Freedom’s Legacy: The Journey of Lucy Carey

Freedom from slavery has had a profound historical and social impact on the three-hundred-year history of Canterbury, New Hampshire. This is the story of two individuals, Lucy Carey and Sampson Battis, whose lives were brought together by the harsh realities of slavery and the turning tides of the Revolutionary War. Like many other Black people in colonial New Hampshire, they wove a narrative of resilience that allowed their descendants to become notable community members who helped secure American independence.

The First Generation:  Lucy Carey and Sampson Battis

Lucy’s story begins in the shadows of the colonial “sugar trade.” The origins of Lucy Carey (c. 1750–1845) remain partly shrouded in mystery; it is unknown if she was born into slavery in New Hampshire or brought there from the West Indies. She was owned by William Coffin (1726–1815), a member of a prominent family in the Concord-Boscawen area. She spent her youth as an enslaved domestic and remained a person without legal freedom.

Sampson Battis (c. 1748–1847) was also enslaved, owned by Colonel Archelaus Moore, an early settler of Canterbury. During the Revolutionary War, Sampson served as a surrogate for Colonel Moore, a common path for enslaved men to earn their liberty. Having distinguished himself as a war hero, Sampson was granted his freedom by the Colonel, who also provided him with a hundred-acre lot in northwest Canterbury.

The homestead still stands today in Canterbury, N.H.
From: https://canterburyhistory.org/luther-cody-negative-collection/buildings-individual-
The Windswept “Mallett” (63 Old School House Road, Canterbury, NH). This farm was constructed c.1747 by Colonel Archelaus Moore. It was owned by the Fifield family for several years, where it was a dairy farm. Today it is a horse farm.

Bound by love, Sampson sought to secure Lucy’s freedom as well. After the war, he negotiated a “marriage pact” with William Coffin. Sampson agreed to indenture himself to Coffin for one year of hard labor—a price equivalent to a yoke of oxen—to purchase Lucy’s liberty. Upon completing his service, he married Lucy, and the couple settled in a Canterbury community known as “New Guinea,” named for the families of freed people who lived there. They raised nine children, supporting their large family through farming and Sampson’s talent as a “famous fiddler”.

 Both lived into their nineties. Some say Sampson was 103 when he died. The Town of Canterbury helped Lucy and Sampson with aid and provisions in their old age. As it does today, our town provides for those in need and understands the interdependency of neighbor helping neighbor.

The Second Generation: Lucinda Battis and Anthony Clark

The legacy of the Battis family continued through their daughter, Lucinda Moore Battis (c. 1782–1862). On January 12, 1804, she married Anthony Clark (c. 1756–1856) in Warner, New Hampshire. Lucinda was 22 and Anthony was 48 years old.  Like Sampson, Anthony was a Revolutionary War veteran who had fought at Bunker Hill and lived to be a centenarian.

Lucinda and Anthony were integrated members of the Warner community, raising ten or eleven children. Lucinda managed a busy home that became part of the local social fabric. For years the family was prominent at social gatherings around the area.  Anthony followed in his father-in-law’s footsteps as a renowned fiddler and dancing master, instructing local youth in “the arts and graces of politeness”.

Lucinda passed away in 1862 and is buried in Pine Grove Cemetery; the Clarks are notably the only Black family in Warner with a headstone marking their burial place.

The Third and Fourth Generations: Caroline Clark and William Haskett and son, James

The third generation, represented by Lucinda’s daughter, Caroline Clark (1826-1874), faced the mounting tensions of a nation heading toward Civil War. Caroline lived in Warner with her husband, William Haskell, a well-known basket maker and owned their own home.

Warner Historical Society

Her only child, James Franklin Haskell, was born about 1842. He represented the fourth generation of this resilient lineage. In 1863, at the age of 21, James joined the 54th Massachusetts Regiment, the Union Army’s first military unit comprised primarily of African American men. Serving under Colonel Robert Gould Shaw, the regiment became famous for its heroic and brutal battle at Fort Wagner.

His service and that of his comrades are immortalized in the Robert Gould Shaw and Massachusetts 54th Regiment Memorial, a bronze monument by Augustus Saint-Gaudens that stands as a testament to Black bravery and the promise of equality.

Caroline maintained the home front, embodying the anxiety and pride of a mother whose lineage had traveled from the slave quarters of Concord to the battlefields of South Carolina. James survived the war but tragically died of tuberculosis at the age of 28 in 1870. Though Caroline died just a few years after her son’s premature death, her life bridged the gap between the era of colonial bondage and the Emancipation Proclamation.

Saint-Gaudens National Historical Park in Cornish, NH

“This memorial was distinct among public commemoration of the American Civil War. While centering the white commander of the war’s first federally-raised regiment of African American men, the piece of art also depicted soldiers marching to wage a war over slavery. It is the first well-known, American civic monument to include dignified representation of Black men.  As it was unveiled along Boston Common in 1897, racist violence and stereotypes continued to inflict harm on Black communities. In contrast, this monument depicts bravery, sacrifice, and the promise of equality. In 1997, this version was cast in bronze by the Saint-Gaudens Memorial and installed here as a testament to its groundbreaking public expression of dignity and resilience. ”Joshua B. Smith, a black businessman, former slave, and former employee of the Shaw family, initiated the campaign for this monument. It wasn’t until 1883 that enough funds were raised to hire a sculptor. Renowned American sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens took the job, but the process took him another decade.

ONE UNION WITH LOVE IN THEIR HEART AND FREEDOM IN THEIR SOUL

The lives of these women; Carey, Battis, Clark and Haskell, come together with joy, sacrifices and a determination to make a life worth living for their children.

Lucy, born into slavery, gained her freedom because a man must have cared deeply for her; her daughter, Lucinda, was a free woman able to marry and provide her children with stability; finally, Lucinda’s daughter, Caroline, bore a son, James, who volunteered and fought in the Civil War for the freedom of those still enslaved in the South.

HISTORIC RIPPLE EFFECT

  • The Bargain for Freedom: Without Sampson’s owner, Colonel Archelaus Moore, promising to free him in exchange for fighting in the war, Sampson would not have been able to work for Lucy’s owner, William Coffin of Concord, to buy her freedom.
  • The Power of Union: Without the union of Sampson Battis and Lucy Carey, thousands of African American descendants might never have been born.
  • Generational Liberty: Without their freedom being both won and bought, their descendants would not have been born free or been able to marry and raise children prior to the Emancipation Proclamation.
  • The Role of Black Soldiers: Without young, enslaved Black men joining both the Continental and Union Armies, battles might have been lost and lives remained unsaved, were it not for their heroic deeds and ultimate sacrifices.
  • A Legacy of Community: Without their freedom and independence, the communities of Canterbury and other towns in New Hampshire would look very different today.

Sources and Footnotes

Primary Historical Records

  • Town Ledgers & Census Data: The Town of Canterbury records from 1845 note expenditures for Lucy Carey’s coffin and grave digging, as well as provisions for Sampson Battis. The 1790 Census for Rockingham County (which then included Canterbury) recorded 97 enslaved persons in the region.
  • Ancestry.com: searches for births, marriages, deaths, censuses and stories.
  • Marriage Certificate: The March 12, 1868, marriage certificate for George Wilkins and Naomia Edwards Battis (daughter of Lucy and Sampson) identifies Naomia as Black and George as White.

Secondary Sources and Reports

Footnotes

  1. The area known as the West Indies is referred to today as the Caribbean.
  2. The “Body of Liberties,” written in 1641, was the first legal code in British North America to make slavery lawful, though it simultaneously paid homage to the Magna Carta.
  3. Sampson Battis is recorded as one of three enslaved persons in Canterbury in 1780, alongside Peter Blanchard and Prince Thompson.
  4. “Dropsy,” the recorded cause of Caroline Clark’s death, is a historical term for edema or swelling.

Canterbury’s Tribute to Black Lives

This news article of July 31, 2020, in the Concord Monitor completes the circle. Rob Scarponi, Mark Stevens, and Doris Hampton, her husband, Mark Hampton, Bill Adams and Greg Heath joined together on this day to honor Black Lives in Canterbury, N.H. https://www.concordmonitor.com/2020/07/31/women-voice-their-support-for-blm-35386773/

IF YOU WANT TO KNOW MORE

Town Ledgers:

Canterbury Town records show provisions for Lucy’s in her 90’s as noted in the 1845 ledger.  And in 1845, the town paid for Lucy’s coffin and the digging of her grave. There are entries that Sampson was paid for and provided cords of wood.

Slavery Data:

The table below shows the total population and number of enslaved persons. At the time there was not a Merrimack County. Canterbury was part of Rockingham County. The 1790 Census records list 97 enslaved persons and by 1830 Census list 3 enslaved persons for Rockingham County. In the 1790 Census, The Town of Canterbury in Rockingham County listed 9 enslaved persons. The largest towns are Portsmouth with 126 enslaved persons and then Brentwood with 94, Concord with 32.

https://nesri.commons.gc.cuny.edu/dashboardresult/?State=NH&cbResetParam=1

“NESRI indexes census records, slave trade transactions, cemetery records, birth certifications, manumissions, ship inventories, newspaper accounts, private narratives, legal documents and many other sources. The goal is to deepen the understanding of slavery in the northeast United States by bringing together information that until now has been largely disconnected and difficult to access. This allows for searches that combine records from all indexed sources based on parameters such as the name of an owner, a place name, and date ranges.”

From the above website are the records for the three enslaved persons in Canterbury, NH in 1780: Sampson Battis, Peter Blanchard and Prince Thompson. All three noted as fought in the Revolutionary War (DAR).

Historical Context of West Indies and the Slave Trade:

Map of the Area Called the West Indies and Today the Caribbean Islands

From: https://legacyofslaveryreport.harvard.edu/report/slavery-in-new-england-and-at-harvard

The information from the above link, gives a summary of how and why enslaved persons came to New Hampshire.

“Enslaved Africans were brought from the West Indies to New Hampshire. In 1755, a ship owned by John Moffatt of Portsmouth, the Exeter, arrived with 61 enslaved people from Africa, a notable exception to the usual practice of ships carrying one or two.”

“Leading historians agree that the colonial economy thrived based on “an economic alliance with the sugar islands of the West Indies.”⁠ This trade involved the provision of food, fuel, and lumber produced in New England to plantations of the Caribbean, where those goods were exchanged for tobacco, coffee, and sugar produced by enslaved Africans—or for enslaved people themselves.⁠ “This effectively made Boston a slave society,” according to one historian, “but one where most of the enslaved toiled elsewhere, sustaining the illusion of Boston in New England as an inclusive republic devoted to the common good.” Yet slavery was not absent from New England.”

“By 1700, New Englanders had made at least 19 voyages to Africa and then to the West Indies, the chief route of the slave trade, as well as many more voyages between Massachusetts Bay and the Caribbean.⁠ The Massachusetts Bay Colony’s Body of Liberties, written in 1641, made slavery and the slave trade lawful. The first legal code governing slavery in British North America, it prohibited “bond-slavery,” “unless it be of lawfull captives, taken in just wars, and such strangers as willingly sell themselves, or are solde to us,” leading one historian to note, “the word ‘unless’ has seldom carried more baggage.”⁠ Even as it paid homage to the Magna Carta, the Body of Liberties permitted the buying, selling, and trading of Indigenous people and Africans. Slavery would not officially end in Massachusetts until 1783.

One comment

  1. I have heard (although I have never researched it myself) that the Battis family had Native American blood as well as African American ancestry. If so, they were most likely of Abenaki descent. There was an old legend among the Canterbury Shakers, which I heard growing up, that, in the very early years of Canterbury Shaker Village, the Shaker Sisters would meet Native Americans on the South Barn Field (the location of which can be seen as identified by name on Elder Henry Blinn’s hand-drawn map) and the Sisters would learn basket making from the Natives. Martha Weatherbee, the preeminent maker of reproduction Shaker baskets and a scholar on the subject, has said that Canterbury Shaker baskets show Abenaki influence on them. The Battis family are known to have a basketmaking tradition in their lineage that continues even to the present day. Do you see how all the pieces are falling together in my mind? I’m wondering if the Native Americans whom the Sisters learned their basket making skills from could possibly have been the Battis family. Darryl Thompson

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