By Hasan Kwame Jeffries, The Ohio State University
Despite the bitter beginnings of the African sojourn in America, persistent Black resistance led to emancipation. The struggle to abolish slavery, which stretched many generations, succeeded. It was important to recognize that accomplishment, to acknowledge that progress had been made. ‘Lift Every Voice and Sing’, the song composed by James W. Johnson, echoed the sentiments of the Black Americans.
Celebrating Emancipation
Yet with a steady beat,
Have not our weary feet
Come to the place for which our fathers sighed?
The second verse of ‘Lift Every Voice and Sing’ conveys the feelings of accomplishment of the African Americans.
In Jacksonville, African Americans highlighted progress by celebrating emancipation. And they were not alone. Wherever Black folk were, in Southern cities or Northern metropolises, in rural, mostly white midwestern hamlets or all Black western towns, they came together to acknowledge the moment when the shackles of slavery had been broken for good.
These were joyous occasions, often featuring picnics and parades. Black Civil War veterans participated in these events well into the new century. And community leaders gave moving speeches about how far they had come since those ‘bullwhip days’.
But hardship was not confined to the chronological boundaries of bondage. Just as the tribulations of slavery were not to be forgotten, neither were the difficulties that African Americans faced once Reconstruction was undone. Again, ‘Lift Every Voice and Sing’:
We have come, over a way with tears has been watered,
We have come, treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered.
This article comes directly from content in the video series African American History: From Emancipation through Jim Crow. Watch it now, on Wondrium.
Ida B. Wells
Black journalist Ida B. Wells was among those who refused to be quiet about the atrocities of the time.
Wells was born in slavery in Holly Springs, Mississippi, in the middle of the Civil War. During Reconstruction, her parents were active in local politics. Wells internalized their fighting spirit, an attitude that led her to file a lawsuit against a railroad company in 1884 for insisting that she ride in a segregated rail car even though she had purchased a first-class ticket. She won the case locally but lost on appeal.
As a young woman, Wells moved to Memphis, Tennessee, where she earned a living as an educator before turning her attention to publishing. She filled the pages of the Memphis Free Speech, which she co-owned, with news and notes that she thought would advance racial equality. But after her friend Thomas Henry Moss Sr., the co-owner of the People’s Grocery store in Memphis, was lynched—the final act of a terror campaign designed to shut down the store—she focused on exposing mob violence. This drew the ire of local whites, who raided her office and destroyed her printing press.
Speaking the Truth
But if the mob thought their rage would silence Wells, they were wrong. She embarked on a mission to tell the truth about lynching, from causes to consequences. She wrote and published Southern Horrors in 1892 and The Red Record three years later. And she didn’t stop there. She encouraged African Americans to defend themselves rather than submit to white lawlessness.
For her exposés and outspoken advocacy of equal rights and justice, she was forced to relocate to Chicago. But it really didn’t matter where she was. She continued to speak the truth about the past and the present.
Bloodied but Unbowed
The second verse of ‘Lift Every Voice and Sing’ ends by affirming the strength that African Americans had exhibited during the journey from slavery to freedom; they were bloodied but unbowed.
Out from the gloomy past,
Till now we stand at last
Where the white gleam of our bright star is cast.
George Washington Williams was one of the people who stood tall despite being bludgeoned by racial discrimination. Born in Pennsylvania in 1849, Williams enlisted in the Union Army at age 14. After an honorable discharge following injuries sustained battling Native Americans out West, he enrolled in college and became an ordained Baptist minister. He eventually settled in Cincinnati, Ohio, where he studied law. In 1880, he was elected to the Ohio General Assembly, becoming the first African American to serve in the Ohio legislature.
George Washington Williams
Williams was committed to making sure that the world saw the white gleam of African Americans’ bright star. He wrote two books: History of the Negro Race in America 1619 to 1880 and A History of Negro Troops in the War of Rebellion.
He was equally committed to making sure the world saw the atrocities that African people were still suffering at the hands of Europeans. After visiting the Congo, which was under the brutal control of King Léopold II of Belgium, he penned an open letter to the king documenting the human rights violations occurring in the Congo and calling on the community of nations to intervene.
Williams did not live long enough to see his words acted upon. He died in 1891 following a second fact-finding trip to the Congo. Although his life ended prematurely, his Black history publications and international human rights activism captured and conveyed Black excellence.
Common Questions about the Journey from Slavery to Freedom
Ida B. Wells filed a lawsuit against a railroad company in 1884 for insisting that she ride in a segregated rail car even though she had purchased a first-class ticket. She won the case locally but lost on appeal.
Ida B. Wells’ mission was to tell the truth about lynching, from causes to consequences. With this purpose in mind, she wrote and published Southern Horrors in 1892 and The Red Record three years later.
George Washington Williams wrote two books: History of the Negro Race in America 1619 to 1880 and A History of Negro Troops in the War of Rebellion.
