|
ByCorinne Nyquist Librarian, Sojourner Truth Library |
Sojourner Truth was born about 1797 in Ulster County.
Life on Mars
|
Sojourner Rover
| The Mars Pathfinder was launched on December 3, 1996 and travelling at a rate of 62 miles per second covered the 48 million miles to Mars in just 7 months. We have all seen the pictures transmitted by the landing probe named for Sojourner Truth and watched her explorations. The mission of the Sojourner Microrover was to do soil experiments, take measurements of rocks, and to travel around taking pictures. Sojourner has her own NASA home page and discussion group. Sojourner Truth once said that she was not going to die. That instead she was "going home like a shooting star." |
Sojourner Truth Library
| This three story building, on the campus of the State University of New York at New Paltz, has over half a million volumes and serves as the central library for a nine county area. It may seem ironic that a library is named for a woman who could not read or write. It is just as ironic that this great communicator is one of the most famous persons to come from Ulster County. She often said " I can't read books, but I can read the people." |
Her Narrative
| Though illiterate Truth produced a book, which she sold to support herself. This Narrative, which was written down for her by Olive Gilbert and published first in 1850, was republished five times during her lifetime with additions. Today she is well-represented in libraries with over fifty-one books and plays having been written about her as well as two recent new editions of her Narrative. Recent biographies are those in 1993 by Carleton Mabee, SUNY College professor emeritus and Pulitzer Prize winner; and in 1996 by Nell Painter, Princeton Professor of African-American History. In addition there are many reference books that include her, books that contain chapters about her, videos and audiotapes of theatrical presentations, as well as teaching materials and posters. |
First Day Cover
| One of the most exciting events to take place in this library was the dedication of the Sojourner Truth Stamp on February 4, 1986. This poster-sized replica hangs behind the library circulation desk. The twenty-two cent stamp, the ninth in the postal services's Black History Series, was designed by Croton-on-Hudson artist, Jerry Pinkney, who particpated in the festivities. |
Library Mural
| This Library mural was dedicated on May 19, 1995. The mural is the work of former SUNY New Paltz Art Education instructor, Rikki Asher, and thirteen of her graduate students. It is a lovely, large work of art, 7 by 16 feet, placed high above a stairway, under a skylight. The students spoke movingly at the dedication of getting to know Sojourner Truth through reading about her in the library. They were moved by her suffering and were inspired by her courage and by her triumphs. |
Library Sculpture
| In the spring of 1996, a sculpture entitled Mvet Truth was installed and dedicated in the college library lobby. New York artist and SUNY College faculty member, Terry Adkins says that MVET is onomatpoetic. It refers to the sound made by some West African instruments. It is symbolic of her love of music and her angelic nature. |
What do we really know about Sojourner Truth? Well, we know that she was born here in Ulster County about 1797. She was almost six feet tall and spoke English with a Dutch accent. Sojourner Truth first had her picture taken in 1863, while in her sixties. The photographer and date for photograph at the top of this page are unknown. A larger than life-sized print hangs near the library entrance.
Her signature
|
A copy of her signature, reproduced on a wall in the College Library from an 1880 autograph. |
Hardenburgh House in the hamlet of Hurley
| It was once thought that she was born on the grounds of this Hardenburgh House in the Hamlet of Hurley. |
Ulster County Map
| An 1840 map of Ulster County shows why it is difficult determine precisely the places that Sojourner Truth lived in Ulster County. Few of the town boundaries were the same as today. She was then named Isabella, and born to slaves named James and Betsey. Their owner, Johannes Hardenbergh had land in the Swartekill area, (now known as Rifton) in what was then the Town of Hurley. It was near where the Swartekill joins with the Wallkill, before flowing into the Roundout Creek, which six miles later flows into the Hudson River. Johannes Hardenburgh was a large landower, operated a grist mill, and had seven slaves, according to the 1790 census. He had been a member of the New York colonial assembly and a colonel in the Revolutionary War. |
Hardenburgh House in Rifton
 Click to enlarge Many believe this house by the Swartekill (Black Creek) is the proper Hardenburgh house. |
An example of an old stone basement
| While Isabella was an infant, Johannes died and she and her parents became the property of his son, Charles. He ran a hotel and housed all his slaves in a damp basement. The building has not yet been located. Isabella was the next to the youngest of ten or twelve children, most of whom had been sold away. |
Roundout Creek near Kingston
|
When Isabella was about nine years old, Charles died and she was auctioned off to John Neely, an Englishman, who owned a store near Kingston on the Roundout Creek. Neely beat her severely because she did not understand his instructions. She later showed these scars when she lectured about her life under slavery. |
Hudson River
| View of the Hudson River. About 1808, Isabella was sold to Martinus Schryver, a fisherman and tavern keeper, in what is now Port Ewen. He was crude and she said that she learned to swear then, but he was decent to her. She had time to watch the white-sailed sloops on the Hudson and roam about. She found a special place on an island where she went to talk to God. Much of Port Ewen was part of Schryver's farm, but a street name is all that remains. The tavern site has yet to be found. |
Entrance to the former John Ignatius Dumont farm
| At the age of about 12 or 13, Isabella was sold to John Ignatius Dumont, of French Huguenot extraction, who operated a farm about ten miles south of Kingston, with four slaves. The Dumont farm was on the banks of the Hudson River, a beautiful location. Formerly a part of New Paltz, the site is now in West Park in the town of Esopus. This area was called New Paltz landing and there was ferry boat service to Poughkeepsie. The owner claims the original house stood between the buildings now seen. |
Klyne Esopus Historical Society
| The Klyne Esopus Dutch Reformed Church was organized in 1791 and this building constructed in 1827. It was the church of the Dumont family. It is now the site of the town's historical society. Dorothy DuMond, whose husband descended from another line of the Dumonts, has a very interesting display there on Sojourner Truth and the museum director, Sue Boice, has her on their home page. Two of Truth's daughters remained with the Dumonts for many years. The oldest, Dinah was member of this church until 1850. |
You may know the story of the escape as told in the Narrative. Isabella and her husband had been promised their freedom on July 4, 1826, one year early for faithful service. Master Dumont retracted his promise, apparently because he has lost some of her service through the birth of her child that year or because of an injury to her hand. After Isabella had finished the fall work and spun one hundred pounds of wool, she determined, after talking to God, to leave even though her husband decided to stay. She took the infant, Sophia, but left her three other children. She walked away; she said she did not run away, as somehow that would be wrong. She did not go far.Toll roads level the landscape. But most paved roads simply follow earlier gravel roads, that follow earlier dirt roads that follow earlier walking trails along the lay of the land. Thus it is possible today to climb and descend the same hills that Isabella walked, covering by car or foot the eleven and one half miles.
Poppletown
| She says in her Narrative that she went to the home of a Quaker named Levi Rowe, in Poppletown, but he was very ill. He directed her to the house o people, whom she remembered, which supports the theory that it was to where she grew up. She might have passed the grounds of the Hardenburgh house on the way. One can visit the grave of that same Levi Rowe, by taking the road by the Postage Inn to the Meeting House in Tillson. Isabella turned to the Quaker community several times for help. |
The Quakers had a Sunday School for slaves in Poppletown, but she did not attend. The site has not been located. Truth said she came to Battle Creek because "old friends from Ulster County had removed and wanted me to follow" Also in Tillson is the grave of Alexander Young who helped her recover her son. His daughter, Dorcus, married a Cornell and then moved to Harmonia, where Sojourner Truth visited them. It was from the Cornell's son Hiram that Sojourner bought the lot for her house.
The Van Wagenen House
| Here on the east bank of the Roundout,where Isabella most likely came. Having known her from infancy, the Van Wagenens took her in. Although not Quakers, they did not believe in slavery. Later the same day Master Dumont came here to claim her. Having tasted freedom, she would not go. He threatened jail. The Van Wagenens paid him $20 for Isabella and $5 for Sophia and he left. At the Van Wagenens, she was not treated as a slave. She says she became so comfortable that she almost forgot about God. As the slave holiday of Pinkster (Pentecost) approached, she desired to return to the Dumonts to sing, drink, smoke, and dance with her slave friends. In her Narrative she tells that God then revealed himself to her "with the suddeness of a flash of lightning." |
She tried to crawl away but could not hide. In what she came to call her religious conversion, she saw for the first time a vision of Jesus.
Former D & H Canal Locks
|
The Van Wagenens are thought to have had a store near the newly constructed D and H Canal and it is supposed that Isabella worked there during her year with them. In her Narrative she notes that, after her son, Peter, was returned to her, she procured a place for him as tender of Locks at Wagondale (Wahkendall), which is near to where the Van Wagenens lived. |
Ulster County Court House.
| The Ulster County Court House in Kingston is another site connected with Sojourner Truth. It is the same building that she entered numerous times in 1827 and 1828 while fighting to recover her son, Peter. Early in 1827, he had been sold and sent to Alabama illegally. On July 4, 1827, all adult Blacks in New York State were freed. Children became bonded servants for a period of years, depending upon their ages, but eventually were to be freed. This would not happen if they were sent out of the State. |
Huguenot Street
| Huguenot Street in New Paltz is little changed from the 1820's. It was to New Paltz that Truth went to see the mother of Solomon Gedney, who had sold Peter to the relative, who had taken him to Alabama. |
Truth, who said that she had never before had a dollar in her life, raised more than $5.00 that lawyer, Herman Royeyn, would use to hire someone to bring both Gedney and Peter to court. Romeyn and at least two other lawyers in both Kingston and New Paltz worked to help her, asking no fees.
Plaque in front of the Ulster County Court House
| Truth was awarded custody of her son and Gedney was fined. Peter had been beaten badly in Alabama. Years later she would describe welts the size of her finger when she spoke to groups about it. Master Fowler had been cruel not only to Peter but also to his own wife--he later beat her to death. Truth decided that this punishment resulted from her prayers and she told Him that "I did not mean quite so much, God!" This plaque outside the courthouse commemorates the event. |
St. James Methodist Church
| On March 27, 1993, the fifth annual Symposium on Sojourner Truth was held here in her church. This was not the same building of rough hewn timber built in the mid 1820's, that she attended, but it was on about the same site. She joined it late in that decade, at the time that she was legally freed from slavery and living in Kingston as a domestic. Methodists welcomed Blacks, as shown by their having a Sunday School especially for them. Methodists emphasized direct personal experience with God and they loved to sing. Truth said long afterwards that she liked the Quakers, but they would not let her sing, so she joined the Methodists. |
One of the stained glass windows in the St. James Methodist Church in Kingston lists Ira Ferris as an early pastor. Truth had attended her first Methodist meeting, led by circuit rider Ferris, in a private home in New Paltz. She looked in through an open window as was the custom for Blacks and saw him line out the hymn, "There is a holy city, a world of light above." She learned it on the spot and could sing it all her life.
| To read more about Sojourner Truth look for the following books in your library.
Narrative of Sojourner Truth: A Northern Slave [as told to Olive Gilbert] Boston: Printed for the author, 1850. First edition was in 1840, but many editions have followed. Sojourner Truth: Slave, Prophet, Legend by Carleton Mabee with Susan Mabee Newhouse. New York: NYU Press, 1993. The author is a Pulitzer Prize-winning Professor Emeritus of the State University of New York at New Paltz. |
