Lucy Ann Delaney, born Lucy Berry (c. 1830 – after 1891), was an African-American author

Author

An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...

, former slave

Slavery

Slavery is a system under which people are treated as property to be bought and sold, and are forced to work. Slaves can be held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase or birth, and deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to demand compensation...

, and activist, notable for her 1891 narrative

Slave narrative

The slave narrative is a literary form which grew out of the written accounts of enslaved Africans in Britain and its colonies, including the later United States, Canada and Caribbean nations...

 From the Darkness Cometh the Light, or, Struggles for Freedom. This is the only first-person account of a "freedom suit" and one of the few post-Emancipation published slave narrative

Slave narrative

The slave narrative is a literary form which grew out of the written accounts of enslaved Africans in Britain and its colonies, including the later United States, Canada and Caribbean nations...

s.

The memoir recounts her mother Polly Berry

Polly Berry

Polly Berry, also known as Polly Crockett and Polly Wash , was an enslaved African American woman who on October 3, 1839 filed a freedom suit in St. Louis, Missouri, which she won in 1843 based on having been held illegally as a slave for an extended period of time in the free state of Illinois...

's legal battles in St. Louis, Missouri

Missouri

Missouri is a US state located in the Midwestern United States, bordered by Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska. With a 2010 population of 5,988,927, Missouri is the 18th most populous state in the nation and the fifth most populous in the Midwest. It...

 for her own and her daughter's freedom from slavery. For her daughter's case, Berry attracted the support of Edward Bates

Edward Bates

Edward Bates was a U.S. lawyer and statesman. He served as United States Attorney General under Abraham Lincoln from 1861 to 1864...

, a prominent Whig

Whig Party (United States)

The Whig Party was a political party of the United States during the era of Jacksonian democracy. Considered integral to the Second Party System and operating from the early 1830s to the mid-1850s, the party was formed in opposition to the policies of President Andrew Jackson and his Democratic...

 politician and judge, and the future US Attorney General under President Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...

. He argued the case of Lucy Ann Berry in court and won in February 1844. Their cases were two of 301 freedom suits filed in St. Louis from 1814-1860. Discovered in the late 20th century, the case files are held by the Missouri Historical Society and searchable in an online database.

Early life

For decades little was known of Lucy Ann Delaney beyond her memoir

Memoir

A memoir , is a literary genre, forming a subclass of autobiography – although the terms 'memoir' and 'autobiography' are almost interchangeable. Memoir is autobiographical writing, but not all autobiographical writing follows the criteria for memoir set out below...

, but in the late 20th century, both her and her mother's suits were discovered among case files for 301 freedom suits

Freedom suits

Freedom suits were legal petitions filed by slaves for freedom in the United States and its territories before the American Civil War, including during the colonial period. Most were filed during the nineteenth century. After the American Revolution, most northern states had abolished slavery, and...

 in St. Louis from 1814-1860. Related material is available online in a searchable database created by the St. Louis Circuit Court Historical Project, in collaboration with Washington University. In addition, scholars have done research into censuses and other historic material related to Delaney's memoir to document the facts.

Born into slavery in St. Louis, Missouri

St. Louis, Missouri

St. Louis is an independent city on the eastern border of Missouri, United States. With a population of 319,294, it was the 58th-largest U.S. city at the 2010 U.S. Census. The Greater St...

 in 1830, Lucy Ann Berry was the daughter of slaves Polly Berry

Polly Berry

Polly Berry, also known as Polly Crockett and Polly Wash , was an enslaved African American woman who on October 3, 1839 filed a freedom suit in St. Louis, Missouri, which she won in 1843 based on having been held illegally as a slave for an extended period of time in the free state of Illinois...

 and a mulatto

Mulatto

Mulatto denotes a person with one white parent and one black parent, or more broadly, a person of mixed black and white ancestry. Contemporary usage of the term varies greatly, and the broader sense of the term makes its application rather subjective, as not all people of mixed white and black...

 father {whose name she did not note}. She said that Polly Berry had been born free in Illinois

Illinois

Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...

, where she was known as Polly Crockett, but was kidnapped when a child by slave catchers and sold into slavery in Missouri. (In her freedom suit, Polly Berry deposed that she was held as a slave in Wayne County, Kentucky

Wayne County, Kentucky

Wayne County is a county located in the U.S. state of Kentucky. As of 2000, the population was 19,923. Its county seat is Monticello. The county was named for Gen. Anthony Wayne. It is a prohibition or dry county.-History:...

 by Joseph Crockett, and was brought by him to Illinois. There they stayed for several weeks while he hired her out for domestic work. As Illinois was a free state, he was supposed to lose his right to hold slave property by staying there, and Polly could have been freed. It was on this basis that she was later awarded freedom, as witnesses were found to testify as to her having been held illegally as a slave in Illinois.)

Polly was sold to Major Taylor Berry of St. Louis, from whom she took the surname she used. Polly married another of the Berry slaves, and they had two daughters, Nancy and Lucy Ann.

When Delaney wrote her memoir late in life, she remembered the Major and his wife Fanny Berry as kind slaveholders. After the major died in a duel, Fanny Berry married Robert Wash, a lawyer later appointed as a Missouri State Supreme Court judge. When Fanny Wash died, the Berry slave family’s fortunes changed. Although Major Berry's will had called for freeing his slaves after his and his wife's deaths, Judge Wash sold Lucy Ann's father to a plantation

Plantation

A plantation is a long artificially established forest, farm or estate, where crops are grown for sale, often in distant markets rather than for local on-site consumption...

 down the Mississippi River

Mississippi River

The Mississippi River is the largest river system in North America. Flowing entirely in the United States, this river rises in western Minnesota and meanders slowly southwards for to the Mississippi River Delta at the Gulf of Mexico. With its many tributaries, the Mississippi's watershed drains...

 in the Deep South

Deep South

The Deep South is a descriptive category of the cultural and geographic subregions in the American South. Historically, it is differentiated from the "Upper South" as being the states which were most dependent on plantation type agriculture during the pre-Civil War period...

.

Polly Berry became concerned for the safety of her daughters, and determined they should escape. Lucy Ann's older sister Nancy slipped away while traveling with a daughter of the family, Mary Berry Coxe, and her new husband on their honeymoon in the North. Nancy left them at Niagara Falls

Niagara Falls

The Niagara Falls, located on the Niagara River draining Lake Erie into Lake Ontario, is the collective name for the Horseshoe Falls and the adjacent American Falls along with the comparatively small Bridal Veil Falls, which combined form the highest flow rate of any waterfalls in the world and has...

, took the ferry across the river, and safely reached Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

 and a friend of her mother's.

After having conflict with Mary Coxe in 1839, Polly Berry was sold to Joseph A. Magehan, but escaped about three weeks later. She made it to Chicago

Chicago

Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...

, but was captured by slave catchers. They returned her to Magehan and slavery in St. Louis.

On returning, Polly Berry (also known as Polly Wash after her previous master) sued for her freedom in the Circuit Court in the case known as Polly Wash v. Joseph A. Magehan in October 1839. When her suit was finally heard in 1843, her attorney Harris Sproat was able to convince a jury of her free birth and kidnapping as a child. Wash was freed. She remained in St. Louis to continue her separate effort to secure her daughter Lucy Ann Berry's freedom, for which she had filed suit in 1842, shortly after Berry fled her master.

Trial and freedom

By 1842, Lucy Ann was working for Martha Berry Mitchell, another of the Berry daughters. They had conflict in part because of the slave girl's inexperience at heavy domestic tasks, including laundry. Martha decided to sell her, and her husband David D. Mitchell arranged the sale. The day before she was to leave, Lucy Ann escaped and hid at the house of a friend of her mother’s.

That week, Polly Wash filed suit in Circuit Court in St. Louis for Lucy Ann Berry's freedom, as a "next friend" to the minor girl. Since her own case had not been settled, Wash was still considered a slave with no legal standing, but under the slave law, she could bring suit on behalf of a minor. The law provided a slave with the status of a "poor person", with court-appointed counsel when the court determined the case had grounds. Delaney's memoir suggests that her mother's attorneys suggested her strategy of filing separate suits for her and her daughter, to prevent a jury's worrying about taking too much property from one slaveholder.

The case was prepared primarily by Francis Butter Murdoch, who litigated nearly one third of the freedom suits filed in St. Louis from 1840-1847. Francis B. Murdoch had served as the Alton, Illinois

Alton, Illinois

Alton is a city on the Mississippi River in Madison County, Illinois, United States, about north of St. Louis, Missouri. The population was 27,865 at the 2010 census. It is a part of the Metro-East region of the Greater St. Louis metropolitan area in Southern Illinois...

 district attorney, and prosecuted the murder of the printer Elijah Lovejoy by anti-abolitionists. Wash also attracted the support of Edward Bates

Edward Bates

Edward Bates was a U.S. lawyer and statesman. He served as United States Attorney General under Abraham Lincoln from 1861 to 1864...

; a prominent Whig politician

Politician

A politician, political leader, or political figure is an individual who is involved in influencing public policy and decision making...

 and judge, he argued Lucy Ann's case in court. Bates later served as the US Attorney General

United States Attorney General

The United States Attorney General is the head of the United States Department of Justice concerned with legal affairs and is the chief law enforcement officer of the United States government. The attorney general is considered to be the chief lawyer of the U.S. government...

 under President Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...

.

While waiting for trial, Lucy Ann Berry was remanded to the jail, where she was held for more than 17 months without being hired out, which was customary to offset expenses and earn money for slaves' masters. In February 1844 the case went to trial. By then her mother's case had been settled, and Polly Wash was declared free. In addition, Wash had affidavits from people who knew her and her daughter. Judge Robert Wash (Fanny Berry Wash's widower and Polly's previous master) testified that Lucy Ann was definitely Polly Berry Wash's child. The jury believed the case for freedom had been proved, and the judge announced Lucy Ann Berry was free. She was approximately 14 years old.

Lucy Ann and Polly Berry lived in St. Louis after gaining her freedom. They had to get certificates as free blacks and deal with other restrictions of the time. They worked together as seamstresses.

Marriage and family

In 1845, Lucy Ann met and married steamboat

Steamboat

A steamboat or steamship, sometimes called a steamer, is a ship in which the primary method of propulsion is steam power, typically driving propellers or paddlewheels...

 worker Frederick Turner, with whom she settled in Quincy, Illinois

Quincy, Illinois

Quincy, known as Illinois' "Gem City," is a river city along the Mississippi River and the county seat of Adams County. As of the 2010 census the city held a population of 40,633. The city anchors its own micropolitan area and is the economic and regional hub of West-central Illinois, catering a...

, and her mother lived with them. Turner died soon after in a boiler explosion on the steamboat

Steamboat

A steamboat or steamship, sometimes called a steamer, is a ship in which the primary method of propulsion is steam power, typically driving propellers or paddlewheels...

 The Edward Bates. (It was named for the lawyer who had helped secure Lucy Ann's freedom two years before.}

Polly Wash and Lucy Ann moved back to St. Louis. In 1849 Lucy Ann met and married Zachariah Delaney. They were married for the rest of their lives, and her mother lived with them. Though the couple had four children, two did not survive infancy; the remaining children, a son and a daughter, both died in their early twenties.

Later life

As Delaney recounted in her memoir, she became active in civic and religious associations. Such organizations grew rapidly in both the African-American and white communities nationally in the years following the Civil War. She joined the African Methodist Episcopal Church

African Methodist Episcopal Church

The African Methodist Episcopal Church, usually called the A.M.E. Church, is a predominantly African American Methodist denomination based in the United States. It was founded by the Rev. Richard Allen in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1816 from several black Methodist congregations in the...

 in 1855, founded in 1816 in Philadelphia as the first independent black denomination in the US. In addition, Delaney was elected president of the Female Union, an organization of African-American women. She also served as president of the Daughters of Zion, as well as a women's group affiliated with the Freemasons, to which her husband belonged. They often supported community education and health projects.

Delaney belonged to the Col. Shaw Woman's Relief Corps, No. 34, a women's auxiliary to the Col. Shaw Post, 343, Grand Army of the Republic

Grand Army of the Republic

The Grand Army of the Republic was a fraternal organization composed of veterans of the Union Army, US Navy, US Marines and US Revenue Cutter Service who served in the American Civil War. Founded in 1866 in Decatur, Illinois, it was dissolved in 1956 when its last member died...

 (GAR). The veterans' group was named after the white commanding officer of the 54th Massachusetts Infantry, the first of the United States Colored Troops

United States Colored Troops

The United States Colored Troops were regiments of the United States Army during the American Civil War that were composed of African American soldiers. First recruited in 1863, by the end of the Civil War, the men of the 175 regiments of the USCT constituted approximately one-tenth of the Union...

 and a unit that achieved renown for courage in the Civil War. Delaney dedicated her memoir to the GAR, which had fought for the freedom of slaves.

In the late 19th century, many blacks migrated to St. Louis from the Deep South for its industrial jobs. Delaney met with new arrivals to try to track down her father. Learning that he was living on a plantation 15 miles south of Vicksburg, Mississippi

Vicksburg, Mississippi

Vicksburg is a city in Warren County, Mississippi, United States. It is the only city in Warren County. It is located northwest of New Orleans on the Mississippi and Yazoo rivers, and due west of Jackson, the state capital. In 1900, 14,834 people lived in Vicksburg; in 1910, 20,814; in 1920,...

, she wrote and asked him to visit her. Her sister Nancy from Canada joined their reunion in St. Louis. Their father was glad to see them, but, with his wife Polly dead by then, he returned to Mississippi and his friends of 45 years.

Nothing was recorded about the year or circumstances of Lucy Delaney's death.

Memoir

In 1891, Delaney published her From the Darkness Cometh the Light, or, Struggles for Freedom, the only first-person account of a freedom suit. The text is also a slave narrative

Slave narrative

The slave narrative is a literary form which grew out of the written accounts of enslaved Africans in Britain and its colonies, including the later United States, Canada and Caribbean nations...

, most of which were published prior to the Civil War and Emancipation. Delaney devoted most of her account to her mother Polly Berry’s struggles to free her family from slavery. Though the story is Delaney’s, she features her mother as the lead protagonist

Protagonist

A protagonist is the main character of a literary, theatrical, cinematic, or musical narrative, around whom the events of the narrative's plot revolve and with whom the audience is intended to most identify...

.

The narrative is steeped in spirituality

Spirituality

Spirituality can refer to an ultimate or an alleged immaterial reality; an inner path enabling a person to discover the essence of his/her being; or the “deepest values and meanings by which people live.” Spiritual practices, including meditation, prayer and contemplation, are intended to develop...

. It celebrated what Delaney saw as God

God

God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....

’s benevolent role in her own life and she attacked the hypocrisy

Hypocrisy

Hypocrisy is the state of pretending to have virtues, moral or religious beliefs, principles, etc., that one does not actually have. Hypocrisy involves the deception of others and is thus a kind of lie....

 of Christian

Christianity

Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...

 slave owners. From the Darkness shows the strength of the African Americans who suffered under slavery, rather than recount the horrors of the institution. By continuing her memoir after her gaining freedom at age 14, Delaney showed her fortitude following the death of her first husband, and later the deaths of each of her four children. She portrayed her mother Polly Berry as serving as an adviser and role model

Moral example

Moral example is trust in the moral core of another, a role model. It was cited by Confucius, Muhammad, Mohandas Gandhi and other important philosophers and theologians as the prime duty of a ruler - including the head of a family or the owner of a business....

. By celebrating her own political and civic activities, Delaney argued for the place of African Americans in US democracy

Democracy

Democracy is generally defined as a form of government in which all adult citizens have an equal say in the decisions that affect their lives. Ideally, this includes equal participation in the proposal, development and passage of legislation into law...

.

Publication history

From the Darkness was originally published in St. Louis in 1891 by J.T. Smith. After the rise of the 20th-century Civil Rights Movement

Civil rights movement

The civil rights movement was a worldwide political movement for equality before the law occurring between approximately 1950 and 1980. In many situations it took the form of campaigns of civil resistance aimed at achieving change by nonviolent forms of resistance. In some situations it was...

 and feminism

Feminism

Feminism is a collection of movements aimed at defining, establishing, and defending equal political, economic, and social rights and equal opportunities for women. Its concepts overlap with those of women's rights...

, and new interest in historic black and women's literature, in 1988 the book was reprinted in the collection Six Women’s Slave Narratives by Oxford University Press

Oxford University Press

Oxford University Press is the largest university press in the world. It is a department of the University of Oxford and is governed by a group of 15 academics appointed by the Vice-Chancellor known as the Delegates of the Press. They are headed by the Secretary to the Delegates, who serves as...

. It is carried online by Project Gutenberg

Project Gutenberg

Project Gutenberg is a volunteer effort to digitize and archive cultural works, to "encourage the creation and distribution of eBooks". Founded in 1971 by Michael S. Hart, it is the oldest digital library. Most of the items in its collection are the full texts of public domain books...

, as well as by the University of North Carolina

University of North Carolina

Chartered in 1789, the University of North Carolina was one of the first public universities in the United States and the only one to graduate students in the eighteenth century...

 in its Documents of the American South http://docsouth.unc.edu/neh/delaney/menu.html.

The literary critic P. Gabrielle Foreman has suggested that the author Frances Harper

Frances Harper

Frances Ellen Watkins Harper was an African American abolitionist and poet. Born free in Baltimore, Maryland, she had a long and prolific career, publishing her first book of poetry at twenty and her first novel, the widely praised Iola Leroy, at age 67.-Life and works:Frances Ellen Watkins was...

 based her character of "Lucille Delaney" in the novel Iola Leroy

Iola Leroy

Iola Leroy or, Shadows Uplifted, an 1892 novel by Frances Harper, is one of the first novels published by an African-American woman.-Plot introduction:...

(1892) on the historic Delaney’s memoir published the year before.

Work

• From the Darkness Cometh the Light, or, Struggles for Freedom (1891), reprinted in Six Women’s Slave Narratives, Oxford: Oxford UP, 1988. ISBN 0-19-505262-5.

External links

• "Freedom Suits", African-American Life in St. Louis, 1804-1865, from the Records of the St. Louis Courts, Jefferson National Expansion Memorial, National Park Service
• From the Darkness Cometh the Light or Struggles for Freedom, St. Louis, MO: J.T. Smith, [189-?]; Documenting the American South, University of North Carolina (full text)