Forty-five- year-old James Milburn died of “Diseases of the Liver and Lung” on January 18th in 1853 and was buried on the 29th at Bethel Burying Ground. The reason for the delay in burial was due to the weather that froze the over the Delaware River and covered the streets in ice and snow.* Mr. Milburn was a “prominent Mason” and his brethren from the city and county” ” . . . with all the honors of the order” marched in his funeral procession from his residence at 197 Lombard Street to the Bethel Burying Ground at 5th and Queen Street. The procession “attracted a great crowd of spectators.”** Mr. Milburn is one of several other Masons that have been identified as interred on Queen Street. It may have to do with the fact that the Reverend Richard Allen was a highly ranked Mason.

According to the 1847 African American Census, Mr. Milburn was employed as a barber that owned only $1.50 in personal property (about $40 in today’s currency) and paid $4.00 a month in rent which he shared with another male also a barber. Mr. Milburn stated to the 1847 census taker that he “. . . has two wives both of whom are supposed to be living.” He also stated that he had no religious affiliation.  Mr. Milburn was born in Maryland.

For further reading on Black Masons in Philadelphia, you can go to pages 280-281 in William Dorsey’s Philadelphia & Ours: On the Past and Future of the Black City in American by Roger Lane.

*Daily Pennsylvanian, 18 January 1853.

** Daily Pennsylvanian, 24 January 1853.

Sixty-year-old Anna Maria Henson died this date, January 21th, in 1854 of heart disease and was buried at Bethel Burying Ground. As of 1847 she lived at 185 Lombard Street and shared a large room with another woman. They paid $3.00 a month for rent or $75 in today’s currency. Ms. Henson’s 1854 death certificate states that she lived on 8th Street just south of South Street at the time of her death. The 1850 Federal Census reports that she was born in Maryland.

In the 1847 African American Census, Ms. Henson reported that she was employed as a nurse. Black women in the 19th century were employed as wet-nurses, child’s nurse, sick room nurse and hospital nurses in segregated maternity wards and general wards. The 1847 census shows that 21 Black women and men reported their occupation as “nurse.”

19th and early 20th century African American nurse.

Further Reading

Wet Nursing: Tramps, Unfit Mothers, and Neglected Children: Negotiating the family in Late Nineteenth-Century Philadelphia, Sherri Broder (2002).

Black Nursing in General: Black Women in Nursing, Darlene Clark Hine (1985).

One-year-old Emma Anderson died this date, January 17th, in 1854 of Pneumonia and was buried at Bethel Burying Ground. She lived with her parents Elizabeth (36) and George (36) at #3 Gray’s Alley. Emma had a nine-year-old sister Georgianna.  Both parents were born in Maryland while the children were born in Pennsylvania. George worked as a porter and earned $5 a week: approximately $125 in today’s currency. Elizabeth was a “day worker” and took care of the children. 

The Gray’s Alley residence was a large tenement with 20 Black families living there as of the 1837 African American Census. The Anderson family lived in a 9’X9′ room for which they paid an estimated $3.00 a month ($75). The 1837 census taker reports that the residents of 3 Gray’s Alley are poor, but the building is not in as bad shape as 46 Spruce Street which is overrun by rats that attack the occupants and bite them in their sleep and eat their clothing. 

The rear of a 19th-century tenement.

Thirty-five-year-old John Johnson died this date, January 6th, in 1849 of Tuberculosis and was buried at Bethel Burying Ground. He was occupied as a whitewasher or house painter as we know it today. He would have painted fences, stables, house walls and ceilings. The whitewash/paint that he would have used contained a high content of lead. It was not uncommon for these men to suffer brain damage and early death.

Nineteenth-century Philadelphia whitewash man. 

Mr. Johnson lived at 237 Lombard Street near the large outdoor market. He and his wife lived in an 8’x8′ room for which they paid 50 cents a week according to the 1847 African American census. He was married to an unnamed woman who was occupied as a domestic “in-service.” After researching the 1850 Federal Census I believe her to be Ada Johnson born about 1815. In 1850 she was a live-in domestic employed by a wealthy Philadelphia liquor distiller Andrew C. Craig who lived with his wife and son at 13th and Walnut Street. It appears that Ms. Johnson did not have any children.