Julia Wilbur

[L Verge]

Surratt House Museum had a good turnout on a rainy, cold Saturday yesterday for a program on Julia Wilbur, an abolitionist from New York, who was sent by the Rochester Ladies' Anti-Slavery Society in 1862 to D.C. to assist the swell of contraband (later designated as freedmen) in the capital city's surrounds. Her work centered mainly around the numerous hospitals and camps sheltering the refugees in Alexandria, Virginia, and D.C.

Miss Wilbur kept a series of pocket diaries as well as lengthy ones that were eventually given to Haverford College in Pennsylvania. Most of her work has now been transcribed and digitized by members of Alexandria history groups and are really a treasure trove. Those of you who read BoothieBarn have seen parts of them, and members of the Surratt Society will read assassination-related excerpts in their April Courier, which goes in the mail this week.

You can also read her diaries year-by-year online. We enjoyed a talk by Paula Tarnapol Whitacre of Alexandria Archaeology, who discovered several of the pocket diaries and worked on the project of bringing Wilbur's work to light. A biography of the lady will be published soon.

In the course of that talk, I also learned about her friend, an amazing freedwoman named Harriet Jacobs. Harriet fled slavery as a young person when faced with the perpetual "interest" of her master. She literally fled to her free grandmother, who hid her in the attic for seven years. During that time, Harriet began to write about the conditions of slavery, especially for women, and became one of those rare sources of black, enslaved women who had her story published. Our February lecture series had featured a speaker on these African-American women who published in an era when education for blacks was largely illegal.

For five years, our museum's programs focused on the events of the Civil War and culminated last year with the commemoration of the Sesquicentennial of the end of that conflict and the assassination of Mr. Lincoln. This year, we have been featuring things related to stepping away from slavery and making a step forward towards progress as African American citizens of a re-united, healing U.S.