For more than 60 years Liberty Hall Historic Site was the home to enslaved individuals and families that made the Brown Family’s elegant lifestyle possible.
In 1804 Margaretta wrote that she and John did not own slaves.[1], However, they would take advantage of slave labor in other ways. Harry Mordecai, the famous Kentucky craftsman, was one of the men who laid the brick and plastered the rooms. At the time he worked on Liberty Hall he had not yet bought his freedom from his enslaver.[2]
The Browns enslaved one family as early as 1806, but in 1810, census records show that the number increased to 9 people and then 13 in 1830. From Brown family letters we know that many of them belonged to the Stepney family-- Miles and Hannah and their eight children, Rose, Joseph, Selim, George, Mary, James, Mourning, and Edwin. Other people mentioned in John and Margaretta’s letters are Henry, Franky, Harriet, and two women named Fanny. Like many sites of enslavement, Liberty Hall has many archival absences regarding the identities and surnames of non-white families.
The Stepneys, Henry, Franky, Harriet, and the two Fannys spent most of their days working. Tasks included domestic chores like cooking and serving meals, cleaning, and laundry. But not all chores were inside the home. Others included maintaining the gardens, tending the stables, and almost any other job the Browns saw as beneath their status. When not working, they lived in the attic, or garrets, of Liberty Hall and were expected to be on call at all hours if the Browns needed anything.
Not all people enslaved at Liberty Hall worked full time on-site. Joseph Stepney worked in another Frankfort household and Selim Stepney worked on a steamboat. Others like Mary Stepney, Fanny, and Henry accompanied the Browns while they were traveling, including trips to New York and Philadelphia.
The Stepneys were released from bondage following John Brown’s death.[3] To learn more about the Stepney family visit our blog.
In addition to Liberty Hall, the Browns had two farms, one in Frankfort, KY (along what is now Holmes Street) and Owen County just south of Gratz, KY called Brown’s Bottom. To John these farms would have been considered side projects, outside of his primary investments, to give him the image of the 19th century ‘gentleman farmer.’ For later generations, they provided a passive income to keep up with polite society and avoid the bust and boom economy of the time.
John and Margaretta’s sons, Mason and Orlando, would grow up to be enslavers as well and increased the number of people held in bondage until Emancipation in December 1865. Between the two of them, they enslaved 48 people in 1860[4]; however, little is known about them. Two stories stand out to give us a glimpse into those who remained bound as the Browns’ property. One is of Frederick Hart who was born c. 1776 and was the first non-indigenous child born in Kentucky.[5] He was enslaved by John’s brother, Preston, then Orlando before being manumitted sometime before 1842. Another is Amanda Preston (née Nichols) who was born into slavery c. 1855 and 80 years later recounted her memories of enslavement as part of the WPA Slave Narrative Project.[6] Learn more about Frederick and Amanda on our blog.
References
[1] Margaretta Brown to Eliza S. Quincy. Dec 22, 1804. Liberty Hall Collections.
[2] Sharon Cox, Harry Mordecai, Plasterer and Bricklayer of Frankfort, Kentucky, https://www.mesdajournal.org/2020/harry-mordecai-plasterer-and-bricklayer-of-frankfort-kentucky/
[3] Last Will of John Brown. May 4, 1836. Liberty Hall Collections.
[4] Franklin County Slave Schedule, pg. 18 & 26. 1860.
[5] Frankfort Commonwealth, June 1, 1841.
[6] Mrs. Preston’s Story. Federal Writers' Project: Slave Narrative Project, Vol. 5, Indiana, Arnold-Woodson. Pg. 153-4. 1936. Manuscript/Mixed Material. https://www.loc.gov/item/mesn050/.