Finding Mary: How Frederick Douglass inspired my family search

I wrote in part three of Finding Mary how my search for my mother’s Southern roots uncovered my family’s legacy of slave ownership that stands in stark contrast to our connection to Lynn and the city’s proud history of striking blows against slavery. 

The Civil War seems to live on much stronger in the minds of my South Carolina relatives than it did in mine when I was growing up in Lynn. I don’t remember it being a subject taught in detail at St. Mary’s High School, or a subject at the supper table with my parents — although in later years my parents did join and actively participate in the Lynn Historical Society. 

My research into my mother’s past embraced the genealogy sites 23andMe and Ancestry, leading to me establishing connections to Southern relatives. But I also knew the search had to encompass Lynn and it had to start with an understanding of one of the city’s most famous residents.

I don’t remember the life of anti-slavery orator and former Lynn resident Frederick Douglass being taught, and I don’t remember discussing how Lynn was a center for the elimination of slavery. It’s possible that I was absent from school that day, or I didn’t absorb it during my teenage-years daze. 

Frederick Douglass escaped enslavement in Maryland. Although Maryland did not join the secessionist movement that led to the founding of the Confederate States of America, the state was fully a part of the American slave system. 

Among the issues of which I must profess my ignorance is that slavery existed in the North, although it did not take a Civil War to eliminate slavery in most of the Northern states. 

Maryland was “federalized,” meaning it was taken under federal control so that it could not join the Confederate States of America. Given Washington’s location, one can easily see the danger that would be caused if Maryland joined the Confederacy.

Once Douglass escaped, he first traveled to New York City and then to Massachusetts where he experienced employment discrimination. In August 1841, he attended and spoke at an anti-slavery convention in Nantucket, which set Frederick Douglass on his road to activism toward the abolition of slavery. 

He became a very important — if not the most important figure in the 1800s in the U.S. and in Europe. He became an amazing orator, prodigious writer and editor, and was a key leader in the  abolitionist movement. All of these accomplishments are even more amazing considering it was illegal for African-American slaves to be taught to read and write. 

Autobiographies of Frederick Douglass such as “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass,” “My Bondage and My Freedom” and “The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass” have been published. 

Among the amazing details in these revelations is the detailed and pain-staking steps that Douglass took to learn how to read and write. These are basic skills that we take for granted. Imagine having to learn while it was illegal to be taught those skills!

In a recent book, “The President and the Freedom Fighter,” author Brian Kilmeade discusses in detail how Frederick Douglass influenced Abraham Lincoln, perhaps our greatest president, to move toward the emancipation of slavery. 

On page 253, Kilmeade states that “by the end of the twentieth century, Lincoln came off his pedestal and Douglass rose from obscurity. Today these two good men once again occupy a shared space in the ongoing story of the American experiment.” 

The author places the amazing life of Frederick Douglass from slave to antislavery, right beside the equally-amazing life of President Abraham Lincoln. 

Although I knew some information about Frederick Douglass, I was ignorant of his connection to Lynn.

The book “Ordinary Philosophy,” recorded an incident that Frederick Douglass was involved in during his travels.

“An incident occurred at this stop of a train between Boston and Portland. Douglass resisted being forced into a Jim Crow segregated car on Sept. 28, 1841, while he was riding the train with his friend James N. Buffum, who would later become mayor of Lynn and who had inspired him to move to Lynn in the first place. Douglass simply refused to leave his seat, and when employees of the railroad company tried to remove him by force, he hung onto the seat until they were ripped and torn out of place. As Edward Covey, the slave breaker, had discovered years prior, Douglass was physically strong and no pushover. Over time, he ended up doing this sort of protest often, to raise awareness. His letter about this experience was published in the newspaper, and local indignation and protests over this incident helped lead to the eventual end of segregated cars in New England.”

Frederick Douglass lived with his family in Lynn for seven years. This event shows that violence against African Americans and the segregation that existed in the north. It also shows there was a strong movement in Lynn, including abolitionists, who organized for the end of slavery in the United States. How strong of a movement and how many abolitionist leaders lived in Lynn I did not know. 

When my sisters and I embarked on the search for our mother’s birth parents we also included the search for our father’s family, which inspired a six-week family tour in October 2021.

The first stop was in Lynn on Oct. 13. I was able to visit the graves of abolitionists buried in Pine Grove Cemetery by reaching out to Michel K. Chamsarian, Pine Grove Cemetery head clerk at 250 Commercial St. 

Her phone number is 781-268-8000 extension 13, and her email is [email protected]. For more information visit http://www.lynnma.gov/dpartments/pinegrove_cemetery.shtml. 

Michel facilitated setting up the tour of the abolitionists’ gravesites. Jim Farrell, a Pine Grove Cemetery employee, began the tour by guiding us to these graves, and had previously marked off other graves with flags so we could continue the tour at our leisure. 

My sister Frances and I are very grateful for both Michel and Jim taking their time to help us. 

Michel also shared a list of abolitionists buried in the cemetery and the exact locations of their burials. I counted 143 abolitionists on this list who are buried at Pine Grove Cemetery. Certainly, this is an indication that a vibrant movement for freedom existed in Lynn and this is an important part of our history.

During our tour we also visited the gravesites of hundreds of Lynn men who fought for the Union Army and Navy in the Civil War. 

On May 31, 2012, The Boston Globe noted that 283 soldiers and sailors from Lynn lost their lives in the Civil War. Wikipedia states that the number of Lynn men who served in the U.S Army and Navy in the Civil War was 3,270 out of a population of 19,083! 

In researching our family, among those who served was our third great-grandfather, Ebenezer B. Matthews. He was born in 1817 in Stoneham and died in Lynn in 1898. 

He joined the Union Army (also called the Grand Army of the Republic) when he was 45 years old, and was a private who served in Company F, 5th Infantry. He was a shoemaker, like many in Lynn in those years, and like the other 3,269 men, his service should be remembered.

History shows that the Union won the Civil War. Winning the peace was a different matter altogether. Current events and divisions in our country show the ongoing remnants of that reality, which I witnessed during my six-week trip to meet newly-found family members including those in Virginia and South Carolina. 

NEXT — I  share my trip to Virginia to meet relatives and friends of my newly-found grandfather, and share how the issues of slavery and white supremacy are currently repeating themselves today in the U.S.