At 2:26 PM -0400 4/16/01, Harold S. Forsythe wrote: > I don't doubt that there were many Quakers in Delaware, but I do >doubt that their presence was the determining factor in Delaware's >gradual emancipation (or manumission.) Delaware, home of Du >Pont de Nemours, was perhaps the most industrialized slave state >by 1850. The history of emancipation in Delaware was indeed a function of agrarian Quakers, like the Dickinson, Hunn, and Mifflin families that were politically active. Governor John Dickinson, a Quaker, called the "Penman of the Revolution," was a slave owner, by the way. Industry, of course, in those days was dispersed along the water power streams. The biggest milling installations were merchant flour mills and, later, textile mills. Delaware's sizable free colored community, living on the border as they did, were quite active in the anti-slavery movement, with such individuals as Bishop Richard Allen and Harriet Tubman, to name but two who were active in the state. Wilmington's black middle class was economically devastated by emancipation, but they had been among the key people in the Underground Railroad. I believe the free black population of Richmond suffered a similar decline in fortunes, but the general depression of Reconstruction may have masked the effect. Delaware's manumission reforms occurred before duPont was much of a force in Delaware. The duPonts only came to Delaware in 1802, and they didn't make an immediate splash. Not until the Civil War did that company become even a blip on the radar screen outside its small sphere upstate. Lincoln tried to persuade the white slave owners of Sussex County, Delaware, to experiment in compensated emancipation, and sent a popular politician to sell the idea. He escaped with his life and was appointed Chief Justice of the District of Columbia in compensation. To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe, please see the instructions at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html