Blog post by Rachel McLaughlin
Turning into the grassy parking lot of Long Branch Church in Benson, North Carolina, you’ll be greeted by the site of a small white church. There’s a sign with their updated name New Disciples Long Branch Church and an advertisement for their upcoming celebration event. To the left of the church is an old cemetery that shows signs of love and care as well as deterioration. As I stood in the cemetery looking for a name, all I could reflect on were the lost souls and voices buried there, unmarked. Rebecca Harper Ingram is one of those voices. I came to the church looking for her headstone, but sadly, it is nowhere to be found.
Rebecca Harper Ingram is just one of the descendents of the enslaved people who lived and worked at the home of John and Amy Harper. You’ve probably taken a tour there, walked around the grounds, including the outbuildings that are set up for historical interpretation as the kitchen and the enslaved living quarters. When you take the tour, you’ll hear your tour guide say the names of the African American people who lived there: Lucy, Alex, and Clarsey. However, little information has been gathered about the family, frankly, because little exists in the historical record. Primary documents concerning enslaved people are extremely rare to locate, especially with such a small homestead like the Harper Family. There are few surviving narratives or records of the enslaved African Americans that lived and worked on their property. The only mention in any records related to the Harpers states:
“Our home was one of those very large, perfectly square two story buildings, of ye olden time, when the servants prepared the meals away down in the kitchen and took them up to the “Big House,” as they expressed it.” – Mary F. Harper in Reminiscences of The Battle of Bentonville.
The lack of primary sources, and documentation of enslaved African Americans makes it an extremely difficult task to create a narrative, or even for descendants to be able to trace their own family lineage. However, in the case of Alex and Clarissa, I have been able to trace a portion of their family to living descendants. But why is it hard to find information concerning enslaved people in the South?
Documentation:
The documentation of enslaved people prior to the 1870-1880 census did not usually list their names. In the 1850 and 1860 Federal Census Records, there were documents called slave schedules in which enslaved people were merely listed by number, and may include other information like age groups and sex. Besides slave schedules, there are documents for receipts of sale that usually list names, sex, and ages, as well as will and testaments. In the case of the enslaved family living at the Harper House, Johnston County has record of the sale document in which James Woodward sold teenager Lucy (age 16), with her infant son, Alex (7 months), to John Harper in May, 1839. This is the only known document that mentions Lucy. Currently, we do not know where she was born or who her parents are.
Post Civil War, Black Americans were listed on census records. However, common problems that arise with early census data include name changes (oftentimes former slaves took their former enslaver’s name), misspellings of names, or incorrect data such as age. Clarsey is also known as Clarissa, or Clarisa.
Deterioration of Cemeteries
Driving around Johnston County and Sampson County, you’ll notice cemeteries everywhere, including on the roadside. Some of these cemeteries and headstones date back to before the Civil War. Many of these cemeteries, including the historically Black cemeteries, see deterioration because of lack of funding, erosion and nature, or they become abandoned. It becomes harder to trace the location of graves without the headstones or records of the burials. There are projects all over the Southern United States that are attempting to reverse the crisis. The information that is lost, however, could be potentially lost forever. For Rebecca Harper, this may be the case; The cemetery is known, but her exact location is not.
In a similar journey to gather pictures of graves and headstones, I ventured out to Point Level Hope Church on October 7th, 2023. Just like the other small church where Rebecca Harper lies in peace, there is a small local church off the side of an empty road. Pulling into the dirt driveway, you can see the small church and the cemetery. The difference being, this cemetery is larger, includes newer burials, and seems to have the lack of deterioration like Long Branch. The trip to this cemetery was more successful, finding 5 descendants of Alex and Clarsey.
Grandchild: Cassie Ann Ingram Lee and Husband George W. Lee
Great Grandchildren: Gertie P. Ingram, Hassie Ingram Jr., and Mattie C. Ingram
As the research continues, we hope to find more information, primary documents, and headstones. Through this process, it is also important to remember that these are people, with stories and narratives that have left long standing impacts within their community. During a phone call with a local church member and genealogist, she mentioned she knew some of the Ingrams when she was growing up. While 1865 seems so far away, the history and the people are still here.
Editor’s Note: Read more about our ongoing research project here: https://fobbnc.com/it-was-home/