 Although this family is not in Wisconsin, they illustrate how many of the African Americans during this time period looked and traveled. State Historical Society of Wisconsin, CF 32912 WHi(W6), copy negative number 8950. |
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African Americans have a long history in Wisconsin. They joined French and British explorers and trappers on expeditions through the Northwest Territory, which later became Wisconsin and Michigan. They also served as soldiers when the land came under British control. Although several trappers founded towns, it was not until the early 1800s that they established permanent residence in Wisconsin.
In 1787, an ordinance that banned slavery in the Northwest Territory passed. Still, some settlers owned slaves, including many white Southerners who had moved north. Governor Henry Dodge owned slaves, also, but freed them and gave them land when it became a political issue. The Reverend Edward Mathews, an abolitionist, was one of the many people outraged at Wisconsinites who owned slaves. He recorded the names of the owners of the eleven slaves listed in the 1840 census and began a heavy campaign in Wisconsin to ensure that the practice of slavery ended. It was not until a census count of 1850 that slaves did not appear in the count.
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The numbers of recorded blacks in Wisconsin almost doubled between the 1850 and 1860 censuses. Since Wisconsin borders Canada, it was natural that routes on the Underground Railroad passed through the state. Many Wisconsinites eagerly offered aid along this route. The southern states passed laws that required freed slaves to move to free states. Many free blacks and escaped slaves were not comfortable living in border states, like Ohio and Indiana. Slave owners could legally cross state lines to capture runaways under the Fugitive Slave Act, so they moved further north. There was an incident in Wisconsin in 1854 involving Joshua Glover, a runaway slave from Missouri. His former owner found him and imprisoned him in Milwaukee. A group of angry men broke into the jail and helped Glover escape to Canada. This case caused such problems in Wisconsin that it eventually went to the state Supreme Court, where the Fugitive Slave Act was ruled unconstitutional. |
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Although the debate about giving African Americans the right to vote began in the 1840s, they were not legally awarded that privilege until 1866 when the Wisconsin Supreme Court decided the case Gillespie vs. Palmer. Ezekiel Gillespie was a Negro active in the debate about voting rights. He was working with Byron Paine, an attorney who argued against the Fugitive Slave Law in Joshua Glover's case. In 1865, he attempted to register and vote, was denied, and took the inspectors of the seventh ward who denied his vote to court. The case promptly moved to the Supreme Court, where the three justices decided unanimously that African Americans could vote. During the Civil War, several African Americans represented Wisconsin in the Union Army. After the war, many moved to northern states from the South. Their population in Wisconsin almost doubled between 1860 and 1870. |
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One well-documented family living in Madison during this time
is the Noland family, who moved to Madison in the 1850s. The father,
William H. Noland, became a popular citizen and was involved in
local politics, as well as filling a variety of roles as a baker,
musician, grocer, and barber. He also worked for the improvement
of conditions for African Americans. His son, William S. Noland,
might have been the first minority graduate of the University
of Wisconsin-Madison on record.
 The Pleasant Ridge School about 1880, from the scrapbook of Dr. Louis C. Smith, Lancaster. State Historical Society of Wisconsin, CF 32912 WHi(x3)22096. |
African Amrericans contributed to Wisconsin in many ways during the Nineteenth Century. They established many communities, like Pleasant Ridge, Chilton, and Forest. The Pleasant Ridge School, pictured at the left, was the first integrated school in Wisconsin. Many of these communities drew people to Wisconsin. African Americans took up a variety of trades, including farming, teaching, providing medical care, and working in politics. |
Cooper, Zachary. Black Settlers in Rural Wisconsin. Madison: State Historical Society of Wisconin, 1977.
Fischel, Leslie H., Jr. "Wisconsin and Negro Suffrage." Wisconsin Magazine of History, Vol 46 No 3 (Spring 1963). pp. 180-196.
Martell, Chris. "A Place Forgotten: Former Slave Settlement of Pleasant Ridge; Buildings Gone, Memories Linger; Exhibit to Honor Community of Harmony." Wisconsin State Journal, Nov. 30, 1997, p. 1A.
Mathews, Edward. "An Abolitionist in Territorial Wisconsin: The Journal of Reverend Edward Mathews (Part 1)." Wisconsin Magazine of History, Vol 52 No 1 (Autumn 1968). pp. 3-18.
Mathews, Edward. "An Abolitionist in Territorial Wisconsin: The Journal of Reverend Edward Mathews (Part 2)." Wisconsin Magazine of History, Vol 52 No 2 (Winter 1968-1969). pp. 117-131.
Mathews, Edward. "An Abolitionist in Territorial Wisconsin: The Journal of Reverend Edward Mathews (Part 3)." Wisconsin Magazine of History, Vol 52 No 3 (Spring 1969). pp. 248-262.
Mathews, Edward. "An Abolitionist in Territorial Wisconsin: The Journal of Reverend Edward Mathews (Part 4)." Wisconsin Magazine of History, Vol 52 No 4 (Summer 1969). pp. 330-343.
Noyes, Edward. "A Negro in Mid-Nineteenth Century Wisconsin Life and Politics." Wisconsin Academy Review, Vol 15 No 3 (Fall 1968). pp. 2-6.
Wisconsin Department of Tourism and the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, in cooperation with the African American Heritage Task Force. Heritage Wisconsin : open a treasure of African American culture in America's heartland. Madison: Wisconsin Department of Tourism, 1997.
Images are courtesy of the Visual Materials Archive of the
State Historical Society of Wisconsin. Click on the images to
see a larger version.
This page was originally created by Jessica Baumgart for The Wisconsin Mosaic as part of LIS 839: Special Collections: In the Digital Environment, Spring 2000.
Last update: April 16, 2000.
