To understand the true meaning of freedom, one needs to look back at a time when certain members of our society were not free.
Or, as Dr. Elaine Wilson said during Saturday’s Lake Cumberland Juneteenth Jubilee held at Somerset Community College, “We’re here today to honor our ancestors who endured much before we were born, in order to do what they had to do to make a life for the family that they had around them at the time. Please remember that some family members were sold off and separated from their true families. We must always remember the sacrifices that they made in order that we might live as we do in relative peace today.”
Juneteenth, declared a national holiday in 2021, is the commemoration of the day the last Black slaves in the United States learned they were free.
Although Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, it took two and a half more years for the Union Army to defeat Confederate soldiers and bring news of slavery’s end to outlying areas of the country.
Confederate soldiers surrendered in April 1865, but word didn’t reach the last enslaved Black people until June 19, when Union soldiers brought the news of freedom to Galveston, Texas.
Wilson, the director of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at SCC, led Saturday’s program by giving a brief history of the holiday, as well as leading the crowd in a singing of “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” also known as the Black National Anthem.
Wilson also gave the Juneteenth audience a list of facts concerning the day, including the fact that the announcement given in Galveston, Texas included an encouragement for the newly-freed Black slaves to remain with their past owners in order to earn wages for their work.
Despite that recommendation, many of the freed people left their former masters, attempted to reunite with separated family members and find their own ways in the world.
And hearing about the treatment that slaves received from their masters, it’s not hard to see why they wouldn’t want to stay.
That was eloquently illustrated by Georgetown educator and actor Virgil Covington, Jr., who came to Somerset’s Juneteenth dressed in full suit and tie – despite temperatures topping out in the upper 90s – to depict the life of former slave and abolitionist William Wells Brown.
While Brown’s story is ultimately one of hope and perseverance, Covington told all of the steps that Brown had to take to get to freedom, including those that put him in physical harm.
Brown, through Covington’s voice, explained that he was born as a slave near Lexington, Ky., around 1814. He was, in fact, related to his original master, as Brown’s father was a white man who was a relative of Brown’s owner.
His mother, however, was a slave who worked in the fields, and Covington described how Brown’s mother and others like her would be severely whipped for not showing up to work on time. In her case, it was not showing up to the fields at 4:30 in the morning, or for being late because she was nursing her children.
Brown’s master decided to move closer to St. Louis, Mo., which is where Brown grew up. At one point, Brown was hired out by his master to another man – with Covington pointing out that “hired out” meant that the master received the wages, not Brown himself – who had a habit of beating slaves with chairs when he was drunk.
In an effort to get away from those beatings, Brown escaped, but ran back to his master’s farm. He was soon caught and punished in a manner Brown called “Virginia Play,” where he was not only whipped but was held in a smokehouse, left with tobacco stalks that were set on fire, and smoked until he couldn’t breathe.
Fast forward a few years, and after another couple of failed attempts at running towards freedom, Brown managed to escape near Cincinnati, Ohio, in the middle of January. While the dream of becoming a free man by running to Canada was strong, the combination of hunger and winter weather took its toll on Brown’s health.
In desperation, he approached a white man for help. That man turned out to be a Quaker by the name of Wells Brown, who took the runaway slave in, fed him, and nursed him back to health.
In appreciation, the young runaway took Wells Brown’s name to be his own middle and last name.
Brown eventually learned to read and write, and not only wrote his own story for a book, but became a lecturer who traveled around different places in the U.S. and Europe discussing an anti-slavery narrative to those who would listen.
While remembering those like Brown who lived in such desperate circumstances, the Juneteenth Jubilee’s crowd also had the chance to remember a more recent – and more local – historical figure.
Recently, Habitat for Humanity of Pulaski County announced the creation of a group of homes that were being built to house local veterans. In creating that veterans village, the organization decided to name it after Louis Garrett, a well-known resident of Somerset.
Wilson told the Juneteenth crowd that Garrett was “a man who had lived and worked in this community, who had been a Buffalo Soldier and who had been a tailor in Somerset for many years.”
Garrett passed away in 2005, but his family were able to be a part of a special groundbreaking ceremony held in April.
Garrett’s widow, Maxine, was able to attend, but she herself passed away soon after that ceremony.
On Saturday, two of Garrett and Maxine’s children, Danita Ross and Janis Carter, attended Somerset’s Juneteenth celebration.
Ross thanked those involved with Habitat for Humanity for building homes for local veterans, as well as thanking Wilson for connecting her family with project organizers.
“We really do appreciate all the support that this community can give for our veterans who are homeless in this area,” Ross said.
Wilson added, “It is an honor for us to be a part of Habitat for Humanity’s decision to have these homes available for people who absolutely need them.”
The village is located at the corner of Bourne Avenue and Race Street, and Wilson said the first home should be occupied by August.
