Follow Us
Like Us
Matching family tree profiles for Brown Colbert
view all 14
Immediate Family
-
wife -
son -
daughter -
son
-
daughter
-
son
-
son
-
mother -
brother -
brother
-
brother
-
sister
About Brown Colbert
From http://www.monticello.org/getting-word/people/brown-colbert
Dates: 1785–1833 Family: Colbert (Hemings)
Occupation: Nailmaker; Blacksmith
Brown Colbert lived his first twenty years at Monticello, where he worked as a household servant and a nailmaker. In 1805, he asked to be sold to a free workman leaving Monticello, so that he and his wife would not be separated. Jefferson reluctantly agreed and the Colberts lived in slavery in Lexington, Virginia, until 1833, when they took a momentous step.
In exchange for freedom, they agreed to leave Virginia for a new colony in Africa. Colbert, his wife, Mary, and their two youngest sons boarded a ship for Liberia, leaving behind three grown children who could not be freed. Tragically, only one of the family, eight-year-old Burwell, survived the first weeks in the new land of freedom. He may have lived to see Liberia become Africa's first independent republic in 1847.
Descendants of Colbert left behind in Virginia include a Union Army soldier, teachers and university professors, and a well-known lecturer and suffragist. The story of their ancestors' courageous gamble for freedom was evidently not passed down orally but it survived in a family Bible.
notes
From http://www.monticello.org/getting-word/people/betty-brown
Described as “light colored & decidedly good looking,” Betty Brown had seven children who lived to adulthood. Among these were head gardener Wormley Hughes, Monticello butler Burwell Colbert, and nailmaker Brown Colbert. Her sons Edwin and Robert both became runaways after being given and sold away from Monticello. Her daughter Melinda Colbert Freeman married and lived in freedom in Washington, DC. Betty Brown died in the early 1830s, probably before her daughter Mary Colbert and son Brown Colbert chose to seek freedom in the African colony of Liberia in 1833.
- Updated from MyHeritage Match via daughter Melinda Edmondson (born Colbert) by SmartCopy: Oct 6 2014, 22:55:23 UTC
view all
Brown Colbert's Timeline
| 1785 |
December 25, 1785
|
Rockbridge County, Virginia, United States
|
|
| 1806 |
1806
|
Virginia, United States
|
|
| 1808 |
1808
|
Lexington, Virginia, United States
|
|
| 1809 |
1809
|
Virginia, United States
|
|
| 1820 |
1820
|
Virginia, United States
|
|
| 1825 |
1825
|
Virginia, United States
|
|
| 1827 |
1827
|
Virginia, United States
|
|
| 1833 |
1833
Age 47
|
liberia, Liberia
|