This data set extracts people listed as American potters (or pottery workers) of African descent in the 1850, 1860, 1870 and 1880 federal census schedules. (For some important caveats, please see below.) If you find yourself using this set in published research, please cite as follows:
“African-American Potters: 1850-1880 Federal Census Extract” (Data Set), Thomas Commeraw Project, Release 2023-01-03.
- Alabama
- Arkansas
- Benton, Saline County — 1870
- Olliver Harris (Born: Arkansas, 1839) [note]
- Illinois
- Alton, Madison County — 1860
- Summerfield Wilkerson (Born: Illinois, 1835)
- Township 5 Range 9, Madison County — 1870
- William Wilkerson (Born: Illinois, 1833)
- Indiana
- Wayne, Wayne County — 1850
- George S. Bell (Born: Tennessee, 1807)
- Richmond, Wayne County — 1860
- George S Bell (Born: Tennessee, 1811)
- Richmond, Wayne County — 1870
- George Bell (Born: Tennessee, 1810)
- Center, Marion County — 1870
- Madison Crarius (Born: Georgia, 1818)
- Warren, Putnam County — 1870
- George Perry (Born: Indiana, 1837)
- Iowa
- Vernon, Dubuque County — 1870
- Wylis Cary (Born: Virginia, 1847)
- Kentucky
- Louisville — 1880
- Andrew Hartzell (Born: Kentucky, 1832)
- George Lewis (Born: Kentucky, 1835)
- Edward Merriwither (Born: Kentucky, 1852)
- James Owens (Born: Kentucky, 1827)
- Eward Prather (Born: Kentucky, 1841)
- John Williams (Born: Tennessee, 1858)
- Louisiana
- New Orleans — 1880
- Felix Aitken (Born: Louisiana, 1840)
- Maryland
- Baltimore — 1850
- John Mackey (Born: Maryland, 1828)
- Baltimore — 1870
- Charles Hill (Born: Maryland, 1851)
- Dennis Keeley (Born: Virginia, 1835)
- Massachusetts
- Charlestown, Middlesex County — 1850
- Isaac Gracy (Born: Pennsylvania, 1810)
- Boston — 1880
- Jabes Bowen (Born: Georgia, 1850)
- Nathanel Moody (Born: Virginia, 1846)
- Mississippi
- Montgomery, Montgomery County — 1880
- C. Ball (Born: District of Columbia, 1840)
- Missouri
- Boonville, Cooper County — 1870
- Charles Braxton (Born: Virginia, 1849)
- W. H. Minor (Born: Virginia, 1838)
- William Nelson (Born: Virginia, 1830)
- J. Shepley (Born: Kentucky, 1817)
- J. Williams (Born: Missouri, 1845)
- Boonville, Cooper County — 1880
- James Williams (Born: Missouri, 1845)
- St. Joseph, Buchanan County — 1870
- George Washington (Born: Kentucky, 1856)
- Polk, Sullivan County — 1870
- Bud Stephens (Born: Missouri, 1852) [note]
- Rocheport, Boone County — 1880
- Joe Embree (Born: Kentucky, 1821)
- William Hencly (Born: Kentucky, 1835)
- Calhoun, Henry County — 1880
- George Davis (Born: South Carolina, 1862)
- Ned Minor (Born: Missouri, 1853)
- New Jersey
- New Brunswick, Middlesex County — 1880
- Henry F. Bergen (Born: New Jersey, 1798)
- New York
- Albany — 1850
- Oliver Tompson (Born: New York, 1821) [note]
- Brooklyn — 1850
- James Wallace (Born: Maryland, 1805)
- Manhattan — 1860
- James H. Turner (Born: New York, 1807)
- Manhattan — 1880
- Ellis Williams (Born: Pennsylvania, 1843)
- Binghamton, Broome County — 1870
- James Archer (Born: New York, 1831)
- Ohio
- Dayton, Montgomery County — 1880
- Henry Buckner (Born: Tennessee, 1846)
- Pennsylvania
- Philadelphia — 1850
- Abraham Boyer (Born: Maryland, 1810) [note]
- Ashbury Conner (Born: Pennsylvania, 1829)
- John Johnston (Born: Pennsylvania, 1820)
- Philadelphia — 1870
- John H Parker (Born: Pennsylvania, 1819)
- Cromwell, Huntingdon County — 1850
- Robert Thompson (Born: Pennsylvania, 1821)
- Mahoning, Lawrence County — 1850
- Lawden Curtis (Born: Pennsylvania, 1816)
- Pittsburgh — 1870
- George Johnston (Born: Virginia, 1840)
- Greensboro, Greene County — 1870
- Robert Peters (Born: West Virginia, 1818) [note]
- Greensboro, Greene County — 1880
- Robert Peters (Born: West Virginia, 1816) [note]
- Judgson Richison (Born: Pennsylvania, 1863)
- Columbia, Lancaster County — 1880
- John Wesley (Born: South Carolina, 1835) [note]
- Tennessee
- Texas
- Precinct 1, Guadalupe County — 1870
- John Chandler (Born: South Carolina, 1830) [note]
- Hiram Wilson (Born: North Carolina, 1837) [note]
- James Wilson (Born: North Carolina, 1847) [note]
- Wallace Wilson (Born: North Carolina, 1845) [note]
- Guadalupe Valley, Guadalupe County — 1880
- James Wilson (Born: North Carolina, 1844)
- Marshall, Harrison County — 1870
- A. Prothro (Born: Georgia, 1815) [note]
- Precinct 1, Rusk County — 1870
- Calvin Robinson (Born: Virginia, 1835)
- Huntsville, Walker County — 1870
- Ben Penson (Born: Virginia, 1830)
- Virginia
- Fairfield, Henrico County — 1880
- Watt Green (Born: Virginia, 1821)
- Richmond — 1870
- Thomas Trent (Born: Virginia, 1828)
- John Wharton (Born: Virginia, 1848)
- Richmond — 1880
- Anderson Jefferson (Born: Virginia, 1847) [note]
- Harrisonburg, Rockingham County — 1860
- Abram Spencer (Born: Virginia, 1812) [note]
- Lower Revenue District, Hanover County — 1870
- Reubin Brockenbrough (Born: Virginia, 1818)
Compiler’s Note
While this cannot possibly be a complete set, it certainly goes a long way toward one. The majority of the men listed here are either completely undocumented in modern texts or barely documented. A couple of caveats: Because the occupations “potter” and “porter” could easily be mistranscribed from a census taker’s notes, there is always the possibility that some of these men were not actually potters. Further, potters were not always called so in the census; in some cases their primary occupation was something else (for instance, farmer), in others, parlance dictated that another term was used (for instance, see David Drake as a “turner” in the 1870 census). Birth years are approximate, extrapolated from the age given in the census; a person listed as 50 years old in 1850 may have been born in 1799 instead of 1800. Further compounding problems, the listed ages are often wrong, and you will see varying ones for the same individual in these listings.
Some of the entries above include brief linked notes listing modern references / research or other helpful information. This was not meant to be exhaustive, but a quick attempt to recognize modern work that had already been done on these potters or provide breadcrumbs that might help those trying to flesh out these people’s lives.
If you have access to a piece of pottery signed by one of these potters, I would really love to see it! Please contact me here.
Finally, if there is something here you’d like to work on with an eye toward publishing an article, I am amenable to teaming up on something along those lines. Please drop me a line if you’re interested in working together on something.
This research and digital repository are generously sponsored by:
Edmond Benjamin: See Joey Brackner, Alabama Folk Pottery (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2006), 92, 248.
Richard Williams: See Joey Brackner, Alabama Folk Pottery (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2006), 258.
Abraham Boyer: Susan H. Myers, Handcraft to Industry … (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1980), 54 notes Boyer appearing “at various addresses” in 1842-55 Philadelphia city directories.
John Chandler: John Chandler is noted in Philip Wingard, “From Baltimore to the South Carolina Backcountry: Thomas Chandler’s Influence on 19th-Century Stoneware” in Ceramics in America 2013.
Watt Green: Green is noted in Kurt C. Russ, Robert Hunter, Oliver Mueller-Heubach, and Marshall Goodman, “The Remarkable 19th-Century Stoneware of Virginia’s Lower James River Valley” in Ceramics in America 2013.
Olliver Harris: Oliver Harris, a former slave, is discussed in Swannee Bennett and William B. Worthen, Arkansas Made …: Second Edition, Volume 1 (Fayetteville, The University of Arkansas Press, 2021).
Isaah Heaten: See Samuel D. Smith and Stephen T. Rogers, Tennessee Potteries, Pots, and Potters … (Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation, Division of Archaeology, Research Series No. 18, 2011), Volume 1, 117; Volume 2, 736.
Joshua Hill: For a reference to Hill’s existence, see Kurt C. Russ, “Exploring Western Virginia Potteries,” JESDA 21:2 (Winter 1995), 131.
Anderson Jefferson: Jefferson appears adjacent to Richmond potter David Parr, Jr. in the 1870 census; he is called there a “Labourer.” He is probably the man named Anderson who was enslaved by Henrico County, Virginia, stoneware potter Stephen B. Sweeney, noted in Kurt C. Russ, Robert Hunter, Oliver Mueller-Heubach, and Marshall Goodman, “The Remarkable 19th-Century Stoneware of Virginia’s Lower James River Valley” in Ceramics in America 2013.
Squire Johnston: See Samuel D. Smith and Stephen T. Rogers, Tennessee Potteries, Pots, and Potters … (Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation, Division of Archaeology, Research Series No. 18, 2011), Volume 1, 312.
William Moore: See H.E. Comstock, The Pottery of the Shenandoah Valley Region (Winston-Salem: Museum of Early Southern Decorative Arts, 1994), 16, 445, 470.
Robert Peters: A National Register of Historic Places information sheet on the Peters/Graham House in Greensboro discusses Peters in detail.
A. Prothro: See the MFAH’s William J. Hill Texas Artisans & Artists Archive for a hint at how he might fit into the broader family of Prothro stoneware potters.
Ed Rushton: See Joey Brackner, Alabama Folk Pottery (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2006), 110, 253.
Abram Spencer: The first modern reference to Spencer is Alvin H. Rice and John Baer Stoudt, The Shenandoah Pottery (Strasburg: Shenandoah Publishing House, Inc., 1929), which includes probably apocryphal tales about him. See also H.E. Comstock, The Pottery of the Shenandoah Valley Region (Winston-Salem: Museum of Early Southern Decorative Arts, 1994), 16, 475-476. The best source on Spencer is Brenda Hornsby Heindl, “Research Note: Freedom in a Slave Economy: Abraham Spencer and Pottery Making in the Shenandoah Valley,” JESDA 41 (2020).
Bud Stephens: As detailed in this census record, Stephens was apprenticed to Anton Riger, a German immigrant earthenware manufacturer.
Oliver Tompson: William C. Ketchum, Jr., Potters and Potteries of New York State, 1650-1900 (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1987), 571 states that Tompson made stoneware, but this appears to be extrapolated. Hoffman’s 1850 Albany city directory has him as a waiter, and this may be a case where “porter” was eventually copied over into the census rolls as “potter.”
John Wesley: Wesley’s listing in an 1884 city directory is noted in M. Luther Heisey, “The Makers of Pottery in Lancaster County,” Papers Read before the Lancaster County Historical Society 50:4/5 (1946), 127.
Richard Williams: See Joey Brackner, Alabama Folk Pottery (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2006), 258.
Hiram, James and Wallace Wilson: The Wilsons are well documented; see for, instance, Michael K. Brown, “The Wilson Potters: An African-American Enterprise in 19th-Century Texas” in Texas Clay: 19th-Century Stoneware Pottery from the Bayou Bend Collection (Houston: The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, 2015).