Visions of Freedom: Family
Slavery often separated families. During Reconstruction, many newly freed African Americans sought to reunite with family members and redefine family roles and responsibilities in ways they believed best suited their new circumstances. Their efforts highlighted the importance of family as foundational to their status as free people.
Creating Households After Slavery
Family in front of a house, Thomasville, Georgia, ca. 1895
As newly freed people reunited with their families and looked to establish new ones, they set up households to keep their families together. A home of their own, furnished with their own possessions, signified freedom, security, and success.
To acquire a Homestead should be the ambition of each man in the land.
Colored National Labor Union, 1870
A Family Homestead
Portrait of Squire and Roseanna May
Squire and Roseanna May were enslaved at Montpelier, the home of President James Madison. After Emancipation, Squire May purchased land in nearby Orange County, Virginia.
In 1874 Squire May’s daughter, Polly, married Frank Ellis. The two of them soon established their own homestead in Virginia. Furnishings from their household were passed down to their descendants as treasured family heirlooms.
The Ellis family Bible was passed down through the generations. Information recorded in the Bible, including births, marriages, and deaths, was invaluable in reconstructing the family’s history.
Marriage After Emancipation
Portrait of a Buffalo Soldier and his wife, ca. 1870
Slaveholders rarely provided formal marriage ceremonies. After emancipation, many formerly enslaved men and women wanted official ceremonies to honor marriage commitments previously made. Seeking to make legal what had long existed, African American husbands and wives celebrated the official recognition of their commitments. As couples, they also renegotiated their roles together as free people.
Mothers, once fully assured that the power of slavery was gone, were known to put forth almost superhuman efforts to regain their children.
Bvt. Brig. Gen. John Eaton, 1865
Parents and Children
Children outside a farmhouse, ca. 1900
Tintype portrait of a woman and four children, 1870s
Indenture Petition
Enslaved parents had no legal or parental rights. Under slavery, children were expected to obey others’ orders and could be removed at any moment, regardless of the parents’ wishes. Now free, African Americans resisted efforts to undermine their parental authority when whites sought to have Black children sent to court-ordered apprenticeships. African American parents wanted to ensure that their influence and love was the most important factor in their children’s lives.
Women
Woman with a bicycle, 1895
African American women struggled to gain respect as wives, mothers, and women. Though they sought the same status and opportunities as other women, their quest for equal rights was resisted within and without the African American community. They were denied the right to vote, criticized scrutinized if they chose not to work, and subjected to harassment and physical abuse. Defining and defending their place within American society remained a difficult challenge well into the twentieth century.