Margaret Crittendon Douglass facts for kids

Photo of Margaret Crittendon Douglass, who wrote a book about her experience.

Margaret Crittendon Douglass (born 1822; year of death unknown) was a white woman from the Southern United States. In 1854, she spent one month in jail for teaching free Black children to read in Norfolk, Virginia. She chose to defend herself in court without a lawyer. Later, she wrote a book about what happened to her. Her case brought attention to the strict laws against Black people learning to read and write in the American South before the Civil War.

Her Early Life

Margaret Douglass was born in 1822 in Washington, D.C.. As a child, she moved to Charleston, South Carolina, where she got married. By age fourteen, she had a daughter named Hannah Rosa. She also had a son who passed away. We don't know much about her husband.

In 1845, Margaret and Hannah Rosa moved to Norfolk, Virginia. Margaret worked as a seamstress and vest maker to support herself. She lived in a simple apartment in a busy neighborhood. She chose not to spend time with her white neighbors, feeling they were "not of the most refined class." This made her unpopular. She described her life as quiet and hardworking, saying she had to "labor incessantly."

Starting a School

In 1853, Margaret visited the barber shop of a free Black man named Robinson. He was an important person in Norfolk's community of over 1500 free people of color. Robinson's two young sons were studying a reading primer. Margaret asked him if there was a school where free Black children could learn to read. Robinson said there was only a Sunday school at Christ Church, where "they didn't learn much."

Margaret went home and asked her teenage daughter, Hannah Rosa, if she would teach the boys. Hannah Rosa agreed. The boys began getting free reading lessons at the Douglass home, using books from their church. Later, Robinson needed his sons to help at the barber shop. He sent his two daughters to the school instead. Margaret wrote that the girls were smart and learned quickly. She said they were "a source of pleasure to us."

A month later, Margaret and Hannah Rosa decided to open a small school for free Black children in their home. They charged three dollars per student every three months. Robinson told the free Black community, and many children wanted to join. For 11 months, they taught 25 children. Margaret described them as "well-behaved" and "anxious to be taught." When one girl became sick and passed away, Margaret visited her home and helped with the funeral. She noted that other white people in the community did not approve of this.

The Arrest and the Law

On the morning of May 9, 1853, two police officers came to Margaret's house. Hannah Rosa and the children were at their desks. The officers told Margaret and Hannah Rosa that teaching free Black children was against Virginia law. They took the two women and the twenty-five scared children to the mayor's office.

This law, passed in 1849, was similar to others across the South. These laws were made after Nat Turner's Rebellion in 1831. The law said it was illegal for Black people to gather to learn to read or write. The punishment for Black people was whipping. For any white person teaching them, the punishment was a fine of up to 100 dollars and up to six months in jail.

When they arrived at the mayor's office, Mayor Stubbs said, "You have a very large family." He asked Margaret if she knew about the law. Margaret said she did not know it was illegal to teach free Black children. She argued that if it was illegal for her to teach, it should also be illegal for the church, since she used the same books. The mayor sent everyone home. He told Margaret that nothing would happen to the Black children or their families.

Outside the mayor's office, Margaret saw a group of free Black adults. They were parents of the children and their friends. They were waiting to hear the decision and offered to pay any fines or bail for her. Margaret gathered the children back at the school. She gave them back their books and slates and said goodbye. She wrote that it was "a sad parting."

After Hannah Rosa left Norfolk for New York on June 29, Margaret was alone. However, her former students often visited her and brought her flowers. Margaret wrote about the support she received from the Black community. She believed that those who called Southern Black people ungrateful had never done anything to earn their gratitude.

Her Court Trial

Margaret thought the case was over. But on July 13, she received legal papers. She and her 17-year-old daughter were accused of gathering with Black people to teach them to read and write. This was against the law in Virginia.

Margaret had little money and did not like lawyers. She decided to defend herself. She did not tell Hannah Rosa about the trial until September 1, when she told her to stay in New York. On November 11, Margaret entered the crowded courtroom alone. She wore a black velvet dress, white gloves, and a simple straw hat. She noted, "Everyone present seemed to be confused, except myself."

She called three men from Christ's Church as her witnesses. Two of them were also lawyers. One of them had even signed the order against her. Margaret noted that the courtroom was very excited when these three witnesses arrived. In her book, she said these men were important people in Norfolk. They or their family members taught at the church's Sunday school. They had given the free Black children the same books she used to teach them. The witnesses either denied teaching reading or said they only gave moral and religious lessons, not reading or writing.

In her final speech to the jury, Margaret described herself as a Southern woman who had owned enslaved people. She said she was not against slavery. She also strongly disagreed with abolitionists from the North, even though she thought their ideas were based on religion. She believed that Southerners had a duty to teach their enslaved people about their responsibilities to their masters and to God. She also spoke about how white people ignored the suffering of free and enslaved Black people. She noted that it was illegal for more than two or three Black people to gather for any reason.

She asked the jury, "When they are sick, or in want, on whom does the duty devolve to seek them out and administer to their necessities? Does it fall upon you, gentlemen? Oh no, it is not expected that gentlemen will take the trouble to seek out a negro hut for the purpose of alleviating the wretchedness he may find within it. Why then persecute your benevolent ladies for doing that which you yourselves have so long neglected? Shall we treat our slaves with less compassion than we do the cattle in the field?"

She also told the jury that while they had nothing to fear from "true blooded" Black people, she felt that those with "white blood in their veins" were "presumptuous, treacherous, and revengeful." She suggested they ask how that white blood got there. She said to blame the "authors of this devilish mischief," not the victims.

In closing, she said she was willing to go to prison if needed. But she called the law against Black literacy "one of the most inhuman and unjust laws that ever disgraced the statute book of a civilized community." When she finished, the judge asked if anyone wanted to speak for her. No one did.

Margaret successfully argued that the charges against Hannah Rosa should be dropped because she was a minor. The jury thought for two days. They found Margaret guilty and fined her one dollar. She then left for New York to get her daughter.

Jail Time

On January 10, 1854, Margaret was called back before Judge Baker for her sentence.

The Judge noted that some people in Norfolk did not like the law. He criticized Margaret for speaking too freely about Black people. He said such opinions were "mischievous." He explained that Church officials could teach Black children because religious instruction was needed. However, Black people learning to read was dangerous. He described the law as a way to protect against Northern anti-slavery activists. He said these activists sent anti-slavery papers to Southern Black people to encourage them to revolt. He also said they spread handkerchiefs with anti-slavery pictures to influence Black people.

The judge also told her off for defending herself instead of hiring a lawyer. He said a lawyer would have made her case look "far more favorable." He said her "bold and open opposition" was serious and needed a stronger punishment.

For these reasons, he said, "as an example to all others... and in vindication of the policy and justness of our laws... the judgment of the Court is, in addition to the proper fine and costs, that you be imprisoned for the period of one month in the jail of this city."

Margaret served her one-month sentence. When she was released, she had nowhere to go. The jailer and his wife let her stay with them for two days. Then, she and her daughter moved to Philadelphia.

What People Said

Margaret's case received a lot of attention in newspapers. Some supported her, and some were against her and the law. The Petersburg Daily Express wrote about her defending herself, calling her "Her Own Lawyer." The newspaper said the courtroom was "filled with persons anxious to witness the novel spectacle" of a woman speaking for herself. They compared her speaking skills to famous women like Lucy Stone.

Even though Margaret said she was not an abolitionist, abolitionists saw her as a hero. William Lloyd Garrison, in his newspaper The Liberator, wrote that a Quaker woman in Norfolk gave a sermon for Margaret while she was in jail. He joked, "The women are a great trouble to our Norfolk neighbors... If they want peace, they will have to expel all Christian women... from the city."

The Virginia newspaper The Argus wrote that while Norfolk did not want to jail a white woman, there was anger towards someone who would disrespect their laws. The editor wrote, "Let her depart hence with only one wish, that her presence will never be intruded upon us again. Let her seek her associates at the North... but let us put a check to such mischievous views as fell from her lips last November."

In a religious publication called Covenanter, David Smith asked the Presbyterian General Assembly to ask the U.S. government to make sure all citizens could teach others to read. He pointed out that the U.S. government had helped Presbyterian women jailed in other countries for handing out Bibles, but would not help Margaret Douglass. Smith said the case "exposed the country to the contempt and hissing of every civilized country on earth."

Her Book and Impact

In 1854, Margaret published her book, Educational Laws of Virginia: The Personal Narrative of Mrs. Margaret Douglass, a Southern Woman, who was Imprisoned for One Month in the Common Jail of Norfolk, Under the Laws of Virginia, for the Crime of Teaching Free Colored Children to Read. In it, she described her trial and the events leading up to it. She also included the speech she gave in court.

Like in her speech, she criticized the laws against Black literacy and gatherings. She also criticized white people's lack of care for Black people. However, she still said she supported slavery and believed in white supremacy. She wrote, "I have been a slaveholder myself, and, if circumstances rendered it necessary or practicable, I might be such again."

She pointed out that many of the Black children she taught were children of the same white men who helped accuse her. She believed this was a reason for the anti-literacy law. She wrote about the quiet frustration of white women who knew about their husbands' relationships with Black women. She also wrote about the powerlessness of Black women. She ended her book by asking her white "Southern sisters" to fix this situation.

We don't know much about Margaret Douglass's life after her trial.

In June 1865, free Black people in Norfolk, Virginia, asked the government to end the strict laws against literacy and gatherings. The law was finally removed in 1867.

Documents and books about Margaret Douglass's trial have helped historians understand this time period. Her story sheds light on American history, race relations, women's history, religion, and law. One legal expert wrote that Margaret Douglass's case showed how modern law was developing. Her speech used the idea of a family, where all children should be treated equally. This idea would become very important in American law.

See also

In Spanish: Margaret Crittendon Douglass para niños