Sarah Harris, a young black woman who lived in Canterbury, Connecticut, may have read Stewart’s essays in the booklet printed by Garrison, as well as the other articles concerning emancipation and equal rights in Garrison’s Liberator. The local agent and distributor for the Liberator in northeastern Connecticut was William Harris, Sarah’s father. William Harris traveled from the West Indies to the United States and settled in Norwich, Connecticut. He married Sally Prentice in 1810; together they raised twelve children and moved to Canterbury, where William made his living as a farmer.24
18. Harris family sampler, which states, “Sarah … was born April 16, 1812.” Sarah Harris was Prudence Crandall’s first black student.
Harris family sampler. Courtesy of the Collection of Glee Krueger.
The Harris family was part of a growing network of literate and informed black families who aspired to more than what the prejudices of the day permitted. Academies for blacks did not exist in Canterbury or anywhere else in Connecticut. William Harris was frustrated by what he saw as deliberate barriers to opportunities for blacks.
“The free blacks are prevented by prejudice and legal restraints from resorting to innumerable modes of supporting themselves and their families by honest industry,” a commentator in Connecticut noted. “Our colleges and seminaries exclude them; the professions are sealed against them … they are prohibited, if not by law, yet in fact, from pursuing anything but menial occupation.”25 Reading the Liberator helped Harris imagine a country with equality for all. Harris thought so much of the Liberator and Garrison that he named one of his sons William Lloyd Garrison Harris.26
Maria Stewart’s promotion of education and self-improvement would have resonated with William Harris and his daughter Sarah. “Many bright and intelligent ones are in the midst of us; but because they are not calculated to display a classical education, they hide their talents behind a napkin.”27 Stewart wrote that there were “no chains so galling as those that bind the soul,” and encouraged her readers to claim their rights.28 “Possess the spirit of independence,” Stewart said. “Possess the spirit of men, bold and enterprising, fearless and undaunted.”29
Mariah Davis, a close friend of Sarah Harris, worked at Prudence Crandall’s school as a servant, or as Crandall referred to her, a family assistant.30 Mariah was engaged to Sarah’s brother, Charles Harris, and shared the Harris family’s interest in education for black men and women. When Mariah finished her daily chores at the school, she occasionally sat in on classes with the white girls.31 She read the Liberator and once gave a copy to Prudence Crandall; thereafter, Crandall faithfully read Garrison’s newspaper.32
Sarah Harris dreamed of becoming a teacher.33 On a visit to Crandall’s school to see Mariah in September 1832, Sarah summoned the courage to ask Prudence Crandall if she could enroll as a student and attend class full-time.34 Sarah said she did not need to board as she could walk each day from her father’s farm. Her father could afford to pay the tuition. Sarah told Crandall about her desire “to get a little more learning, if possible enough to teach colored children.”35 Sarah also understood the magnitude of the request. “If you think it will be the means of injuring you, I will not insist on the favor,” Sarah told Crandall.36
Crandall knew that no one objected when Mariah Davis sat in on classes after she finished her work. Mariah, however, was a school employee, not a student. The distinction was obvious and important. Crandall listened carefully to Sarah’s request but did not give an answer. She told Sarah she needed time to think it over.37
Prudence Crandall considered the potential reaction of her family, the town fathers, the school’s Board of Visitors, and her students and their parents. Crandall depended on the success of her school in a number of ways. Her family had invested in the school, and a significant mortgage on the schoolhouse was still outstanding. She employed her sister Almira at the school. The school provided Crandall with the opportunity for leadership and a career path with the potential for long-term financial security.
Crandall’s first inclination was to deny Sarah’s request. She later confided her doubts to Rev. Samuel May, who became a staunch supporter and teacher at her school. “Miss Crandall confesses that at first she shrunk from the proposal,” May wrote, “with the feeling that of course she could not accede to it.”38 Crandall had succeeded against all odds as a single woman in establishing a well-respected school. “I am, sir, through the blessing of Divine Providence, permitted to be the Principal of the Canterbury Female Boarding School,” she once wrote. “Since I commenced I have met with all the encouragement I ever anticipated, and now have a flourishing school.”39 Weeks passed and Crandall continued to ignore Sarah Harris’s request. Despite all of the expedient reasons to be clear with Sarah and simply refuse her request, Crandall remained silent, conflicted, perhaps hoping that Sarah would not persist.
Mariah Davis continued to share copies of the Liberator with Prudence Crandall. In the summer and fall of 1832, articles appeared regarding the rights of women. William Lloyd Garrison wrote that advocates of immediate emancipation often overlooked the ability of women to assist in the cause. Garrison wrote that the cause of humanity is “the cause of woman,” and women “undervalue their own power.”40 Without the assistance and hard work of women, Garrison wrote, social progress would be “slow, difficult, imperfect.”41
An essay by Maria Stewart in the Liberator encouraged activism that combined religious faith with the fight against prejudice and discrimination. “It is that holy religion, which is held in derision and contempt by many, whose precepts will raise and elevate us above our present condition … and become the final means of bursting the bands of oppression.”42 Stewart noted that black men and women lacked the opportunity to receive an education, and called for change. “It is high time for us to promote ourselves by some meritorious acts,” Stewart said. “And would to God that the advocates of freedom might perceive a trait in each one of us, that would encourage their hearts and strengthen their hands.”43
In September, Maria Stewart delivered a lecture at a meeting of the New England Anti-Slavery Society, at Franklin Hall in Boston. Garrison published her speech in the Liberator. Stewart said that black women lacked opportunity because employers feared “they would be in danger of losing the public patronage” if they hired blacks. “Such is the powerful force of prejudice. Let our girls possess whatever amiable qualities of soul they may; let their characters be fair and spotless as innocence itself; let their natural taste and ingenuity be what they may; it is impossible for scarce an individual of them to rise above the condition of servants. … Owing to the disadvantages under which we labor, there are many flowers among us that are ‘born to bloom unseen, and waste their fragrance on the desert air.’”44 Mariah Davis and Sarah Harris read the Liberator throughout the summer and fall of 1832, as did Prudence Crandall.45
Sarah did not let the matter drop. After she waited for what she considered a reasonable amount of time without receiving an answer, she made “a second and more earnest application” to Prudence.46 This time, Crandall gave her a definitive answer. “Her repeated solicitations were more than my feelings could resist,” Crandall said. “I told her if I was injured on her account I would bear it—she might enter as one of my students.”47
Prudence Crandall’s decision to admit a black student to her school was part of a growing and uncertain transformation in America. Black writers such as David Walker and Maria Stewart demanded an end to slavery and championed civil rights and citizenship for all free blacks. The first national antislavery convention of those who favored immediate emancipation was held in Philadelphia in December 1833. William