Samuel Ringgold Ward

Abolitionist and minister

• Born: October 17, 1817
• Birthplace: Maryland
• Died: 1866
• Place of death: Saint George Parish, Jamaica

Significance: Samuel Ringgold Ward was an abolitionist, minister, newspaper editor, and activist. He founded and headed influential abolition newspapers and lectured widely on the topic. Because he had been born enslaved and feared being arrested, he relocated to Canada, where he aided organizations that helped escapees from his homeland. He was an early member of the anti-slavery Liberty Party and remained a member until he fled to Canada.

Background

Ward was born in Maryland in the Eastern Shore region in 1817. His parents, William and Anne Ward, escaped enslavement when he was very young and would never tell him the particulars of his birth for fear that he would reveal their origin and cause them to be returned to their enslaver. They lived with this fear until their deaths during the 1850s and saw several of their relatives, likewise escapees, captured and returned to enslavement. Of their three sons, only Samuel Ringgold Ward, their second-born child, lived to adulthood.

The family lived in rural New Jersey in an area populated by other escapees and Quakers. When he was older, the family moved to New York City, where he attended the African Free School. He was a teenager when he witnessed a white mob launch an attack against those attending an abolition meeting in 1834. For a time, he worked as a teacher in Black schools. In 1839 he was ordained a congregationalist minister and in 1841 became minister to a White congregation in South Butler, New York. He moved to Cortland, New York, several years later to minister to a larger White congregation. For several years in the 1840s, he studied medicine in Geneva, Switzerland, where he hoped to be cured of an affliction of the tonsils that threatened to end his ability to speak. He also studied the law briefly.

Life’s Work

Ward spoke out against enslavement. He worked for the American Antislavery Society as a lecturer and in 1840, when the organization divided, he spoke for the American and Foreign Antislavery Society. He was a member of the Liberty Party and was its candidate in 1848 for a state assembly seat. During the campaign, he denounced enslavement in new Western territories, a war with Mexico, and the 1846 Wilmot Proviso

that permitted those who had escaped enslavement to be returned to enslavers. He also supported prohibition of alcohol and suffrage for Black citizens of New York. He and a cousin, Reverend Henry Highland Garnet, assisted escapees on the Underground Railroad.

In 1847 Ward founded a newspaper, The True American and Religious Examiner, in Cortlandville Township, New York. It merged with other influential publications, the Northern Star and the Advocate, to form the Liberty Party newspaper Impartial Citizen.

At times Ward was drained by the fight against enslavement. He thought about leaving the United States to settle in places where he hoped to find less discrimination, such as Trinidad, where enslavement was outlawed in 1838. He learned in 1842 that he had been born enslaved; this knowledge caused him great concern because he realized that he could still be captured and returned to Maryland.

In 1850 formerly enslaved abolitionists Frederick Douglass, Henry Bibb, and Ward worked to organize a labor union for Black craftsmen. The American League of Colored Laborers (ALCL) was a response to labor unions that denied membership to Black workers. Ward was appointed the president, Douglass was the vice president, and Bibb was the secretary. The union helped Black entrepreneurs with funding for new businesses.

Events finally persuaded Ward to leave his country in 1851. He returned to Syracuse, New York, where he had recently moved after a lengthy tour of the West, to learn that an escaped enslaved man had been caught and was being held in the local jail. He visited the man, Jerry McHenry, who was likely to be returned to Missouri and enslavement. Ward reportedly helped McHenry escape the manacles. A crowd descended upon the jail and freed McHenry, and then helped him escape to Canada. Ward feared that he would be taken and went to Canada as well, settling in Toronto initially. His wife and their three children joined him several months later.

He remained outside his homeland for the rest of his life. He worked for the Antislavery Society of Canada, which helped escapees from the United States. Ward soon embarked on a speaking tour of western Canada, where he helped to organize four new Antislavery Society branches.

Ward and Mary Ann Shadd Cary founded the Provincial Freeman in 1853. He traveled to England to raise money for the cause. He also lectured on temperance and other topics. He advocated for the spread of Christianity in Africa as a means to elevate the status of Africans. During these years, he wrote his autobiography.

In 1855 an English Quaker friend gave Ward land in Jamaica. He traveled there from England and served a group of Baptists as pastor for several years. In 1860 he began farming the land. He died about 1866.

Impact

Ward’s eloquence as a public speaker was widely touted. He was in greater demand than most White lecturers and almost as popular as Douglass. His work as a newspaper editor also helped spread his message about the evils of enslavement. While in England he supported boycotts of cotton, sugar, and other crops from the United States, arguing that these goods could be produced more cheaply by free labor in the British colonies of the West Indies. Although he was readily received by abolition groups, he was a study in contradictions. For example, he took the side of White enslavers in the Morant Bay Rebellion of October 1865.

Personal Life

Ward married in New York in 1838. He and his wife had several children, including Samuel Ringgold Jr., William Reynolds, Emily, and Alice.

Bibliography

Bradley, Jonathan. “American League of Colored Laborers (1850—?).” Black Past, 4 Jan. 2011, www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/american-league-colored-laborers-1850/. Accessed 26 June 2023.

Blackett, R.J.M. “Frederick Douglass Thought This Abolitionist Was a ‘Vastly Superior’ Orator and Thinker.” Smithsonian Magazine, 24 Mar. 2023, www.smithsonianmag.com/history/frederick-douglass-thought-abolitionist-samuel-ringgold-ward-was-a-vastly-superior-orator-and-thinker-180981857/. Accessed 26 June 2023.

Kerr-Ritchie, Jeffrey R. “Samuel Ward and the Making of an Imperial Subject.” Slavery & Abolition, vol. 33, no. 2, 2012. DOI: 10.1080/0144039X.2012.669899. Accessed 26 June 2023.

Schmidt, Lori. “Bicentennial Minute: Samuel Ringgold Ward.” Finger Lakes Times, 12 Jan. 2023, www.fltimes.com/lifestyle/local‗history/bicentennial-minute-samuel-ringgold-ward/article‗1325d7b7-771c-5f5a-befe-eb2f508a07ce.html. Accessed 26 June 2023.

Ward, Samuel Ringgold. Autobiography of a Fugitive Negro: His Anti-Slavery Labours in the United States, Canada, & England. John Snow, 1855.

Winks, Robin W. “Ward, Samuel Ringgold.” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, 1976, www.biographi.ca/en/bio/ward‗samuel‗ringgold‗9E.html. Accessed 26 June 2023.