Episodes Nearest to August 28, 1820: 1 through 25 of 25

  1. Initial State Elections of Missouri
    date August 28, 1820map ST LOUIS, Missouritags Law

    Missouri's first state elections were scheduled to choose a governor, a lieutenant governor, Congressional representative, and membership of both houses of the General Assembly. Following the contemporary national pattern during the 1820s' “Era of Good Feelings,' Missouri did not have opposing political parties. Virtually all adult, white males were Republicans, but the most powerful...

  2. A Shocking Scene
    date August 12, 1820map NORFOLK CITY, Virginiatags African-Americans, Migration/Transportation, Race-Relations, Women

    The passengers of the steamship Virginia witnessed a shocking scene on the afternoon of August 12, 1820. In fact, the scene was so unnerving and immoral that one passenger decided to write a letter to the Norfolk and Portsmouth Herald to express his disgust. The episode began when the steamship happened upon a small boat while traveling up the river near Fort Norfolk. Hearing cries...

  3. Runaway Slaves
    date October 10, 1820map FAIRFAX, Virginiatags African-Americans, Migration/Transportation, Slavery

    One of the worse things that could happen to a slaveholder was to have one of their slaves run away. They ran away for many reasons. They suffered from the brutal treatment of their master. They sought to be reunited with relatives or friends that lived in the North. They could run away just to experience the taste of freedom that had been stripped away from them. Most slave holders posted news...

  4. A Request from the American Colonization Society
    date July 7, 1820map NORFOLK CITY, Virginiatags African-Americans, Economy, Government, Politics, Migration/Transportation, Race-Relations, Slavery

    On July 7, 1820, the American Colonization Society took out an advertisement in the Norfolk and Portsmouth Herald. The ad, which was actually more of an announcement, concerned the need for equipment, tools, food, and other supplies by the colonists whom the Society sponsored. These colonists were free African Americans who had volunteered to set up a black colony on the west coast of the...

  5. Van Buren and Reservation in the South
    date 1820map HANOVER, Virginiatags Politics

    Martin Van Buren, a Democrat from New York and Vice President to Southerner Andrew Jackson was a questionable figure in the nineteenth- century South. His motives and ideas were unclear and not exactly in-line with everything that the South stood for during this time. He voted for Free Negro Suffrage; the South could not place a finger on the reasons behind his vote, resulting in an unstable opinion...

  6. Grundy and McMinn and the New Bank of the State of Tennessee
    date 1820map DAVIDSON, Tennesseetags Economy

    In 1820, Joseph McMinn, a farmer, state legislator, Indian agent, and governor, and Felix Grundy, a Congressman, U.S. Senator and Nashville Democrat leader, suggested to create a New Bank of the State of Tennessee; it was the central feature of his program while he was candidate for a seat in the state senate. This bank was supposed to be better than the old one, based in Knoxville: the state should...

  7. Missouri Convention
    date June 12, 1820 to July 19, 1820map ST LOUIS, Missouritags Slavery

    Southerners wasted no time after the completion of the Missouri Compromise to create a sound structure of government for the newest slave state. The 1820 Convention to establish guidelines for Missouri statehood consisted of 41 delegates, all but eight of whom were born in slave states or territories. The convention was organized with David Barton as president, William G. Pettus as secretary,...

  8. The Runaway Slave and His Broken Family
    date June 20, 1820map BALDWIN, Georgiatags African-Americans, Slavery

    John W. Bridges of Wilcox County, Alabama, desperately penned a letter to the Southern Recorder, the Columbian Telescope, the Carolina Observer, and the Georgia Advertiser on May 27, 1820, looking for a runaway slave by the name of Aaron. A few weeks prior to the publication of this letter, Aaron, a stout well-fed Negro man of 30 years standing around 5'10 had escaped from the John Bridges'...

  9. John England Named First Catholic Bishop of Charleston
    date June 17, 1820map CHARLESTON, South Carolinatags Church/Religious-Activity, Slavery

    John England served a priest in various capacities in his native country, Ireland, from 1808 to 1820. On June 17, 1820, England was appointed by Pope Pius VII as bishop of the new diocese centered in Charleston, SC. He did not receive word of this decision until July 10, when he read the news in a letter from Reverend Henry Hughes. England was asked to accept the position and travel to America...

  10. Alexandria Herald Commented on Illegal Slave Trafficking
    date June 9, 1820map ALEXANDRIA CITY, Virginiatags Crime/Violence, Economy, Migration/Transportation, Slavery

    In June of 1820, the Alexandria Herald ran an editorial condemning Northerners for their attacks on slaveholding. The writer used primary evidence to make the argument that those who criticized Southerners for upholding the institution of slavery were hypocritical because many of them made money from illegal importation of slaves overseas, the act that “produced this servitude (Alexandria).'...

  11. First Meeting of the Alabama State Legislature
    date November, 1820map CAHAWBA(BIBB), Alabamatags Economy

    After being admitted to the Union in 1819 as the 22nd state, the Alabama state legislature convened for the first time in the fall of 1820. The initial order of business was to arrange memorials for the deceased Governor Bibb and instate his younger brother, Thomas, to serve out the remaining eighteen months of the term. The focus of the first assembly was primarily financial, because with the...

  12. William A. Betton Reported Slave Runaway and Posted Reward
    date June 6, 1820map BALDWIN, Georgiatags African-Americans, Slavery

    As was common during the early nineteenth century, a Milledgeville slaveholder ran a public notice when one of his slaves escaped from his plantation by the Wateree River on May 18, 1820. The slave, Davy, was described in the Southern Recorder as a 25-30 year old man, about 5'10' tall, with a “well made, round face, with tolerable large whiskers.' Betton, the owner, surmised that...

  13. Choctaw Treaty of 1820
    date October 18, 1820 to December 23, 1820map INDIAN LANDS, Mississippitags Migration/Transportation, Race-Relations

    The United States, represented by Generals Andrew Jackson and Thomas Hinds, negotiated at Doak's Stand with “Mingoes,' or head men and warriors of the Choctaw nation, over land. The United States hoped to expand white settlement specifically in Mississippi, the Choctaw homeland. In return for the Choctaw land, President Monroe agreed to a cession of about one-fifth of the state of...

  14. Cowford (Jacksonville) Formally Becomes US Territory
    date December, 1820map INDIAN LANDS, Georgiatags Agriculture, Economy, Urban-Life/Boosterism

    Following the War of 1812, Isaiah D. Hart was living on a farm near the St. Mary's River in Florida. Learning of the early successes of some small stores opened by white settlers near the Ferry Crossing on the St. John's River, Hart envisioned great potential for the area. Making perhaps the most profitable decision of his life, in late 1820 Hart purchased what was then known as Cowford...

  15. Alabama Legislature Charters State University
    date December 18, 1820map CAHAWBA(BIBB), Alabamatags Education

    A year before Alabama was admitted to the Union as a state on March 2, 1819, the federal government authorized a grant for the territory to set aside land for a “seminary of learning.' With the addition of Alabama as a state came a second township of the grant. This seminary was officially established by the General Assembly of Alabama on December 18, 1820, when Tuscaloosa was the state...

  16. The Old Woman Who Sold Ale
    date April 29, 1820map ARKANSAS, Arkansastags Church/Religious-Activity, Women

    On August 29, 1820, the Arkansas Gazette told of an old woman who had dozed off one Sunday in church, probably due to the heat and an oppressively long and boring sermon. The incident might have gone unnoticed but for her Bible, which slipped out of her lap and fell to the floor, creating a massive racket. Jolted half awake by the noise, the elderly lady, known to her fellow churchgoers...

  17. Essex: Starvation and Survival
    date November 20, 1820 to February 23, 1821map NANTUCKET, Massachusettstags whaling, Nantucket, cannibalism, Essex

    As the sun sank toward the horizon, the empty, blue enormity of the Pacific washed over three small whale boats. The Essex had sailed from Nantucket a year ago, scouring two oceans for the whale oil that drove the island’s economy.  On November 20, 1820, the ship was 2000 miles west of South America, over 1200 miles from the nearest island. That day, an eighty-ton sperm whale escaped...

  18. Ratification of the First Treaty of Indian Springs
    date January 8, 1821tags Migration/Transportation, Race-Relations

    Prior to the early 18th Century, most of Georgia was home to American Indians belonging to two groups of Native-Americans; the Cherokee Nation and a southeastern alliance known as the Creek Confederacy. The First Treaty of Indian Springs marks Georgia's first of many governmental and territorial struggles with its Native American population. The provisions of the treaty gave the U.S. government...

  19. Arkansas Becomes a Second-Grade Territory
    date April 11, 1820 to April 21, 1820map Washington City, District of Columbiatags Urban-Life/Boosterism

    In the National House of Representatives, Congressman Johnson of Kentucky introduced a bill to establish Arkansas under the second grade of territorial development. The bill provided for treatment of the Arkansas Territory similarly to the Territory of Missouri and pushed it closer to becoming a state. Johnson's bill looked to past acts of Congress regarding Southern territory as guidelines...

  20. Man or Machine? Commodification in the Antebellum South
    date April, 1820 to 1820map KENT, Delawaretags Slavery, Slave trade, African-Americans

    As the price of Bayley's son steadily rose and the auctioneer continued to call for the highest bidder, Solomon Bayley leaned agains the wall of the church to support himself in the heat of the summer sun. They boy who had been taken from him years earlier was up for sale, and it looked as though Bayley would lose his once in a lifetime opportunity to buy his son back. This is the story of Solomon...

  21. Sale of Thomas Blackwell's Estate
    date January 11, 1821map HENRICO, Virginiatags African-Americans, Health/Death, Slavery

    The Richmond Enquirer, the leading newspaper in Richmond, Virginia during the first half of the nineteenth century posted a notice from W. D. Wren, the executer of Thomas Blackwell's estate, about the sale off this estate to take place on January 15, 1821 (or the next fair day). The sale consisted of all household and kitchen furniture as well as horses several negroes. All items were...

  22. Territorial Capital of Mississippi Established at Jackson
    date January, 1821tags Race-Relations, Urban-Life/Boosterism

    The site of the city, a trading post known as Le Fleur's Bluff near the Natchez Trace, is located on the west bank of the Pearl River thirty-five miles southwest of the geographical center of Mississippi, and was originally owned and inhabited by the Choctaw Indians. The Choctaw were the largest tribe found in the region and their lands stretched throughout western Alabama and southern Mississippi....

  23. Mexico Permits First Anglo Settlement in Spanish Texas
    date January 17, 1821tags Health/Death, Migration/Transportation, Urban-Life/Boosterism

    Moses Austin, originally a Connecticut merchant, migrated throughout the U.S. States and western territories developing the lead industry. After coming into economic ruin after settling in Missouri, he set his sights on economic expansion in Spanish Texas, and became the first man to obtain permission to bring Anglo-American settlers into the foreign territory. Permission was granted for the settlement...

  24. The Brig Nautius Sets Sail for African Colony
    date January 23, 1821map NORFOLK CITY, Virginiatags African-Americans, Church/Religious-Activity, Economy, Migration/Transportation, Race-Relations, Slavery

    The Brig Nautius captained by a Capt. Blair sailed from the port of Norfolk on the morning of Tuesday January 23, 1821. The vessel was bound for the coast of Africa, and carried on board a number of free blacks seeking (or having sought for them) a new life in the African colony, which would later be termed Liberia. Aboard were also a number of clergy from varying denominations ranging from Methodist...

  25. Mail Robbery
    date March 27, 1820map GEORGETOWN, South Carolinatags Crime/Violence

    Mr. Hipps had lived in the Georgetown area two years before he was brutally murdered. The regions mail carrier, Mr. Hipps was making his route towards Georgetown on a Saturday afternoon when his mail carriage was robbed and he was murdered. When members of the community noticed that the mail carriage hadnt arrived, a number of men went out on their horses to check on the delay. These men encountered...