William Turpin Bible (1815)

The South Carolina State Museum recently acquired a 1815 Bible owned by William Turpin, a Charleston merchant and enslaver turned abolitionist. The most remarkable aspect of this rare piece lies within its front cover: a handwritten list of dozens of enslaved people he freed, illustrating the activities of a small, yet vibrant abolitionist community in South Carolina.

Before his death in 1799, Wadsworth would free twenty-one bondspeople living in Newberry, Abbeville, and Laurens counties, claiming he was “induced from notion of humanity to set free and emancipate all the negro slaves that have been intrusted [sic]...” to his care. Additionally, he granted each family fifty acres of land, a cow, and farming tools–and placed them under the guardianship of the Bush River Society of Friends, a community of Quakers who opposed slavery.

This page shows a handwritten list of enslaved persons left by Thomas Wadsworth who were freed according to Wadsworth's final wishes by his son, Benjamin, and William Turpin in January 1800. The list outlines family relationships and notes that the freedpeople were placed under the protection of the Bush River Society of Friends.

On one of the first pages in the Bible, William Turpin kept a handwritten list of names and details of dozens of enslaved people he freed between 1807 and 1826. All but one of those listed remained free in either in South Carolina or New Rochelle, New York, a station on the Underground Railroad.

However, one individual named Boston, freed by Turpin in May 1820, was kidnapped from his home by slave catchers seven years after gaining his freedom. His guardian, John Glen, purchased ads offering a reward for the “restoration of said fellow to his liberty.” Boston’s fate is unknown; Turpin records his death in 1833 but makes no assertion as to whether he died free.