Letters from Freedom

Letter of Joseph M. Stewart to Lucy Chase.

The first lines of a letter from Joseph M. Stewart to Lucy Chase, Columbus, Georgia, 1868.

Support for this project has been provided by a grant from the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation.

The American Antiquarian Society manuscript collection includes letters written between 1863 and 1870 by twenty-two formerly enslaved students in the American South. The letters were sent to sisters Lucy and Sarah Chase, who taught in schools for freedmen throughout the South. The contents of the letters are varied. Some students wrote to update the sisters on family events such as deaths and marriages, to describe their enslavement, or to document the activities of Reconstruction. Several of the students continued their studies at secondary schools and became teachers.

Materials written by non-famous people of color from this period are scarce; therefore, this collection of twenty-two letters is a rare historical record. The letters have been digitized and transcribed and are now accessible to all in this online resource. 

The resource also includes some letters written by Sarah and Lucy containing descriptions of the schools and students. As Quakers, the Chase family valued education, abolition, and support for people of color.

The Students

The Teachers

Additional Information

Primary Source Digital Library

Displaying 1 - 25 of 25
Image Title Location Date Format Transcription
Abraham Rose letter Virginia 1870 Student letters ✓
Celia Coonts letter Virginia Student letters ✓
Charlotte Ann Jackson letter 1865 Student letters ✓
David Barr letter Georgia 1868 Student letters ✓
Dennis Colman letters Virginia 1870 Student letters ✓
Elias F. Jefferson letter South Carolina 1867 Student letters ✓
Emma Bynum letter Student letters ✓
Emma Colt letter Virginia 1864 Student letters ✓
Georgeanne Cook letter Virginia 1866 Student letters ✓
Green Baker letter 1865 Student letters ✓
Hannah Standing letter 1863 Student letters ✓
James M. Quash letter South Carolina 1867 Student letters ✓
Jordan C. Johnson letter Georgia 1868 Student letters ✓
Joseph Green letter Virginia 1865 Student letters ✓
Joseph M. Stewart letter Georgia 1868 Student letters ✓
Julia A. Rutledge letters South Carolina 1867 Student letters ✓
Louis Wales letter Virginia 1870 Student letters ✓
Lucy Chase letters 1863 Teacher letters ✓, ✓, ✓
Matilda Hill letter 1870 Student letters ✓
Moses Hume letter Virginia 1870 Student letters ✓
S.L. Rafe letter Florida Student letters ✓
Sarah Earle Chase diary for 1865 Virginia 1865 Diaries ✓
Sarah Earle Chase letters Teacher letters ✓
Solomon D. Green letter Virginia 1867 Student letters ✓
Thomas Fry letter Virginia 1870 Student letters ✓