children’s death certificates, the family lived in the area of 11th and Washington Avenue in the Moyamensing District. It is farther south than most Black residents living below South Street. The location is a mile from Bethel AME Church, a half mile from the Bethel Burying Ground, and very near what is now known as the famous Italian Market.
Mary Louisa died on a “piercing cold” day in late December that saw a winter storm of “rain, sleet, hail, snow, and high winds.” She was buried, with dignity, at Bethel Burying Ground with her sibling. Sadly, there would be more to come.
(1) Below are the other Custis children:
Lewis Custis: died August 19,1839 at 3 weeks old of Hydrocephalus. He is also buried at Bethel Burying Ground.
John Custis: died December 14, 1842, at 8 months old of Small Pox. burial unknown. He died at the Alms House but was not buried on their grounds. He likely was buried at Bethel Burying Ground and the paperwork no longer exists.
John Custis: died July 16, 1843, at 9 months old of Convulsions. He is also buried at Bethel Burying Ground.
Unnamed male: stillborn January 19,1849; buried at Union (Colored) Cemetery. “Son of Sarah Custis.”
The two-month-old son of Robert Veazy died this date, November 22nd, in 1828 of an unknown cause and was buried at Bethel Burying Ground. The signature in the lower left corner is that of Isacc Cork, the sexton of Bethel AME Church and the manager of the cemetery. Dr. H. Bond of 114 Mulberry Street signed the death certificate. (1)
According to Philadelphia Board of Health records, there were one hundred eighty-two individuals between 1828 and 1829 whose cause of death was labeled “unknown.”
Robert Veazy was approximately twenty-seven years old when his son died. The child’s mother’s name and age are unavailable. Ten years after the child’s death, the 1838 Philadelphia African American Census reports the couple was childless and living at #94 Gaskill Street. Ms. Veazy was self-employed as a laundress while Mr. Veazy worked as a porter. The Census reports both were born free and attended Bethel A.M.E. Church.
When Baby Veazy died the family lived in Clever Alley which was located from 5th to 6th Streets between Spruce and Pine Streets. This narrow thoroughfare was home to Black laborers and white craftsmen.
In the first half of the 19th century, Philadelphia porters were all Black men. It was a back-breaking job, hauling hundreds of pounds on the dirt and cobblestone streets of the city in the heat and humidity of summer and the bitter cold of winter. Business slowed down in the winter when the rivers froze, and ships couldn’t dock to unload their goods. During this time, according to African American journalist William Carl Bolivar, these men would collect “twine and burlap” and turn the material into door mats that “were always in demand.” Dressed in “high hats and leather aprons,” the men would loudly hawk their wares near heavily trafficked areas such as the State House, now known as Independence Hall. There were city laws that prohibited these men from being stationary and blocking the already crowded sidewalks. However, when it snowed these sidewalks and roads became impassable the vendors had little choice. From the newspaper articles below, it appears Mr. Vesey (sic) was, on occasion, in violation of those ordinances. (2)
(The first article is from the February 26,1844 edition of the SUN and the second article is from the March 19, 1845 edition of the Daily Chronicle.
Mr. and Mrs. Veazy buried their two-month-old son on a cold day in late November, with dignity, at Bethel Burying Ground.
(1) The name “Veazy” has many variations including Vesey, Vasey, Vesy, Veasey, Veazy, Very, and Vizy. Ten individuals with some form of these variations have been identified interred at Bethel Burying Ground.
(2) “Pencil Pusher Point,” Philadelphia Tribune, 10 May 1913, p. 4.
Fifty-year-old Joseph Thompson died this date, October 3rd, in 1847 of “Debility” and was buried at Bethel Burying Ground. Dr. Thomas T. Smiley did not take the time to take a medical history from the family and, subsequently, just wrote a cause of death that is meaningless. The illness that Mr. Thompson suffered from rendered him weak. Mr. Thompson may have suffered from heart disease. According to the 1847 Philadelphia African American Census, he was employed as a laborer who worked “irregularly,” presumably due to his illness.
Buckley Street was more of an alley than a broad thoroughfare. The Thompson family lived in a 13″x 13″ room at #34 Buckley Street for which they paid $.50 a week. According to the 1847 Census, the family consisted of Mr. and Ms. Thompson and a female child under the age of fifteen. I have not been able to locate a likely match for Ms. Thompson and the child in the 1850 U.S. Census. She was employed as a rug maker and the child attended St. Mary’s Street School. Two members were native to Pennsylvania while the third was not. They had no personal property. The family was desperately poor.
According to the 1847 Census, there were eight Black families who lived on Buckley, including the Thompsons, who totaled thirty-two men, women, and children. The women were employed doing laundry and working as day workers. The men worked on the Delaware River docks as porters and day laborers. The children went to either the Raspberry Street School, St. Mary’s Street School, or the 6th and Lombard Infant School. The Raspberry Street School also offered evening classes in math and reading to African American residents.
When the Irish gangs weren’t hunting African Americans to kill, they were busy trying to kill each other. Mr. Thompson died on the day that two murderous gangs, the Skinners and the Buffers, chased each other through the neighborhood shooting and killing each other through the night. Tragically, they gave no peace to the dying Mr. Thompson and his terrified family. His family buried their patriarch, with dignity, at Bethel Burying Ground.
Sixty-five-year-old Mark Grubb died this date, September 18th, 1849, of an undiagnosed illness that caused diarrhea to the extent that the dehydration was fatal. Mr. Grubb had not been employed since before at least 1847, according to the Philadelphia African American Census of that year. His death certificate above states that he was employed as a porter at the time of his death which was unlikely given his illness. City directories and the 1838 Philadelphia African American Census have Mr. Grubb employed as a coachman and laborer at different times. (1)
Poverty is as deadly as any disease. In 1849 Philadelphia, the majority of African American men and women had no resources other than their own labor. If illness prevented you from working, you did not get paid. There were no sick days and indeed no vacation time. If the breadwinner is sick then hard times just got harder and I believe that is what happened to the eight other members of the Grubb household. According to the 1847 Census, the family consisted of two males and seven females. Three were under fifteen years old; four were under fifty years old, and two were over fifty years old. One was employed as a cook and two made mats from rags collected from trash piles. Two of the girls were “in service” domestics.
St. Mary’s Alley was a narrow dead-end path that ended in a small courtyard surrounded by rotting tenements. Two years before Mr. Grubbs’ death the family lived on St. Mary’s Street (aka Mary St. – see map above). St. Mary’s Street was a two-block-long stretch of brothels, bars (legal and illegal), gaming houses, and hotels that allowed whites and Blacks to comingle. The street was home to constant violence, arson, and disease, and without clean water or sanitation. Black families lived in one room without heat in the winter or fresh air in the summer.
After the death of Mr. Grubb, the family is not listed in any census or city directory. They likely moved out of the city. This may have been a direct result of what occurred on the night of October 9th, three weeks after Mr. Grubb passed away. In addition to what we have mentioned about what St. Mary’s Street had to offer its Black citizens, they were being hunted by the “Monamensing Killers.” These young Irish thugs’ sole mission was to kill and assault African Americans and the whites who associated with them. Their target on that Fall night was the California Hotel at the corner of 6th and St. Mary’s Street. It was said that the reason for the attack was that the owner, a Black man, had a white wife. Others thought that it might be that the owner was not buying liquor from the people who were represented by the Killers.
Twenty-four-year-old James Williams was on St. Mary’s Street the night of October 9th. When he was thirteen years old, he stole his enslaver’s horse on a plantation in Elkton, Maryland, and rode to freedom. In his autobiography, he remembers that night as an epic battle between whites and Blacks. Mr. Williams joined a group of African Americans called the “Stringers” that were engaging the white mob. The mob outnumbered the Blacks who also had fewer guns. Mr. Williams received a gunshot wound to his right thigh and a hard knock on his head. Several Black men were killed and dozens were seriously injured. The California Hotel was burnt to the ground before military troops intervened. The remaining members of the Grubb family had every reason to seek a safer and healthier residence. (2)
According to the 1847 Census, one member of the Grubb family belonged to a beneficial society, likely at Bethel Church, that allowed Mark Grubb to be buried, with dignity, at Bethel Burying Ground.
(1) Dr. Smith forgot to add a date to his note. Other Philadelphia Board of Health documents were used to determine the date.
(2) Life and adventures of James Williams, a fugitive slave, with a full description of the Underground Railroad, P. 14-15. Available at hathitrust.org.
Thirty-five-year-old Elizabeth Birmingham died this date, August 18th, in 1843 of Tuberculosis and was buried at Bethel Burying Ground. It appears that her four-month-old son, James died the previous day of Cholera.
The documented family history of Ms. Birmingham and her family is thin. Samuel Birmingham is the only Black man with that last name listed in the 1838 Philadelphia African American Census and the 1839 and 1840 city directories. In addition, a seven-year-old boy, Samuel Birmingham, tragically, died a few months after his mother and brother, in October of 1838, and was buried at Bethel Burying Ground. His cause of death was a ruptured blood vessel. He was likely Elizabeth and Samuel, Sr.’s son.
After 1840 Samuel Birmingham disappears from the censuses and city directories. Previously, it was reported that he was employed as a shoemaker and resided in Raspberry Alley. In 1840 he had a workshop in the cellar of 301 N. 2nd Street.
Ms. Birmingham was one of 1,517 Philadelphians to die of Tuberculosis (Consumption) between 1842 and 1843, according to Philadelphia Board of Health records. Baby James and his mother both died on days that were “partly clear and warm and pleasant.”(1) It would have been the custom to open Samuel. Jr.’s grave and inter mother and sons together at Bethel Burying Ground.