Freedman's Village

Freedman's Village was a settlement for recently emancipated enslaved people established by the U.S. Army on December 4, 1863 during the Civil War. Situated on land that was originally part of Robert E. Lee's Arlington plantation, Freedman's Village consisted of about 50 duplex houses, a school, a chapel, a hospital, and a home for the indignant. Officials intended for the village to be a model community for African Americans transitioning out of enslavement.

In 1868, Freedman's Village residents successfully pushed back against a failed attempt at closing Freedman's Village by the U.S. government, after which they were permitted to purchase and rent larger lots. Freedman's Village continued to develop during the Reconstruction Era, and by 1888, the community had grown to 170 households and featured shops, a brick church, and a variety of social organizations. It also became a center of black political power and influence during this period.

As Reconstruction faltered in the 1870s, government support for Freedman's Village declined, and Alexandria County's white political leaders and developers sought to remove the Village. This culminated in the U.S. government once again pursuing the closure of Freedman's Village in the 1880s with support from the Army. John B. Syphax, a black politician and member of the Freedman Village community, secured compensation for residents, which combined with tax reimbursements amounted to a total of $75,000. Following their eviction, which was complete by 1900, many former Village residents resettled in Arlington's existing black enclaves and established new black settlements during the 1880s and 1890s. Former residents brought with them organizations and institutions they established in Freedman's Village, forming the social fabric of Arlington's African American community.

History

Background

Throughout the Civil War, and particularly following the issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation on June 1, 1863, many enslaved African Americans escaped their bondage by crossing into Union territory. The area surrounding Washington, D.C., including Arlington, directly bordered the Confederacy, and was therefore one of the primary destinations for these escapees. This was indicated by the black population's growing share of Washington's total population, which had increased from 19% in 1860 to over 30% by the middle of the war; many had few possessions and were in poor health. Several "contraband camps" were established in Washington to address the needs of the newly free black population, but overcrowding and a smallpox outbreak in 1862 motivated Colonel Elias M. Greene of the Department of Washington to build a camp in Alexandria County.

Establishment and early years

Greene and Danforth B. Nichols, a member of the abolitionist Protestant American Missionary Association, selected a site for the camp in Robert E. Lee's Arlington plantation, which had been seized in 1862 by the federal government. In addition to being outside Washington, the location was chosen for the symbolism associated with a freedman's settlement on Lee's former estate. Founded on December 4, 1863, the Freedman's Village camp, unlike other contraband camps, was envisioned as a model, planned community for the formerly enslaved to progress as they transitioned towards life out of bondage. Government officials also intended for Freedman's Village to serve as a demonstration of the potential of newly freed African Americans to foreign dignitaries and others interested parties.

For incoming residents, the U.S. War Department built a series of duplex, wood frame homes in a simplified Classical Revival style. Other services in the community included Abbott Hospital, which was named after the Medical Director of the Department of Washington, a schoolhouse that provided primary and secondary education, a home for the elderly, and a chapel. Anderson Ruffin Abbott, the first Black Canadian medical doctor, was Abbott Hospital's Assistant Active Surgeon in-Charge in 1865.

The schoolhouse and chapel were both built by the American Tract Society. Tract Society members also ran the school's educational programs with the assistance of volunteers from Northern states, the government, the United States Colored Troops, and members of Alexandria County's local black community. The school often hosted senior government officials, including Secretary of State William H. Seward, who toured prominent visitors to exhibit the Villagers' progress.

Freedman's Village residents were provided with instruction in a variety of vocations and trades, as well as housework, by various societies and organizations. Famous civil rights advocate Sojourner Truth, who as part of her work for the National Freedman's Relief Association, was posted at Freedman's Village for a year. Villagers applied this training in their work as laborers, farmers, craftsmen, and tailors; many were employed by the Union Army for the remainder of the war, as well as in the Village's Abbott hospital and the home for the elderly. Villagers were paid $10 per month in wages and supplied with food and clothing. Residents improved and maintained the homes and added outbuildings to house chickens and horses.

The population of Freedman's Village, which was around 100 immediately after its foundation, fluctuated significantly with new arrivals. For example, on March 22, 1864, 408 survivors from the failed freedman's colony on Île-à-Vache off the coast of Haiti came to the Village. Population estimates occasionally surpassed 1000 residents. Conditions were crowded, and there were outbreaks of contagious diseases including tuberculosis and dysentery.

Post-Civil War development

After Lee's surrender at Appomattox in April 1865, management of Freedman's Village transferred from the War Department to the Freedmen's Bureau. Residents of the Village began establishing fraternal organizations, mutual aid societies, and religious congregations during the Reconstruction era, including a Grand United Order of Odd Fellows in America lodge in 1870. The Little Zion Methodist Church and Old Bell Baptist Church were both founded in 1866; the latter eventually split into the Mount Olive and Mount Zion Baptist Churches in 1873. In 1866, residents partitioned the land surrounding the Village, called Arlington Tract, into five to ten acre lots for rent, which were developed into farms.

Freedman's Village also became a center of black political power in Alexandria County. This was made possible by political reforms under Reconstruction that enabled African Americans to vote and rise to elected office, particularly in the newly formed Jefferson District of the county within which Freedman's Village was located. Elected officials from Freedman's Village included James Pollard, who served as justice of the peace, and William A. Rowe, who was the Supervisor of Jefferson District from 1871-1879 and Board Chairman from 1872-1883. However, the political weight of Freedman Village remained limited by the fact that only a fraction of resident were qualified to vote, as indicated in the participation of only 140 Villagers in the 1888 presidential election. Black officials that were successfully elected were also pushed out by white political leaders due to claimed "inexperience" or failure to pay election dues.

Resident eviction and closure of the village

Pressure to dismantle Freedman's Village, which the federal government originally considered a temporary settlement, increased as Radical Republicans began to fall out of political favor nationally, post-war reconciliation between former Unionist and Confederate states was prioritized, and Reconstruction was undermined. Now derided as "squatters" by the government, residents of Freedman's Village, who continued to maintain and improve their homes and community, organized against an attempt in the winter of 1868 to forcibly evict residents and permanently close the Village. The U.S. Army only succeeded in demolishing homes between Arlington House and the Potomac River before calling off the effort; impacted Villagers were relocated elsewhere in the vicinity, and further community activism enabled residents to purchase their homes.

Following the abolition of the Freedman's Bureau in 1872, several parties, including government agencies such as the War Department and the Department of Agriculture, white residents of Alexandria County seeking to reestablish their political and social dominance that had been lost in the aftermath of the Civil War, and land developers all made a renewed push for the closure of Freedman's Village. Conservative white Southern Democrats, in particular, engaged in a smear campaign in the local press to portray Freedman's Village as illegitimate and destitute.

The formal acquisition of the Arlington estate by the government after the 1882 '' United States v. Lee'' U.S. Supreme Court decision resulted in Freedman's Village falling under federal ownership. This enabled staff at Fort Myer and Arlington National Cemetery to levy complaints about the Villagers, who were decried as a "nusaince". Quartermaster General Samuel B. Holabird claimed that Villagers should "vacate their holdings", as they were living upon a military reservation and therefore in violation of code. This was despite the earlier purchasing of property by residents permitted by the government, who argued that this was under the "direct understanding that they he freedmanare to acquire no title to the land, and are to move when required." Evictions notices were eventually issued to residents on December 7, 1887.

John B. Syphax, a member of the local Syphax family who had been born a freedman before the Civil War and served in the Virginia House of Delegates, pleaded the case for Freedman's Village's existence to the War Department. Syphax argued for the validity of the community based on its continued improvement, which he had executed personally as a Freedman's Village resident, the purchasing of property by residents, and the service provided by many residents to the Union during the Civil War. If eviction was unavoidable, Syphax called for each resident to receive $350 each in compensation. Eventually, the government provided evicted Villagers with an average of $103; some did not receive any. However, the retroactive decision by Congress to regard contraband fund taxes levied on freedman as illegal provided former Freedman's Village residents with additional financial support through reimbursements. In total, evicted residents were given $75,000. By 1900, the last Freedman's Village resident had relocated.

Aftermath of closure and legacy

The closure of Freedman's Village led to the dispersal of former residents across black enclaves in Arlington County and the dissemination of the Village's social institutions. Settlements such as Green Valley, which dated from the 1840s, expanded significantly with the arrival of former Village residents. New black communities were also established by former Freedman's Village residents, including Queen City, which grew around two Baptist churches originally established in the Village, Johnson's Hill, which housed a new lodge of the Village's Odd Fellow's chapter, and Butler-Holmes.

Many residents of these neighborhoods were part of Arlington's growing black middle-class that found employment with the federal government and served as community leaders. Members of Arlington's black working-class, who resided in settlements such as Hall's Hill in northern Arlington, worked in nearby factories or as laborers and domestic workers in Washington. Beyond Arlington's black neighborhoods, some former Freedman's Village residents also moved to white areas such as Ballston. Mutual aid societies and religious congregations founded in Freedman's Village linked these communities together, forming the social foundation of African American life in Arlington County that translated into greater political and civil rights activism in the face of Jim Crow era racial segregation and prejudice.

Today, the site of Freedman's Village is part of Arlington National Cemetery; there are no physical remains of the community besides Jessup, Clayton, and Grant Drives, which follow the route of the Village's main street. The Village is commemorated with historical plaques and markers near its original location. On September 15, 2015, a replacement overpass in the Arlington View neighborhood for Washington Boulevard at Columbia Pike was dedicated as the "Freedmans Village Bridge" in honor of the community.

Footnotes

Bibliography

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See also

* History of slavery in Virginia
* Virginia in the American Civil War

External links

Walking Tour of Freedman's Village



2024 seminar on Freedman's Village hosted by the US National Archives

{{History of slavery in the United States

1863 establishments in Virginia
American Civil War
American Missionary Association
African-American history of Virginia
African Americans in the American Civil War
Arlington County, Virginia
Arlington National Cemetery
Emancipation
History of slavery in Virginia
United States Army