As a DCPS parent, I am always intrigued by the history of the schools in DC, and Capitol Hill particularly. The fight for free, universal, and quality education is one that goes back almost to the founding of the city. Today, we will look at one of the shorter-lived schools on the Hill – but one that remains known as the first free school for African Americans in Washington .
As the Civil War progressed, more and more slaves either freed themselves or were freed by the Union Army and traveled north and across Union lines. Some of these joined the Union army and the fight against those who had enslaved them. Others were taken further north by the army. Unsurprisingly, the District was often the destination for these ‘Contrabands’ as they were referred to. The federal government did what they could for them, and a large number found themselves in the shadow of the Capitol, in Duff Green’s Row. The next step was not easy. Given that most of the freed slaves had spent their entire life at manual labor, there was a great need for their education. Thus, a new school was needed. The man who made it reality was one Hamilton Wilcox Pierson.
Pierson was born in Bergen, New York, in the western reaches of the state, near Rochester. He graduated from Union College in Schenectady, then from Union Theological Seminary in New York City. Originally slated to go to Africa, health reasons kept him in the country, though he did manage to go to Haiti the following year. Thereafter, he worked for both the American Tract Society (ATS) and the American Bible Society, in various states including Virginia and Kentucky. While in the latter state, Cumberland College found itself in need of a new president. Pierson was both Presbyterian and available and so, on May 6, 1858, he was installed as president. Sadly, the institution failed to thrive and folded in 1861; Pierson found himself without a job once again.
Pierson returned to the American Tract Society with the intention of teaching freed slaves. The ATS thus sent him to Washington. Space to operate it was found in the same row of houses that housed the contrabands. This old row of houses had been part of Capitol Hill since its earliest days, and, 15 years earlier, had been where the young Congressman from Illinois, Abraham Lincoln, had boarded.
A ca. 1880 view of Duff Green’s Row, a few years before it was demolished to make way for the Library of Congress (LOC)
On March 16, 1862, thus, Pierson threw open his door to his first 60 students, men, women and children, all from Virginia. For the next four months, they studied under him here. He used the “word method,” where, rather than teaching individual letters, whole words are taught as one, and he had them reading Bible verses in short order, to the great delight of both the readers and the teacher. Pierson also taught at the Navy Yard, as well as starting schools across the District. On July 5, the school was moved to Camp McLellan, at Vermont and R Streets NW. Originally started as barracks for Union Army soldiers, it was turned into a contraband camp in 1862 to house the ever-greater number of freed slaves flooding into the District. It was thus a much better – and bigger – place for the school. Later named Camp Barker, the camp was closed due to an outbreak of Cholera later that year, and, many years later, Garrison Elementary School was built on the site.
Pierson continued his work after the Civil War, moving into the South to help the freedmen there. He was eventually forced out by the Ku Klux Klan. He moved back to western New York and spent his remaining years writing, dying in 1888.
Pierson’s school was only the first of many other free schools for African Americans in the District. The second was opened about a month after Pierson’s. More on these in future installments.
Interesting. I had always understood that the Bell school at 4th and D SE was the first for African-Americans in the city, and that there were a good number of others in the years before the Civil War. I don’t think this is obscure knowledge, so is the distinction that make’s Pierson’s “first” that it was funded with public money? Was it the first not to charge students to attend? Thanks in advance for any clarification.