Enslavement

Enslavers could hire enslaved persons out to other persons in their community. The salaries listed here belonged to the enslaver, not to the enslaved person. Hiring out was not a form of manumission. 

Manumission 

Manumission could occur through a petition to the local courts or directly to the General Assembly, depending on the laws of the time. In 1856, Peter Davis of Beaufort, NC, manumitted Mary Eliza through a General Assembly petition. 

Manumission 

Although most manumission petitions maintained a formal tone, this example from 1787 includes owner Thomas Newby’s justification for freedom: “...being very trusty and one I should be willing to employ in my service...it is wrong for me to hold her as a slave.” 

Emancipation Day 

The Emancipation Proclamation of 1863 declared that “all persons held as slaves” within seceded states “are, and henceforward shall be free.” Although limited in scope and hindered in enforcement, its issuance on January 1, 1863, provided a pathway to freedom for enslaved African Americans in Union-occupied areas of North Carolina like Beaufort, Elizabeth City, Plymouth, and New Bern.  

Emancipation Day 

The first commemorations in Plymouth and New Bern were held in church spaces. By the following year, New Bern’s day of observance included a parade through the main streets of the city with a band and an escort by the North Carolina heavy artillery. The procession halted at the army’s parade field, where an orator read the Emancipation Proclamation and Black leaders offered speeches.  

Emancipation Day 

The 13th Amendment formally ended slavery in the United States upon enactment in 1865. Celebrations of Emancipation Day were originally assisted by Union forces, but following the Civil War, Black communities maintained and amplified the commemoration. By 1878, Emancipation Day celebrations were acknowledged statewide in North Carolina.  

Emancipation Day 

Emancipation Day observations usually included a procession through town, as seen here, as well as a reading of the Emancipation Proclamation, civic speeches and forums, prayers and thanksgiving, and entertainment. Not only did these events celebrate freedom from slavery, but they served as forums for civic engagement, discussing what the future could hold for African American communities. 

Emancipation Day Leaders 

Rev. Richmond H.W. Leak (1845-1920) served as President of the Day in Raleigh’s 1894 commemoration. Leak was presiding elder of the Raleigh district of the A.M.E. church. He was active in Fusion politics, which was a collaboration of the Republican and Populist parties that gained large majorities in state government in the elections of 1894. Leak was also editor of the Outlook, a pro-Fusion newspaper established in 1895.  

Emancipation Day Leaders 

Henry Plummer Cheatham (1857-1935) was a Republican representative in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1888 to 1893. Cheatham was born in slavery. He later graduated from Shaw University, taught school and worked as a principal, and served as a register of deeds and as superintendent of the Colored Orphanage of North Carolina. In 1892, he addressed an Emancipation Day crowd in Wilmington while serving as the only Black member of the 52nd Congress (1891-1893).  

Emancipation Day Leaders 

The onset of Jim Crow weakened commemorations in some places in the 1890s and early 1900s due to escalating white-on-Black violence and the steady elimination of rights for African American citizens. In this speech, former Congressman Cheatham called out the ongoing white prejudice against Black citizens in the South.  

You can read the rest of the speech at the provided link with your local library’s NC Live subscription. 

Emancipation Day Leaders 

Dr. Charlotte Hawkins Brown, founder of the Alice Freeman Palmer Memorial Institute in Sedalia, made a speech at the 1926 Emancipation Day commemoration. Her speech, titled “The Negro Woman and the New Freedom,” was re-printed in The New York Age, a prominent African American newspaper.  

Learn more about influential North Carolinians behind Emancipation Day celebrations in a blog post from the State Archives.  

Juneteenth 

As the 20th century progressed, African American organizers tended to move away from public parades in favor of programs in community and religious centers. These events continued to serve as forums for civic engagement, where African Americans could congregate, educate, and advocate for their communities. Over the last thirty years, the celebration of emancipation has centered on Juneteenth. 

Juneteenth 

Juneteenth celebrates June 19, 1865, when General Gordon Granger entered Texas and issued General Order No. 3, informing residents of the Emancipation Proclamation. In 1999, the North Carolina House of Representatives issued a Joint Resolution “commemorating Juneteenth and honoring the memory of the hundreds of thousands of African-Americans who were enslaved in this country.”  

Juneteenth 

Juneteenth became a formalized state holiday in North Carolina in 2007 by act of the General Assembly. Governors regularly commemorate Juneteenth and its importance in North Carolina history through issuing formal proclamations each June 19.