Potter County Miscellaneous Enslavement Items
Enslaved Persons Listed on This Page
- Azilum
Enslavement Items
- Slave Name: Azilum or Asylum Peters
Sex:
Male
Slave Age:
Slave Date of Birth: 1793
Slave Status:
Slave to age 21--self emancipated
Slave Description: "slave"
Slave Notes:
Information from "Slave Once Owned in Potter County," by W.W. Thompson, in
Historical Sketches of Potter County, Pennsylvania (1925 Coudersport,
PA)Thompson writes that Azilum was "Born a slave in Azilum,
Bradford County, Pa., in 1793, died a freeman on Ayers Hill, Potter County,
Pa., November 24, 1880." He traces the ownership of Azilum from
John Brovost, who brought Azilum to Ceres, McKean County, in 1806, and two
years later sold him to William Ayers for $100 "with the further agreement
that he be given a reasonable amount of education and his freedom when he
reached the age of twenty-one years." Ayers then brought his newly
purchased slave, along with his family, to a farm near Coudersport, Potter
County.Azilum's full name, according to Thompson, was Azilum Peters.
He does not name the parents, but states that they came from San Domingo.
The article further explains that Azilum did not stay to his full term with
William Ayers, but ran away and lived with Major Lyman for about a year and
then went to live with Jonathan Edgcomb. He is described as being
illiterate, speaking both English and French, and a "rather short stocky
built very black man [who] often visited Coudersport and always attracted
attention of men and children."
Azilum was buried in an unmarked grave in the Ayers Hill Cemetery.
Documents: The 1850 census of Homer Township, Potter County, shows
Asylum Peters, a 54 year-old farmer, living with the Jonathan Edgcomb
family. According to census records, he was born in Pennsylvania and
could not read or write. (census page 86)
Enslavement Main Page | Potter County Page | Afrolumens Project Main Page
Original content on these pages copyright 2023 Afrolumens Project.
|
