Vance Lewis Guest

When I was growing up, I learned the family legend that some of our North Carolina ancestors were Cherokee. I was shown a photo of my grandfather and told that everyone could easily see that he was part Cherokee. When I researched my genealogy, however, I found no truth to the family legend, but I did find an explanation for it, as well as an enthralling history of my great-grandfather, Vance Lewis Guest.

Slavery, Racism, and Charles Willson Peale

Charles Willson Peale (1741-1827) was one of the pioneering artists of the early days of the United States. His portraits of George Washington are familiar to fans of American history. His museum, the first in the United States, combined his love of history, science, and fine art.

Charles Willson Peale, The Artist in His Museum, 1822
Collection of Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts

Looking beyond the surface of his illustrious career, Peale's story reveals the complexity of race relations during the late 1700s and early 1800s. A slaveowner for decades, Peale has been praised for voting in favor of abolition, with one brief biography from 1955 going so far as to claim that Peale "hated slavery and freed those few he had inherited as soon as they could support themselves" (Oliver Jensen, "The Peales," American Heritage, April 1955). In truth, Peale never inherited slaves, he purchased them or accepted them as payment for his paintings. While he did eventually free his slaves, his writings suggest he was not concerned about the harm that slavery did to the enslaved; instead, he was concerned that slavery harmed the slave owners.

Nathan Waters, Annapolis Saddler

For the past couple of years, I've been working on a historical novel set in colonial Maryland. As part of my effort to better understand what life was like in that time and place, I've been researching the lives of specific people to see what I can learn about the world in which they lived.

Although my research is focused primarily on Frederick County, the Maryland frontier of the 1700s, a deed from Frederick County led me to research Nathan Waters, a saddler in Annapolis.

Hidden History - Manumissions in Land Records

Maryland's Frederick County Land Records were used during the county's early years to document more than just the sale of land. During the 1750s, at least three instances of slaves being freed were recorded in the land deeds.


Manumission of Dick and Sue

Two people, Dick and Sue, who had been held as slaves by James and Elizabeth (Eltinge) Holmeard, had manumissions recorded in the land records in 1754 after James Holmeard died. Other people held as slaves by the Holmeards were not freed.