Enslaved Individuals: Alexander

Alexander, b. abt. 1807

Documented History

We get our first glimpse of Alexander, who was born about 1807, in records related to the estate of Benjamin Sedwick. From them, we know he was a resident of Page County, Virginia, in 1857, and enslaved by Sedwick at the time of Sedwick’s death. While no records have been located regarding his specific role on Sedwick’s farm, it is virtually certain he was a skilled agricultural worker on a 160-acre farm on the banks of the Shenandoah River near Luray; the farm produced wheat, corn, and oats along with cheese, wool, and other products. At the time of Sedwick’s death, ten people, including Alexander, were enslaved there.

In 1857, Alexander—along with a young girl named Emily Jane—was allotted to Sedwick’s daughter Elizabeth Cullers. He would live on the Cullers farm in the Massanutten mountains, approximately twenty miles from Luray, from 1857 until at least 1859. Alexander and Emily Jane appear to have been the only people enslaved there during this period.

In August of 1859, Elizabeth Cullers filed a petition for divorce from her husband Daniel, and the Virginia Chancery Court records concerning the case provide a slightly fuller picture of Alexander and his life in the late 1850s. In the petition, Alexander is described as being about fifty-two, but seeming older than his years, “not now able to do a full hand’s work at hard work.” Nonetheless, he appears to have been put to work in the field beside Daniel Cullers and Cullers’ children from his first marriage during this period. The Cullers farm was larger than the Sedwick farm, with 290 acres of improved land as of 1860, but with a smaller census of livestock. It produced wheat, rye, corn, oats, wool, potatoes, and sweet potatoes among other products in the year ending June 1, 1860.

The depositions taken in the divorce case also suggest that Alexander would likely have been witness to if not directly affected by tensions between Elizabeth Cullers, her husband Daniel, and Daniel’s teenage children. Among the disputes that are recorded are questions of how work should be allocated in the household and on the farm, who had authority over the enslaved people living in the household, and Elizabeth Cullers’ need for care as she became increasingly debilitated by rheumatism.

What happened to Alexander after the Cullers parted ways is not known. Neither Elizabeth nor Daniel Cullers is listed as a slaveholder on the 1860 slave schedule of the U. S. census, and no person who could be Alexander has yet been located in other listings.

Speculations

It is possible that Alexander is the Black man of forty-two years enumerated as one of the people enslaved by Benjamin Sedwick on the 1850 slave schedule of the U.S. census.

Sedwick expressed concern for maintaining proximity to family members for the people he enslaved in an early draft of his will. If these wishes were known and taken into account when his estate was settled, it is possible that Emily Jane was a close relative of Alexander.