Derby Historical Society shares local info at start of Black History Month

Governor Freeman

and

Governor Freeman

Black History



An interpretation by The Hartford Black History Project 

of Black Governors

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February 1st - Today marks day one of Black History Month, 2021.

Black history is everyone's history. 

We celebrate Black History Month by remembering accomplishments that helped shape our Nation by Black individuals and their contribution to our communities. 

Included in that narrative are the realities that history records, whether dark and shameful or worthy of celebrating - the events of the past influenced the path that led to today. 

How will history look upon us at this moment in time? Whether reminiscing on the rhetoric of the struggle for equality that still exists, or remembering area individuals that made differences in the world around them, this month, we take the time to celebrate Black History.

Today, we highlight Quash and Roswell Freeman. Father and son, both men went on to become Derby’s first and third Black Governors, the latter serving three terms. This was an office that began in the northeast in 1755, and in Derby, 55-years later, that officer would be held by Quash. 

Indeed, Connecticut would need to come a long way before satisfying the duty to abolish slavery, which in Derby still existed until 1840, one-year after the Amistad Rebellion, eight-years prior to the State ending slavery as a whole, and 56-years after Connecticut passed gradual emancipation laws. The context and significance of the date here must be understood and these revolutionary individuals are thus remembered.

What a powerful story it is to share - Quash who was born in Ghana, was captured and sold into slavery, traveled the Middle Passage, and received his freedom in Derby to then become Derby's first Black Governor. There is much discourse that we could have on the institutions that appointed them or the reasons behind the Governorship.

An anecdote that Orcutt (1880) shares about Quash describes that, "He [Quash Freeman] was a man of herculean strength, a giant six-footer, and it is said of him that he could take a bull by the horns and the nose and at once prostrate him to the ground. No one ever dared to molest or tried to make him afraid, and when he was approaching from a distance he awakened the sense of a coming thunder cloud... Physically speaking. Quash was probably the strongest and largest man that ever shared the gubernatorial honors of this commonwealth." 

At the time of the Rev. War/Pork Hollow incident, when Quash was still a slave, he was Isaac Smith Sr.'s personal bodyguard.

Below is a listing of CT’s Black Governors, courtesy of The Hartford Black History Project - you will notice that Jubal, Nelson, and Wilson Weston were Humphreysville Governors. 

Horace Weston, whose father was Nelson, was regarded as the world's best banjo player in the 1880s (Raechel Guest, 2018).



Name

Location

Approximate date


Quash Freeman

Derby

1810


Tobias

Derby

1815


Roswell Freeman

Derby

1830-1835


Eben Tobias

Derby

1840-1845


Caesar

Durham

1800


Peter Freeman

Farmington

1780


William Lanson

New Haven

1825


Quash Piere

New Haven

1832


Thomas Johnson

New Haven

1833-1837


Boston Trowtrow

Norwich

1770


Sam Huntington

Norwich

1772-1800


Jubal Weston

Seymour

1825


Nelson Weston

Seymour

1850


Wilson Weston

Seymour

1855


London

Wethersfield

1760


Cuff

Woodbridge

1840



 Nancy Freeman, wife of Roswell Freeman - DHS Archives

Thanks goes to Daniel Bosques, executive director, Derby Historical Society, for sharing this interesting Connecticut history.