[2] O'Connor, Memoir of Myrtilla Miner, Letter of Frederick Douglass, p. 23.
[3] Special Report of Commissioner of Education, Washington, D.C., Henry Barnard, 1868, p. 207.
[4] She had some friends, however, as the following shows:
"There are in the United States 500,000 free people of color. They are generally, although subject to taxation, excluded by law or prejudice from schools of every grade. Their case becomes at once an object of charity which rises infinitely above all party or sectional lines. This charity we are gratified in being able to state has already been inaugurated, through the devoted labors of an excellent young lady from Western New York by the name of Miss Myrtilla Miner who has established and maintained for the past four years in the city of Washington a school for the education of free colored youth. This school is placed there because it is national ground, and the nation is responsible for the well-being of its population; because there are there 11,000 of this suffering people excluded by law from schools and destitute of instruction; because there are in the adjoining States of Maryland and Virginia 130,000 equally destitute, who can be reached in no other way; and because it is hoped through this means to reach a class of girls of peculiar interest, often the most beautiful and intelligent, and yet the most hopelessly wretched, and who are often objects of strong paternal affection. The slaveholder would gladly educate and save these children, but domestic peace drives them from his hearth; he cannot emancipate them to be victims of violence or lust; he cannot send them to Northern schools, where prejudice would brand them, and it is proposed to open an asylum near them, where they may be brought, emancipated, educated and taught housewifery as well as science, and thus be prepared to become teachers among their own mixed race.
"In its present condition this school embraces boarding, domestic economy, normal teachers and primary departments, and is placed under the care of an association consisting of the following trustees: Benjamin Tatham, New York; Samuel M. Janney, Loudoun County, Virginia; Johns Hopkins, Baltimore; Samuel Rhoads and Thomas Williamson, Philadelphia; G. Bailey and L. D. Gale, Washington; H. W. Bellows, New York; C. E. Stowe, Andover; H. W. Beecher, Brooklyn, together with an executive committee consisting of S. J. Bowen, J. M. Wilson and L. D. Gale, of Washington; and M. Miner, Principal, and William H. Beecher, of Reading, Secretary.
"The trustees state that a very eligible site of three acres, within the city limits of Washington, of the northwest, has already been purchased, paid for and secured to the trustees, and that all which is now wanted is $20,000 wherewith to erect a larger and more suitable edifice for the reception of the applicants pressing upon it from the numerous free colored blacks in the District and adjacent States. The proposed edifice is designed to accommodate 150 scholars and to furnish homes for the teachers and pupils from a distance. The enlarged school will include the higher branches in its system of instruction.
"There was a meeting yesterday afternoon, in an ante-room of Tremont Temple, of gentlemen called together to listen to the statements of the Secretary of the Association regarding this school. The meeting was small, but embraced such gentlemen as Hon. George S. Hillard, Rev. Dr. Lathrop, Rev. C. E. Hale, and Deacon Greele, all of whom are deeply interested in the project.
"The meeting decided to draw up and circulate a subscription paper, and counted upon receiving $10,000 for the purpose in this city. The pastors of several churches in New York had pledged their churches in the sum of a thousand dollars each. Mr. Beecher will solicit subscriptions in most of the principal towns of Massachusetts. The designs and benefits of the project will be fully set forth at a public meeting in this city in the course of a fortnight."—The Boston Journal, April 18, 1857.
[5] An extract from Walter Lenox's article opposing Miss Miner's School, follows:
"With justice we can say to the advocate of this measure, you are not competent to decide this question: your habits of thought, your ignorance of our true relations to the colored population, prevent you from making a full and candid examination of its merits, and, above all, the temper of the public mind is inauspicious, even for its consideration. If your humanity demands this particular sphere for its action, and if, to use your own language, prejudice would brand them at your northern schools, establish institutions in the free States, dispense your money there abundantly as your charity will supply, draw to them the unfortunate at your own door, or from abroad, and in all respects gratify the largest impulses of your philanthropy; but do not seek to impose upon us a system contrary to our wishes and interests, and for the further reason that by so doing you injure the cause of those whom you express a wish to serve."—National Intelligencer, May 6, 1857.
[6] Special Report, Commissioner of Education, Washington, D. C., 1868, p. 207.
[7] This statement is based on information obtained from Mrs. John F. N. Wilkinson and Mrs. Amelia E. Wormley, who were pupils of Myrtilla Miner.
[8] Report of Board of Education, Dr. John Smith, Statistician.