Lewis Hayden
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Lewis Hayden (December 2, 1811 – April 7, 1889) was an African American leader, ex-slave, abolitionist, businessman, Republican Party worker and a representative from Boston to the Massachusetts state legislature in 1873.
Hayden was born of slave parents in Lexington, Kentucky. He escaped from slavery in Kentucky in 1844 together with his wife Harriet and son, aided by Calvin Fairbank and Delia Webster. (Webster served two months of a two-year prison sentence for helping the Haydens, but Fairbank, sentenced to 15 years, served four years until Hayden, in effect, ransomed him.)
After a brief stay in Detroit, the Haydens moved to Massachusetts, where he began work as an agent, or travelling speaker and organizer, for the American Anti-Slavery Society. Hayden appeared as a lecturer for the Society in Massachusetts and western New York in 1846 – 1848. Reports of his appearances appear in The Liberator and the National Anti-Slavery Standard.
In 1847 Lewis and Harriet Hayden began a journey to Vermont that involved travelling on the railroad. When the conductor refused to honor their first class tickets because of their race, the Haydens protested and forced the railroad into compliance. Rather than admit them to the all-white seating area, however, the railroad ordered a special first-class car only for them.
He toured western New York with abolitionist Erasmus Darwin Hudson. In February 1848, he responded to a letter from the society informing him of "his agency being stop[ped]." Nevertheless, the Boston City Directory for 1849-50 lists him as a lecturer.
After Hayden returned to Boston in 1849, he began to work for Fairbank's release. In 1849 payment was arranged for compensation "to the parties claiming redress for the loss of their slaves. Benjamin Howard, Francis Jackson, and Ellis Gray Loring, were parties on each side to pay and receive a stipulated sum -- six hundred dollars. . ." when Fairbank was released.
By 1850, Hayden opened a clothing store on Cambridge Street. He remained in this business until 1858, despite the financial crisis of 1857, which forced him to continue his business from his home. The Boston Globe suggests that Hayden first moved to a smaller store, was burned out, and later "took to peddling jewelry" during the panic of 1857-58. (The bankruptcy papers for Hayden's business failure can be found in the archives of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.) Probably Hayden's activity during this time was also a front for his aiding fugitive slaves as an agent of the Boston Vigilance Committee.
Hayden moved away from the non-violent philosophy of the Garrisonians in the Anti-Slavery Society and worked both independently and as an agent of the Vigilance Committee as an organizer within the African American community to protect escaped slaves, as well as to provide welfare for those who were having money problems. He took up arms resisting legal authorities in the cases of Shadrach Minkins, Thomas Sims, Anthony Burns and William and Ellen Craft. Hayden was arrested and tried in the Minkins case, but the trial resulted in a hung jury.
Hayden was a longtime supporter of John A. Andrew who became governor in 1861. Hayden received a position a messenger in the Secretary of State's office, which he held until retirement. During and after the Civil War, Hayden recruited African American men for the United States Colored Troops, and travelled throughout the South working with new African American Masonic lodges ( Prince Hall Freemasonry). His only known son enlisted in the U.S. Navy and was killed during the war.
In 1873 Hayden served one term as a representative from Boston to the Massachusetts legislature. He was involved in the movement to erect a statue in honor of Crispus Attucks, who was killed in the Boston Massacre. Hayden died in 1889 and is buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in Everett, Massachusetts.
[edit] References
- Collison, Gary, Shadrach Minkins: From Fugitive Slave to Citizen, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press (1998 paperback reprint). ISBN 0-674-80299-3
- Strangis, Joel, Lewis Hayden and the War Against Slavery, North Haven, Connecticut: Linnet Books, (1999). ISBN 0208024352
