Bethel Burying Ground Project

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The stillborn daughter of Julia Pearce was delivered this date, July 18th, in 1849 and was buried at Bethel Burying Ground. 

Dr. Thomas T. Smiley had his medical office on the northwest corner of 10th and Lombard Streets. Nearby lived a family of three generations of Black women. This family included Julia Pearce, 65 years old, her daughter, Hannah Pearce, thirty-two-years-old and Julia Pearce, the daughter of Hannah was seventeen-years-old. Young Julia lost her daughter in stillbirth with Dr. Smiley signing the death certificate. (See above)*

Sadly, the next day Dr. Smiley would sign the death certificate of the matriarch of the family who would pass away from Typhoid Fever.

Dr. Smiley was not done yet with the Pearce family. Tragically, two days later on the 21st, he would sign the death certificate of seventeen-year-old Julia Pearce who would die from Cholera. She was one of 148 Philadelphians to succumb to a vicious Cholera epidemic that week. 

Both women would be buried with the new stillborn baby at Bethel Burying Ground. (See below)

The 1847 Philadelphia African American Census shows a “Julie Ann Pierce” as the head of a family of three females residing on Lombard Street. This would have been the eldest of the three women. Her occupation was reported as “nurse.” One other woman was reported as being “at service” working as a live-in domestic. Only two of the women were born in Pennsylvania. 

The red pin represents the approximate location of the Pearce family home. The black arrow illustrates the location of Bethel A.M.E. Church where the women attended services.

The three women lived in one room at 363 Lombard Street in the 900 block of Lombard. Their rent for this tenement space was $2.25 a month, according to the 1847 Census. This amount would have been close to two weeks’ earnings for one of the working women. 

Three Women on Lombard Street, circa 1900-1905. Temple University’s Urban Archives.

The stillborn baby and the two adult women died between July 18th and the 21st in 1849 and were buried at Bethel Burying Ground. A heatwave had just broken and the days were clear and moderate with temperatures ranging from morning lows in the low 70s to highs in the low 80s in the afternoon.

The survivor of that tragic week for the Pearce family was Harriet Pearce. She buried her mother, daughter and granddaughter all within several days. According to her death certificate, Ms. Pearce lived until she was fifty-four years old working as a housekeeper. Still living on Lombard Street, she died of an “abdominal abscess” (ulcer?) in August 1869 and was buried at Lebanon Cemetery. 

*The ages of the Pearce women were gathered from the death certificates and the 1850 U.S. Census which recorded Harriet Pearson’s age. 

Five-month-old Julia Harper died this date, July 15th, in 1847 of Cholera and was buried at Bethel Burying Ground. She was the daughter of Robert and Dorcas Harper. He was twenty-five years old at the time of his child’s death; she was twenty-years-old. Both were born in Delaware. Julia was their only child. However, Ms. Harper would give birth to a son, Simon, in 1849, according to the 1850 U.S. Census. 

The black arrow indicates the location of the Harpers’ residence on the 900 block of Race Street. The location is now in the Chinatown section of the city. The red arrow indicates the location of what was “Penn Square” at the time – the future home of Philadelphia City Hall.

In 1847, it appears that the Robert and Dorcas Harper family lived with or next door to the George Harper family on Race Street. Robert and George may have been brothers or cousins. According to the 1847 Philadelphia African American Census, the rent for 340 Race Street was a hefty $6 a month. Robert worked as a laborer and George was employed as a stevedore and his unnamed spouse worked as a laundress. 

Little Julia Harper was one of the 443 children in Philadelphia that died of Cholera in 1847. She died on a “temperate and pleasant” day in July with the temperature rising to 82° and was buried at Bethel Burying Ground.

EPILOGUE

Thirty years before the death of little Julia Harper, Race Street looked very different. Black children were being sold as indentured servants. A young Black man was up for sale as “a good Carriage driver” and “an excellent hand on a Farm.”

Poulson’s American Daily, 10 January 1818.

The two girls and the young man listed above were not enslaved for life, as in the historical sense. They were enslaved as indentured servants. Slavery of a different kind. Frequently, white immigrants would offer themselves and their family members as indentured servants in order to pay the cost of their passage across the Atlantic. This would not be the system that Blacks would be forced into. 

Excellent reading on the Philadelphia Black indentured servant is in “A Fragile Freedom” by Erica Armstrong Dunbar. She focuses on Black women and girls forced into servitude. Also, the book “Freedom By Degrees” by Gary B. Nash and Jean R. Soderlund offers an excellent overview of the topic.