The Young Family of Franklin

On this date in 1877, Charlotte Young of Franklin, Tennessee published an ad in the Southwestern Christian Advocate (New Orleans, LA). She was seeking information about her mother and brothers who were sold to "speculators" during slavery near Alexandria, Virginia. They had been enslaved by Bernard Hoe [Hooe Jr] who lived in Prince William, Virginia. According to the ad, when she was small, her mother and two brothers were sold to slave traders.

“Mrs. Charlotte Young,” Lost Friends Ad, The Southwestern Christian Advocate (New Orleans, LA), August 9, 1877, Last Seen: Finding Family After Slavery, accessed April 22, 2018, <a href="http://informationwanted.org/items/show/1203" rel="nofollow">informationwanted.org/items/show/1203</a>.

From what I have pieced together, Charlotte was born about 1832 in Virginia.  I am guessing based on this ad that she may have also been enslaved by Barnard Hooe, Jr. in Alexandria Virginia.  I think that it was around 1840 when her mother and brothers were sold away from Charlotte.  It is pure speculation, but in 1842, Hooe moved from Alexandria into Washington DC to open a new business and seems to have been in some financial trouble. By the 1850 Census he lists no assets - real or personal. I wonder if the sale of the enslaved people in his possession - including Charlotte's family could have been the result.

The_Daily_Madisonian (Washington DC)
Sat__Jul_16__1842

At some point, Charlotte met her husband Samuel and in 1849 - when she was 17 years old - their son Sam Jr. was born in Virginia.

Around 1850, Charlotte, her husband Sam and their infant son were brought to or sold to Franklin, Tennessee.  It was a common practice during this time period for enslaved people to be redistributed from the Upper South to states further south and west where large-scale farming was more profitable.

Lewis Miller, Sketchbook of Landscapes in the State of Virginia, 1853-1867. Courtesy, Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Museum, Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, Williamsburg, Virginia; slide 84-896c.

This sketch, entitled, "Slave Trader, Sold to Tennessee" depicts an all too common scene at the time of people being sold - in this case from Virginia to Tennessee.  People were shackled together, two-by-two in "coffles" or chain gangs.  They were forcibly marched long distances where they were sold like animals.  It is possible this is what happened to Charlotte, Sam and their infant son.  Or perhaps they were moved to Franklin along with the other possessions  - like furniture and livestock - of the people who enslaved them.  

Freeman Thomas, another enslaved man from Franklin, recalled the practice this way, 

I've seen them sell women away from little children, and women would be crying' and they'd slap 'em about crying'. . . . I’ve seen ‘em handcuffed long as from here to the fence out there, women screaming and hollering about leaving their children.

I am not sure who enslaved the Young family here in Franklin, but it is possible that the white William Young and Rebecca Bugg family was keeping some of them in slavery - this may be how at least Sam Young Sr. came by his last name. William Young and his wife had both been born in Virginia and lived on Carter's Creek Pike where he had about one dozen people in bondage. Perhaps he bought Sam, Charlotte and their son from a slave trader; it is likely we may never know.

Charlotte and Sam's next son Moses was born in Franklin, Tennessee in 1851, Another son Eli joined the family in 1857.  The family then lived through the Civil War and all the fighting, chaos and destruction that raged in and around Franklin from 1861-1865. 

On Christmas Day 1865, Sam Sr. entered into a one-year labor contract (along with two other African American men Nelson Wilson and Ryal Atkison) to farm about 212 acres for C. [Charles] A. Merrill. Merrill was a well-known slave trader in Franklin. They may have been working on Merrill's Rose Hill farm on Columbia Avenue just south of Franklin near where the Taco Bell is today.

An ad for Charles Merrill's slave trading business from a Nashville newspaper
April 27, 1861

Charles Merrill's Rose Hill

Sam Young and his partners agreed to "take charge" of the farm and "furnish [21] hands and cultivate" the farm in "good order". The men were to farm 100 acres in cotton and the balance in corn or a mixture of corn and oats. Young and his partners agreed to deliver the cotton to Merrill's cotton gin the same day it was "pict from the fields."  They were to commence to plow the farm "immediately."  The contract implies that a "dwelling house" was provided on the property because they were instructed not to cook in it and to deliver it in good condition at the end of the year. They were also instructed not to have "any crowds . . . assemble there that may annoy the neighborhood."  Merrill was to receive half of the crop at the end of the year.  The large size and relative sophistication of this share cropping arrangement implies that Sam Young and his partners were well-respected and trusted. 

However, tensions remained high between many African Americans employees and landowners. This system of labor contracts was a complete reversal in the social and economic structure, foreshadowed changes in the political structure that were hard for some to accept.  In July 1867 an armed conflict broke out on the Franklin Square between two rival political groups - divided largely - but not exclusively -  along racial lines. Sam Young Sr. was involved and was wounded.  Young was interviewed by the Freedmen Bureau's officers and his affidavit appears below. According to his statement, he was working to keep the peace and was marching with the members of the Loyal League (a group of largely African American men who generally aligned with the Republican Party) when they were fired upon by Conservatives and many former Confederates.  Young was injured, but not seriously.  [The topic of the Franklin Riot deserves a fuller exploration than I can give it here.  I have spoken on this topic before, and have posted many newspaper articles from the time period clipped here if you would like to read the original sources.]

During this time of very early Reconstruction, it is likely that Sam's sons were working with him - either farming or as stone masons - which was Sam's primary skill; but they were also learning to read and write. Middle son Moses must have displayed some aptitude for school work because in 1869 his name appears as a second year student at Central Tennessee College in Nashville - a school for students of color.  

Central Tennessee College, 1869

That same year, his older brother Sam Jr. married Nancy Southall in Franklin. In 1870, the family was shown in the federal census living in Franklin. Sam and the two older boys were working as stone masons.  Sam Jr. and his wife Nancy had added a granddaughter to the household   By 1872, Moses was employed as a school teacher in Franklin, according to a bank deposit record with the Freedman's Bank in Nashville. 

In 1873, Sam Sr. appeared to be farming as well as working as a stone mason, because his cotton entry into the Williamson County Fair that year won him a $25 prize.

Nashville Republican Banner, October 7, 1873, page 3

By August 1877, Charlotte Young had begun to search for her mother and brothers in earnest and published the newspaper ad looking for them.  It's not clear whether she ever found them.  Tragically, the following year, Sam and Charlotte's family home was destroyed by fire.  The loss was reported in the Nashville newspaper.

Nashville Republican Banner, Saturday August 3, 1878

During this time period, Sam Jr, and his wife added several children to the family, but Sam Jr died in 1879 of heart disease, and I suspect that his wife Nancy also died.

In the 1880 Federal Census, Charlotte and Sam Young Sr. were still living in Franklin.  They were raising their five grandchildren and living with another daughter in law.  I think their youngest son Eli had passed away, as well and I can find no record of Moses.  Sadly, I also lost the trail for both Charlotte and Sam Sr.  

One of their grandchildren - Annie Grace - married and stayed in Franklin the rest of her life. She worked as a hotel cook as a newlywed while her husband James Mitchell worked as a mail carrier.  Later James would become a popular minister in town.  He was employed as a pastor at various churches including Presbyterian, Methodist and AME Churches throughout his life.  The couple never had any children, but were active in the community.  Annie went to college and worked as a teacher later in her life.  They lived on Columbia Avenue in Franklin where they often hosted meetings of the various clubs that they participated in.  

The legacy that Charlotte and Sam left behind through their contributions to Franklin and those of their children and grandchildren is long lasting and enduring.