Slavery and Freedom in Northampton
and in the Colonial North:
A Four-Part Lecture Series
and in the Colonial North:
A Four-Part Lecture Series
This four-part lecture series will examine slavery in Northampton, Massachusetts
and place it in the context of the larger narrative of slavery and freedom in the North.
and place it in the context of the larger narrative of slavery and freedom in the North.
In Partnership with the Northampton Reparations Study Commission
Slavery & Freedom in Northampton
A Zoom Presentation with Dr. Ousmane Power-Greene, Dylan Gaffney & Dr. Elizabeth M. Sharpe
Thursday, January 16, 2025 | 7 pm
On Zoom For the last five years researchers at Historic Northampton and Forbes Library have been uncovering stories of slavery and freedom in Northampton. These investigations have revealed that perhaps as many as fifty enslaved people lived in Northampton between 1654, when Northampton was settled by the English, until 1783, when slavery was abolished in Massachusetts.
As elsewhere in the North, slavery in Northampton was inextricably linked to local commerce, local and regional family networks, and the global economy. Among the narratives of Northampton’s enslaved people—who were Indigenous, African, and African American—are stories of a few individuals who were able to take control over their lives, gain freedom, start families, manage careers, and acquire property.
Presenters Dylan Gaffney, Elizabeth Sharpe, and Ousmane Power-Greene will discuss what we presently know about enslaved lives in Northampton and conclude with questions that remain unanswered and avenues for future research. |
Graphic Silhouette of Hannah, her baby, and Mingo (Design Division, 2025)
|
About the Graphic Silhouette of Hannah, her baby, and Mingo
In 1692, Hannah was unmarried and enslaved in Northampton. She bore a child, and in court she named Mingo as the father. The court called their act a “heinous crime against the light of nature” and sentenced both Hannah and Mingo to 15 lashes. Their baby was born into slavery. The court decided that Samuel Parsons (Mingo’s enslaver) and Timothy Baker (Hannah’s enslaver) would be “joint + equal in charge of the child” until the child was nine years old. At age nine, either Parsons or Baker could buy out the other for the value of the child or they could arrange to jointly own him. In this case, the child’s wages if hired out, or the child’s value if sold, would be “divided betwixt them.”
About the Presenters
Dr. Ousmane Power-Greene, Presenter and moderator
Professor of History Clark University A specialist in African American social and political movements, Professor Power-Greene teaches courses for undergraduates and graduate students on American history with a focus on African American internationalism and comparative social and political movements. His book, Against Wind and Tide: The African American Struggle against the Colonization Movement (NYU Press 2014), examines black Americans efforts to agitate for equal rights in the North and Midwest in the face the American Colonization Society’s colonization movement, which hoped to compel free blacks to leave the United States for Liberia. |
Dylan Gaffney
Presenter Local History Specialist, Hampshire Room for Local History Forbes Library Northampton, MA A local historian and scholar, Dylan Gaffney works as the Local History Specialist at Forbes Library. He has also been involved with Historic Northampton's Slavery Research Project. In addition to his work in libraries and archives, Gaffney is Co-founder and curator of the Northampton Film Festival and Cinema Northampton. |
Dr. Elizabeth M. Sharpe
Presenter Co-director, Historic Northampton Elizabeth Sharpe became co-executive director of Historic Northampton on May 1, 2016. Sharpe is an historian and writer who has taught at University of Massachusetts Amherst. She is the author of In the Shadow of the Dam: The Aftermath of the Mill River Flood of 1874. She is the former director of education at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History. |