LEONARD A. GRIMES.
A native of Loudon County, Virginia, born in Leesburg, in 1815, of free parents, Leonard A. Grimes was subjected to all the disabilities that his race had to endure in the South, except being a bound slave. While yet a boy, young Grimes went to Washington, where he was employed in a butcher’s shop, and afterwards in an apothecary’s establishment. He subsequently hired himself out to a slaveholder, whose confidence he soon gained. Accompanying his employer in some of his travels in the remote South, he had an opportunity of seeing the different phases of slave life; and its cruelty created in his mind an early hatred to the institution, which lasted him during his long and eventful career.
On his return to Washington, the subject of this sketch began to take an interest in the underground railroad, and to him many escaped slaves were indebted for their freedom. A free colored man with a slave wife and seven children appealed to Mr. Grimes to aid them to escape, for the wife and children were to be carried to the far South. Through the kindness of this good man the family succeeded in reaching Canada, where they were free. Search was made for the family, suspicion fell upon Grimes as the author of their escape, he was tried, found guilty, and sent to the state prison at Richmond for two years.
At the expiration of his imprisonment, Mr. Grimes returned to Washington, and soon removed to New Bedford, Massachusetts, where he resided two years, and then came to Boston. A small Baptist congregation was worshipping in a hall at this time, and they called Mr. Grimes to be their pastor. In this new field of labor he soon began to show the great executive ability which was to be a blessing to his race in Boston. The Twelfth Baptist Church, of which he was the head for a quarter of a century, and the congregation, consisting of some of the better class of the colored citizens of the metropolis, is a monument that no one need be ashamed of. Mr. Grimes was an ardent anti-slavery man, when many of his clerical brethren were on the other side of the question.
Mr. Grimes was a man of great amiability of character, with always a cheering word and a smile for those with whom he came in contact. As a preacher, he was a man of power, though he was not an easy speaker. He was a mulatto of fine appearance, good manners, dignified, and courteous. No man was more beloved by his friends or respected by the community. At his funeral, which occurred in March, 1873, more than fifty carriages were among the long cortege that followed his remains. It is not often that a man leaves the world with fewer enemies or more substantial friends than Leonard A. Grimes.