Mary S. Peake: The Colored Teacher at Fortress MonroeLockwood, Lewis C. (Lewis Conger)
Religion
Mary S. Peake: The Colored Teacher at Fortress Monroe
Lockwood, Lewis C. (Lewis Conger)
African American women teachers -- Biography; Peake, Mary S., 1823-1862
A day school was kept in a house, near Hampton, formerly the residence
of Ex-President Tyler, which was wholly given up for the use of the
freedmen. This school was subsequently removed to the old Court House
at Hampton, which had been fitted up for the purpose, government
furnishing a portion of the lumber. This school became the largest
under the care of the freedmen's teachers, and numbered at one time
five hundred scholars. Among the ruins of Hampton, which had, at an
early period of the rebellion, been burned by the rebels, the colored
people erected rude cottages, the materials being gathered from the
vacated camps, the deserted dwellings of fugitive slaveholders, &c.
Such of the freedmen as were not employed by government have obtained
a living by fishing, oystering, huckstering, carting, washing, &c.
INTERESTING FACTS.
Many highly interesting facts have been communicated with regard to
the freedmen--their natural endowments, their facility in acquiring
knowledge in letters and arms, their industrial habits, their
shrewdness in business transactions, their gratitude, their courage,
their acquaintance with passing events, their confidence that the
result of the rebellion will be the liberation of their people, and
their piety. Some of these facts have been extensively published, and
have been read with high gratification. It is thought that a few of
these facts may add to the value of this little publication.
[Illustration: A "CONTRABAND" SCHOOL.]
SCHOOLS FOR THE CHILDREN.
A young teacher at Hampton, Virginia, writes as follows: "When I first
commenced the school here, I found the children such as slavery
makes--quarrelsome, thievish, uncleanly in their persons and attire,
and seemingly inclined to almost every species of wickedness; and it
appeared to me that they were too far gone to be ever raised to any
thing like intelligent children at the North. But I found that I had
reckoned without my host in the persons of these children.
"At the end of the first week there was a decided improvement
manifested, and in four weeks you hardly ever saw one hundred and
fifty children more cleanly in their persons and apparel. Their
lessons were, in most cases, quickly and correctly learned, and their
behavior was kind and affectionate toward each other, while in singing
the sweet little Sabbath school songs, I should not hesitate to put
them side by side with the best of our Sabbath-school scholars at the
North. And they so fully appreciate my humble efforts in their behalf,
that my table in the school room is loaded, morning and noon, with
oranges, lemons, apples, figs, candies, and other sweet things too
numerous to mention, all testifying their love to me, although I can
do so little for them."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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