The Emancipation Oak

This Old Tree with Doug Still
The Emancipation Oak (Transcript)
Season 2, Episode 2
​November 23, 2023

Doug Still: [00:02] 
On this show, a tree is never just a tree. Our story today is a good case in point about a 250-year-old live oak on the campus of Hampton University in Virginia. Stately, strong, and gorgeous, it's also a symbol of a watershed moment in American history, the issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation during the Civil War. President Lincoln's pivotal document declared that, "That all persons held as slaves" within the rebellious states "are, and henceforward shall be free."
 
How could a tree play a role in that momentous event, at least locally? What did emancipation truly mean to African-Americans in 1863? How does the tree still inspire the hearts and imaginations of people today? 

Joining me to explore this are garden historian and storyteller, Abra Lee, Hampton University Professor Robert Watson, and Virginia Beach Arborist Tim Nuckols. This is the story of the Emancipation Oak. I'm Doug Still, and this is This Old Tree. 

[This Old Tree theme] 

Doug Still: [01:34] 
First off, I'd like to acknowledge the traditional inhabitants of the peninsula where the Emancipation Oak stands. Since the early 1600s, the Tidewater region has been populated by the Powhatan peoples who call the lands Tsenacommacah. Prior to the arrival of English colonists, the Powhatan Chieftain was made up of over 30 tribes numbering an estimated 25,000 people. I come with respect for the land where our story takes place and for the indigenous people who have and do reside there. 

What strikes me about the Emancipation Oak tree is how passionate people are who know about it, as you'll soon find out. When visiting it, they describe a feeling or aura around it, like that experienced near other famous objects or landmarks. Think the Mona Lisa or Washington Monument.

In addition to the larger story, part of the reason is that this tree is closely linked with the work of an inspirational educator to the formerly enslaved, a free black woman named Mary Peake. Here to dig into this is my guest, Abra Lee. Abra is a garden historian, storyteller, and former city parks arborist based in Georgia. She's currently the Director of Horticulture at Historic Oakland Cemetery in Atlanta. Her degree in Ornamental Horticulture is from Auburn University, and she's also an alumna of the prestigious Longwood Gardens Fellows Program. A freelance horticultural writer and lecturer, her work has appeared in the New York Times, Fine Gardening, Veranda magazine, and NPR. Her first book, Conquer the Soil: Black America and the Untold Stories of Our Country's Gardeners, Farmers, and Growers is due out in 2025. 

[03:20] Hello, Abra. Welcome back to This Old Tree.

Abra Lee: [03:23] 
Thank you, Doug. I appreciate you having me again. 

Doug Still: [03:26] 
Listeners may remember you from our “Tree of Hope” episode a while back. And I have to say you have to be one of the most popular guests we've had on the show. 

Abra Lee: [03:36] 
Oh, my gosh, I'm tickled to hear that. That's so cool. Thank you.
 
Doug Still: [03:41] 
You suggested the Emancipation Oak as a tree to feature, and it's been fascinating learning about it, and the background for this story. Have you been speaking about it for a while?
 
Abra Lee: [03:52]
I have. I have known about the Emancipation Oak. I don't even remember when I first learned about it. My mom is or was, she's passed away now, but she is a retired history teacher and attended historically black colleges and universities. And that was my first knowledge of the Emancipation Oak at Hampton University. Learning about it, hearing about it as a child through her, and also having relatives and friends that attended Hampton University in Virginia. 

Doug Still: [04:24] 
Yes. I was going to say the Emancipation Oak is a live oak on the campus of Hampton University, which is a prestigious historically black college in Hampton, Virginia. You got a chance to go there recently. Was that the first time that you've ever seen the tree? 

Abra Lee: [04:42] 
The first time I saw the tree was when I was 18 years old on college visits. That was the first time I actually saw it in real life. This was the second time. But back then, I didn't understand. I didn't know I was on a road to horror culture or vore culture or any of those things. So, it did not have the meaning. Certainly, I didn't have the understanding of it that I have today. 

I was able to see the tree recently when I was on a trip to Norfolk, Virginia to speak at the Norfolk Botanic Garden at their Heritage Day celebration, which may be interesting to your audience because in the late 1930s, there were 220 African-American men and women, 200 black women, 20 black men, that did the groundwork and laid the groundwork for what is now the Norfolk Botanic Garden. So every year, they have a Heritage Day celebration and a beautiful statue, a huge, tall, maybe 20-foot statue of a black woman with a shovel wearing her WPA skirt and shirt, and it's called Breaking Ground. So this area is incredibly rich outside of the Emancipation Oak with black garden history in America. It's stunning. 

Doug Still: [05:54] 
That sounds fantastic. I'd love to visit. That was a WPA project? 

Abra Lee: [05:59] 
That was a WPA project. And so, this is certainly a public garden that is credited with being started by black people, which is really, really incredible.
 
Doug Still: [06:10]
I love that. I love that. Could you describe for our listeners the Emancipation Oak in your own words after seeing it recently?
 
Abra Lee: [06:19] 
Sure. It is as you stated earlier, Doug, it's a live oak. It really branches out and has these long outstretching, dare I say, tentacles that touch the ground. And it is surprising at-- you look just in the background of it and there's the highway behind it, like the bridge going over the road. It is also a tree that in many ways can be blank, you missed it. You turn onto the campus of Hampton university, and the tree is to your left or at least it was to my left, the way that I came in. But honestly, anyone entering the campus from that way, it would be on your left and it is set back. So, there is a grass strip and a parking lot and then another grass strip surrounding the tree. So, you may not even notice that it's there. It's so surprising. I really don't know if I feel like that's a good thing or a bad thing. Maybe it's a great thing because it keeps it.

Doug Still: [07:21] 
People leave it alone.
 
Abra Lee: [07:23] 
Right. Exactly. Certainly, and let me be very clear, the students of Hampton University, the community there, the professors, the administration, they know what it is. It is incredibly important to that community. It is just this incredible, important monument. 

Doug Still: [07:39] 
Is there a fence around it? 

Abra Lee: [07:40] 
There is a fence around it. There's a big metal fence around it. So the tree is protected. You can't just walk up to the trunk of the tree, but you could reach your arm out and touch a leaf of the tree. There were acorns forming on the tree because I was there in September of this year, and there is signage around the tree that discusses a very-- it discusses, I think, very beautifully and very briefly a complex story surrounding the tree and its rich history.
 
When I approached the tree, I felt like, "Wow, this is the Emancipation Oak." I can feel it. I felt the only time I ever maybe or I don't want to say the only time, Doug, but a similar time I felt that way was on the campus of Tuskegee University, another historically black college university HBCU in Tuskegee, Alabama, where you're walking up just casually right there next to the sidewalk is Booker T. Washington's grave and George Washington Carver's grave. And honestly, you can't believe it. It gives you chills. So this tree, knowing its history, knowing its legacy, I felt that type of excitement and just felt taken aback by it. 

Doug Still: [08:49] 
Could you describe where it is? Where's Hampton, Virginia?
 
Abra Lee: [08:52] 
Hampton, Virginia is in the Tidewater area of the state of Virginia. So it's on the coast of Virginia, and it's on this rich peninsula of water where enslaved African-Americans or enslaved Africans are entering the Americas. Very early on. We're talking 1600s. So, Virginia, in terms of its connection to black garden history, to black tree history is very significant because of its positioning, and it being one of the first colonies in the United States. So, there has been a long history and a black community that has been there for centuries that has thrived and absolutely contributed to the stories and histories of American horticulture.
 
Doug Still: [09:43] 
Virginia was a slave owning state that sided with the Confederates during the Civil War. Early on, however, Hampton and the adjacent Fort Monroe, located at the end of this peninsula at the mouth of Chesapeake Bay, came into the hands of the Union Army. The location became a destination for escaped formerly enslaved people who sought safety and had nowhere else to go. In fact, it was the first self-contained community of African-Americans in the United States.
 
Here to explain its importance is Robert Watson, Professor of History in the Department of Political Science, History, and International Studies at Hampton University. He's had a distinguished career in teaching, nearly 50 years as a matter of fact, 27 of them at Hampton, with stints as a Museum Director and also Director of African-American Interpretation at Colonial Williamsburg.
 
[10:37] Well, Professor Watson, welcome to the show. 

Robert Watson: [10:40] 
Thank you. Glad to be here.
 
Doug Still: [10:41] 
So nice to have you here. I'd like to dig into Hampton, Virginia and the history of the site, and I'd like to ask you about the site prior to the Civil War. What was Fort Monroe and what was the Grand Contraband Camp?
 
Robert Watson: [10:58] 
Okay, thank you for a great question. Fort Monroe was actually built where the construction started around 1819, but it's actually located on what was formerly a place called Point Comfort, which is like a little community, a peninsula rather. And so prior to Fort Monroe, it would have been an area that would have been inhabited by indigenous people with the Chesapeake Bay right in the background, so to speak. 

Doug Still: [11:33] 
So leading up to the Civil War, who lived there?
 
Robert Watson: [11:39] 
Mainly leading up to the Civil War, this area, what we are talking about, would have been African Americans would have been here. There would have been a merchant class of white Virginians, as well as other Virginians who would have lived in this area and would have made their living primarily from the sea.
 
Doug Still: [12:01] 
What was the Grand Contraband Camp?
 
Robert Watson: [12:03] 
The Grand Contraband Camp was an area of Hampton where after the Emancipation Proclamation and even before, to be very frank, were housing. But not just housing, but where people live. Refugees, so to speak, would make that their home here. Not only in downtown Hampton, but also at Fort Monroe. It's one of the largest contraband camps in the south. There are other ones like New Bren, North Carolina had these huge camps where runaway slaves would feel comfortable or at least would feel safer because–

Doug Still: [12:54] They were protected there. 

Robert Watson: [12:56] 
They were protected. And the interesting thing about that, Doug, is that that's where we really get the first understanding of what contraband meant, because normally contraband means an article seized in war. And in this case, you have black people who refuse to go south, because they would have been used to build a fortification for the Confederates. So, they decided to go those places where at least there was some protection that was provided by the United States Union Army.
 
Doug Still: [13:36] 
It sounds like a demeaning term, but in fact, at the time, it was a way for the north or the Union Army to say, "We're not required to send these people back to you," to the south, or to their owners." And so, in that way, technically, it was some modicum of freedom?
 
Robert Watson: [13:59] 
Yes. That’s exactly right. Because there was no certain federal policy about what to do with the fugitives who were running away, this was, in fact, a stopgap measure. But at the same time, by protecting them, it made many people in the north or some people in the north think that they were no longer just straddling the fence over the issue of slavery. It appears that by having a contraband camp or providing a modicum of protection convinced many black people and many of the abolitionists in the north that this was a good thing. It was not certain, but it was better than the previous condition of servitude.
 
Doug Still: [14:53] 
Even before the war, African Americans in Hampton, not only desired peace and safety, but also in education. We're going to take a short break, but when we return, we'll find out about one woman who risked her life in order to teach them. Mary Peake. You're listening to This Old Tree.
 
[song]

Abra Lee: [15:36] 
In this location before the Civil War, specifically at the Emancipation Oak where this tree is, this is where a woman who your audience will have to get to know her name and her story. Mary Peake enters the picture. This is a black woman whose mother. She is a free black woman, Mary Peake is. Her father is an Englishman, her mother is an enslaved black woman, and she is going against the law. She is risking it all to teach what is called "contraband." Meaning, enslaved black people how to read, how to write. She is teaching them. She establishes a school in a protected way.
 
And Mary Peake is a brilliant woman. She is known to be highly educated. She is taking a risk herself to teach these escaped enslaved people how to read, how to write, how to be educated in the United States. And so, under this treat, between May of 1861 and August of 1861, we don't know the exact date, but we can narrow it down to those few months between May and August of 1861, the first class of Mary Peake is taught under this tree. And also, it should be noted that this is credited in historical documents that I have read as being the first public school for black people. So, we have to credit the Tidewater area of Virginia and Hampton and its campus for that as well, because that's incredibly significant.
 
Doug Still: [17:14] 
Right. It's considered the historic start of Hampton University, isn't it?
 
Abra Lee: [17:18] 
It is. And the tree in Hampton, we cannot understate or underscore how hallowed ground it is to American education, to black communities, and to American tree history. Period. She is born a free black woman, so she could just go on mind her business, Doug. Say, you're on your own, y'all. I know how to read and write. But hey, rest of you figure it out on your own. But she doesn't do that. She chooses to risk it all. I think that that's very important, and I think that something has to be bold that she could have just accepted her position as a mulatto. Meaning, at that time, a biracial black woman with a white Englishman father, with a black mother, who could have lived a very--I can't say comfortable. That's why I'm stuttering on my words here. This is still a black woman in America in the 1860s. But she could have lived a relative life of privilege compared to other black people. She could have just done that and not look back. But she understands the privilege she holds with this knowledge, with this education, and that she has a moral obligation to pass this on to her people. So that is who Mary Peake is. And to do that, that means you're risking, not just your life, the life of the people you're teaching. At this time, education is illegal.
 
Doug Still: [18:39] 
And it's the key to a better life, whatever that may be at the time.
 
Abra Lee: [18:45] 
It is. I'm not sure if we have time to get in this today, but this story and discussing it with you and seeing that tree, it just really makes me think about in many ways, I would love to have a broader discussion about trees and the canopy of trees being these spaces. I don't know if I want to say coliseum or these umbrellas of teaching in America and throughout the world. Like, the connection to the trees and education is a real one, and it is a gathering place where people are learning.

Doug Still: [19:13] 
Right. With canopy and protection and the ability to focus on what you're talking about, whether [crosstalk] lessons or discussion. 

Abra Lee: [19:22] 
Absolutely. I think it's also interesting. So, Mary Peake starts this cool 1861. She first teaches it under the tree. Then she moves it to her home, which ends up being burned in 1861. And then essentially or not essentially later, a school is built within relative proximity to this tree.
 
Robert Watson: [19:47] 
Mary Peake is a very interesting lady. I wanted to share some of the information I had learned about Mary Peake. She was born in 1823 and she died in 1862. Her father was an Englishman. Her mother has been described as a light skinned, free black woman from Norfolk, Virginia. Mary Peake went to school in Alexandria, Virginia. And then she came back to Hampton, and she learned how to support herself by making clothes and teaching in Hampton. While she did not live a long time, her life, her experiences, her work speaks for itself because she was the first teacher, as we know, who instructed free blacks and others under the Emancipation Oak or at least somewhere near the Emancipation Oak. 

What is not true about her life is that we've often been told that she read the Emancipation Proclamation to the enslaved population on the 1st January 1863. Well, we know that's impossible because she died in November of 1862.
 
Doug Still: [21:18] 
Right.
 
Robert Watson: [21:19] 
That's one of the things with history. One of the things I try to teach my students is be factual. Give the correct information. You don't have to make up stories about slavery, in particular. Tell the truth, because the real stories are actually much more intense. And in many instances, the story for people who were enslaved is real. Mary Peake also received the support of a lot of white women in the north, and that wouldn't be the first time either, because people like Prudence Crandall, who you might be familiar with, was a white woman who operated a school, I believe in Philadelphia, Boston. But this was a common thing for white women who were fighting for their own rights to get involved with the abolitionist movement, as well as the women's movement and also the temperance movement. And so [audio cut] respected people like Mary Peake.
 
Doug Still: [22:27] 
How might they have known each other?
 
Robert Watson: [22:29] 
Because in those days, people wrote and they heard about things that other people were doing, certainly writing. This is something that Lockwood makes reference to is the strong communication between different regions of the country.
 
Doug Still: [22:52] 
Let's talk about who Reverend Lockwood is.
 
Robert Watson: [22:54] 
He is a missionary who was sent to Fortress Monroe. And it was there that he was able to meet some of the children who Mary Peake taught. So he is, for lack of another-- well, put it use of another term, I would describe Lockwood as being philanthropic, as well as being a missionary, and one who was definitely took abolitionism to a way of thinking that many of his contemporaries also did as well.
 
Doug Still: [23:35] 
And he wrote this piece, I don't know what it was for, called Mary S. Peake: The Colored Teacher at Fortress Monroe.
 
Robert Watson: [23:43] 
Yes.
 
Doug Still: [23:44] 
In 1862- 

Robert Watson: [23:46] 
Yes. 

Doug Still: [23:47] 
-which is the source that we have for her life and the situation at the time.
 
Robert Watson: [23:52] 
Right. 

Doug Still: [23:53] 
Here is a passage from Reverend Lockwood's book, in his own words, describing the establishment of the school in Hampton, Virginia with Mary Peake at the helm.
 
Rev. Lewis Lockwood quote: [24:03] 
"The religious and educational part of the mission has been one of blessedness and promise. And in this, as in everything else, I have aimed to teach self-development. In connection with the gathering of the people in religious meetings, I proposed to commence Sabbath and week-day schools, with such teachers as I had at hand. Meanwhile, some of the children of the vicinity, getting perhaps some hint of my intention, or prompted by an impulse from on high, called on Mrs. Peake, and requested her to teach them, as she had taught the children in Hampton.

It was with much gratification that I learned this request. I soon found from observation, as well as information, that we had in her a teacher of the choicest spirit, and of peculiar qualifications. She was happy in having pupils as ready to learn as to request instruction. Her school numbered at first only about half a dozen, but in a few days she had between fifty and sixty. These scholars were found to have generally very fair intellectual capabilities, and a few evinced quite rare talents. Among these was her own little daughter, five years old, named Hattie, but familiarly called by the pet name of Daisy. She learned to read simple lessons fluently in a very short time. Others also exhibited a precocity which from day to day rewarded and stimulated the ardor of this devoted teacher." 

Doug Still: [25:31] 
Why do you think teaching motivated Mary Peake?
 
Robert Watson: [25:35] 
I think teaching motivated Mary Peake, because she understood that literacy and the ability to read was an important steppingstone for people who were certainly one day going to be free. But it's a belief that black people still believe in, and that is that literacy and education is the steppingstone to mobility, and that if you can read, your chances of having a better quality of life is greatly increased. And so, I believe that's why she was motivated to teach night school, night classes. And that kind of motivation took her down, so to speak, because Booker T. Washington, who was one of probably Hampton Institute best known alumnus thought that reading and writing was important. 

Doug Still: [26:42] 
Yeah, it was obviously something that she had and wanted to share.
 
Robert Watson: [26:46] 
Absolutely.
 
Doug Still: [26:47] 
And it opened doors for her. 

Robert Watson: [26:49] 
Yes, it did. And it still does. That's why our university here tried to prepare our students to be lifelong learners so they can use whatever they learn here in Hampton to make the broader community a better place for everybody. And so, that's coming from the legacy of Mary Peake.
 
Doug Still: [27:18] 
You mentioned that there were other teachers, which is a good point. She wasn't the only one, right?
 
Robert Watson: [27:25] 
Right. No, she wasn't.
 
Doug Still: [27:26] 
I bet there must have been others. She is the one that we talk about the most, I think?

Robert Watson: [27:32] 
Right. I think she's the one we talk about the most. But you're right. She certainly was not the only one. I was reading in the Lockwood book, the introduction, and it said, "By the end of the Civil War, there were more than 900 teachers in the south, and an estimated 200,000 free slave had received instructions in the rudiments of literacy." 

Doug Still: [28:01] 
Wow.

Robert Watson: [28:02] 
That's a huge number. After the Civil War, particularly during Reconstruction, is when you see a great increase in the number of students who are attending some of the first HBCUs, the Historically Black Colleges and Universities long before the Moral Act, which added state institution for black students. You have this great increase in the number of people who are going to school, and they are going to schools that have a particular name like Hampton Agriculture and Normal Institute, which meant that these are people who are being trained to not only be good with their hands, but they also are teachers. They come to school, they get a degree, and they go back into their communities, and they use what they've learned to help prepare the next generation.
 
Doug Still: [29:01] 
Now that number that you gave, is that post-Civil War or prior to the Civil War?
 
Robert Watson: [29:06] 
That is post-Civil War.
 
Doug Still: [29:08] 
Mm-hmm. 

Robert Watson: [29:09] 
Post-Civil War.

Doug Still: [29:09] 
Now, previous to the Civil War, it was illegal to teach, wasn't it?
 
Robert Watson: [29:13] 
That's correct. But you know what's interesting though is that, it was not illegal until shortly after 1831. Individual slave owners wanted their slaves, particularly during the colonial period, to be able to have some education, so they could carry out the orders of their masters. But these were small numbers and were done on an individual basis, as opposed to what happened in 1831, which was Nat Turner's rebellion. And after Nat Turner's rebellion, slave owners in the south decided that, "If a slave can read, they can use that interpretation of the scripture the way Nat Turner did to become the Moses of their people." So, teaching a slave or teaching an enslaved person how to read and write after 1831 became state policy. 

Doug Still: [30:20] 
And that was in all states?
 
Robert Watson: [30:23] 
That was in all the states. I say, all the states in the south. Yeah.
 
Doug Still: [30:28] 
So we're in the Civil War, it's 1863, and President Lincoln issues the Emancipation Proclamation, I think, in January.
 
Robert Watson: [30:38] 
Correct.
 
Doug Still: [30:39] 
What was the Emancipation Proclamation?
 
Robert Watson: [30:41] 
The Emancipation Proclamation was probably one of the most important documents, one of the most important acts, executive order in the history of the United States. Because every other order leading up to the Emancipation Proclamation supported slavery, at least in theory, in an action. If you go back just for a moment and look at the Declaration of Independence, it protected slavery, even though Jefferson and his Committee of Five intent were to bother slavery and the slave trade, but because slavery, the economic backbone of the country, it was supported by the colonies.
 
And then you have the Constitution, which also supports slavery, particularly with those three articles in the Constitution, the Compromise, the Fugitive Slave Law, and the Continuation of the Slave Trade for 20 years. And then the Missouri Compromise, then the Fugitive Act of 1850, all of these support slavery. 

By 1860 though, Lincoln realized that and it's in his quote, "A house of virus against itself cannot stand." There were people who like Lincoln, who I will say was a scientific racist like his hero, Thomas Jefferson, believed that our country would not survive if we continued to support slavery. Lincoln was astute enough to look at other institutions of bondage around the world and see that even changes were taken there like in Russia, where Alexander II abolished serfdom, where he had seen on the horizon. Actually, he'd known that it had been abolished in the Constitutions of most Latin American countries. And here we are in this country, a country of some four million black folks, Lincoln certainly understood, "I believe that it was time to do something." 

Now he wasn't that enthused about doing it. Because remember, South Carolina leaves the Union in 1861. Lincoln felt that the war was only going to last about three months, and so he asked Congress to appropriate enough money to raise an army of 100,000 men. But during those three first two years, the north is not winning a single battle. And so Lincoln is being urged by some of his rivals who were part of the 1860 political season, they're urging him to do something. Frederick Douglas is saying, "If you don't do something to make this war a national issue, then it's very possible that the south might win this war." And so Lincoln decided with a lot of encouragement from Frederick Douglass and Henry Highland Garnet and Harriet Tubman and others that he had to do something. So he wrote this preliminary draft of the Emancipation Proclamation shortly after the Union wins a victory at Antina.
 
Doug Still: [34:48] 
Was that July or August of 1962 somewhere that summer?
 
Robert Watson: [34:53] 
No. September.
 
Doug Still: [34:54] 
September.

Robert Watson: [34:55] 
Right. He wrote it in September, and it sat on his desk until the 1st January, 1863. So, I would say maybe a short answer to the question is that, Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation as an act of military necessity and not as an act of humanitarian concern.
 
Doug Still: [35:16] 
It also allowed black people to serve in the Union Army-

Robert Watson: [35:21] 
That’s correct. 

Doug Still: [35:21]
 -which was another reason, I believe.

Robert Watson: [35:24] 
That's a very good point. It did encourage black people to serve in the Union Army, and it also allowed us, as historians, to appreciate the fact that black people wanted to be agents in their own liberation, which is what Douglas said, "Give a black man a weapon, and he will defend himself." And therefore, Lincoln saw all of that. Reluctantly, he issued it, and it also became a rattling cry for people in the north who were somewhat straddling the fence whether they supported or were against slavery.
 
Doug Still: [36:14] 
What were the limitations of the Emancipation Proclamation?
 
Robert Watson: [36:17] 
It did not freeze slaves in all the states. It only frees the slaves in the states that rebelled and left the Union. And in some states, it only allowed slaves in some counties to continue to be enslaved. It also helped the fact that-- What helped Lincoln is that the border states where slavery existed in Kentucky and Maryland who have Washington, D.C., but West Virginia and Delaware remained in the Union. But in those states, there were about 700,000 slaves. But the fact that those states remained in the Union was good for Lincoln because Maryland decided to leave the Union militarily that would have certainly brought a whole different perspective as to how much longer the Union would have lasted with the Nation's capital being surrounded by the Confederates.
 
Abra Lee: [37:25] 
Now, at this point, it is not yet called the Emancipation Oak. That happens about two years later, in January of 1863. Under this treat, newly freed African American students listen as the Emancipation Proclamation is read out loud. This is essentially the document that officially and legally ends slavery in the United States. I want to be very clear, there are scholars who are experts on the Emancipation Proclamation document just as they are on the United States Constitution. But summing it up for the Tree audience, we just want to make clear that that's what that document is in 1863, and also add, Doug, to your audience that this does not account for Juneteenth. And it being June of 1865 when the message gets to the enslaved African Americans in Texas that slavery is over. So, there is a long two-and-a-half-year gap there before all black people in the United States are notified that slavery is over. 

But the first Southern reading of this document happens under this live oak tree in Hampton, Virginia. It's issued under the administration of Abraham Lincoln. This is his work. It's his document. And I also want to say, in many ways, it is a failed promise to a lot of black people in America. So that's how I feel about it in my own words. I am basing that comment that I'm saying to you on having read Up from Slavery, Booker T. Washington's autobiography, and Booker T. Washington himself, being a student of Hampton University, being this great orator of America, and being handpicked as a former student of Hampton to be the first black President of an HBCU at Tuskegee. So there is a forever permanent Hampton Tuskegee connection that arc there. 

So back to his autobiography. I, for pretty much all of my life, looked at the Emancipation Proclamation as this document where it's read, enslaved people are free. And that was very–

Doug Still: [39:45]
 It was a declaration.
 
Abra Lee: [39:46] 
It was a declaration, Doug. That's all it is. Because not just him, he's not the only one that says this, but he definitely makes a point of saying this in his biography, "When this document is read, yes. Is this declaration that black people are free? Yes, Anne." So, the reality is when he also talks about our older black enslaved people, people who might be in their 8th or 9th decade, this document is read, but where are you going to go? You don't own any land, the clothes on your back aren't yours. So quietly and slowly, after this document is read, there are still many black people who go back to the plantations, back to the big house, back to whatever their former masters were, because at this point, slavery is illegal, and still have to work for them and have this relationship.
 
So it's complicated. It's read as this thing that freed the slaves, but it doesn't really free people because there's still nowhere to go. You don't own anything, you don't have anything.
 
Doug Still: [40:48] 
Right. It must have been incredible to hear for the first time, however, just in a symbolically.

Abra Lee: [40:55] 
Absolutely. So, let's speak to that as well. Even in my own family, and obviously-- I'm speaking from my own experience. In black families where oral history is important, the story that is shared within my own family that I've known since I was a child, My great-great-grandmother, [unintelligible [00:41:16], a beautiful woman. I'm so proud that we even have a picture of her, like a real photograph of her, she was 12 years old-- In 1863, she was on the Purifoy plantation in Upson County, Georgia, when the Union soldiers came. She was milking a cow. That is the way that it is told in my family, as told to her children and her grandchildren, who were my great aunts. Meaning, I knew these women in my life, my grandmother's sisters.
 
And she was milking a cow, and the Union soldier came and took the bucket out of her hand and let her know that the war was over and that the Emancipation Proclamation had been read and slavery had ended. So, this is an important message.

Doug Still: [42:00] 
She hadn’t heard until the end of the war. 

Abra Lee: [42:02] 
Exactly.
 
Doug Still: [42:02] 
The Emancipation Proclamation was a couple of years earlier.
 
Abra Lee: [42:06] 
Exactly. And I've never known the month in my family when she is told, but the origins of freedom in the [unintelligible 00:42:17]-- My last name is Lee, but this is on my mama's side, the [unintelligible [00:42:15] family. The origins of freedom in my family start with the story of [unintelligible [00:42:20], my great-great-grandmother, and that happening. It's important, because that's where I would say act two of the legacy of my family starts from being enslaved to now free black people.
 
Doug Still: [42:38] 
What a great story.
 
Abra Lee: [42:40] 
Thank you.
 
Doug Still: [42:41] 
When we returned from another break, Professor Watson and Abra Lee describe the anticipation people felt leading up to the release of the Emancipation Proclamation, what we know about the event under the famous tree and efforts to preserve the tree’s legacy. You are listening to This Old Tree.
 
[song]

Doug Still: [43:22] 
Getting back to Hampton, then house was the news of the Emancipation Proclamation distributed across the country? Was Hampton one of the first places that people heard about it and how did people know about it?
 
Robert Watson: [43:41] 
Well, excellent question. Thank you. The news of Lincoln going to do something special was on the grapevine. People were talking. And some of the people who were talking worked in the White House. One woman who worked in the White House and who was a Modis, that is, she made ball gowns for Lincoln's wife, had begun to talk to people about this event. And so that event becomes like the grapevine that Lincoln was going to do.
 
By the way, the woman's name was Elizabeth Keckly. And Keckly has spread the news. The grapevine in the black community has always been a very powerful internet. As this sits on Lincoln's desk, people who were traveling, people who own boats are sharing that information. They go from one place to the next place. So, the word is out. So much so that in places such as Hampton, the night before-- Now you brought this up earlier, Doug. The night before, black people began to do something that they had not done before, and that was celebrate by having, what we call, a Watch Night service, where people went to church, they went to brush arbor[?] where people were praying away from their slave masters, they were praying that Lincoln would follow through on his promise, on his act, rather.
 
They were hoping that that would become reality the next day. And so, the next day, the first reading from what I've researched of the Emancipation Proclamation, the first public reading, was at the Emancipation Oak here in Hampton. There's no record that I've seen that will tell you how people heard about it at that point. But if we look at the way news spread it during those days, generally what happened is that people would come to a place, stand on a stump or they would stand on a box, and then they will share whatever it was they were reading with the public. And so, the jubilation comes at that point. One of the ink pens, by the way, that Lincoln used to write the Emancipation Proclamation is housed in the Hampton University Museum. So, when you visit our campus, you'll be able to see what's called the Pen of Liberty.
 
Doug Still: [46:36] 
Wow, that's great to have in the collection.
 
Robert Watson: [46:38] 
Yes, indeed.
 
Doug Still: [46:40] 
Could you describe the Watchnight service a little bit?
 
Robert Watson: [46:43] 
Oh, yeah.
 
Doug Still: [46:44] 
Did it happen nightly?
 
Robert Watson: [46:46] 
No, it actually happened on the last day or the last night of the year. It's something that's still celebrated where people go to church, and they pray, and they bring food. They are praying and asking for God to make the next year better than the previous year.
 
Doug Still: [47:09] 
So this happened on December 31st.

Robert Watson: [47:11] 
Right. December 31st, throughout the country. And that's what's so amazing about it is because not to have the telephone or even the telegraph at one disposal really does give you some idea as to the power of the word and how it spread, how it spread it rather. So, people are playing music, they're singing songs, food is being prepared. And that food that's being prepared, that recipe that's prepared for people to consume that night and also the next day, it also has a lot of traditions. Certain types of food, for example, particularly turnip greens, collard greens, seasoned with a pork ham hocks. ham, sometimes pigtails, pig ears, sweet potatoes, candy yam. I'm making myself hungry here.

Doug Still: [48:12] 
That's right. [laughs]
 
Robert Watson: [48:14] 
But those are the kinds of things that happen on Watch Night. And later on, I learned from my parents that some family will put a penny into the food, and that penny was an indication, "Look, I got a penny this year, but I hope this coming year, I won't have much more money." So, it's in there as a good luck charm.

Doug Still: [48:40] 
At the Watch Night Service in 1862, it's in the air that there's this document on Lincoln's desk. And was that incorporated in some of the services? Is there any documentation from that or just we know that that's probably what happened?

Robert Watson: [48:59] 
We know that that's probably what happened. I have not seen any documentation on it. And here, I think, is the importance of oral tradition, because normally, as you would know with traditional history, if it's not written down, then some people think it's not credible. But with people who are not literate in terms of writing or a tradition is in fact as legitimate.
 
Doug Still: [49:30] 
That makes a lot of sense.
 
Robert Watson: [49:32] 
And one must almost also, here's where you have the opportunity. One has opportunity to talk about Africanisms that have been retained by African Americans throughout the diaspora. Because people are coming from societies in Africa where writing was not the most important thing, but being able to tell a story and that story get passed on became part of tradition that was retained here in the Americas. I've done research and read stories about people who were concerned that he was not going to issue the Emancipation Proclamation. Some people believe that it would be, as it always was, a promise, but an empty promise.
 
The fact that Lincoln followed through is one of the reasons why even today, Lincoln is acknowledged as the great President, because he followed through. Furthermore, Lincoln's legacy of being a great emancipator was actually carried forward in a more aggressive way than it was by white Americans who do not see Lincoln as this great heroic figure that black people see him as.
 
Abra Lee: [50:57] 
Prior to this happening, there's a buzz going around. You go to the enslaved person that's charged with carrying the mail to take it to the post office, they're hearing and getting word that something's going on. So, something is brewing in America, and the black people are knowing that the end of slavery is coming. They're just not knowing when. But it's like the word in the street, the telephone game, maybe you play when you were a child. They're not unaware that it's going to happen. They just don't know when. So when Lincoln makes this declaration, I don't want to say it's a full surprise. I think it's certainly a day that many of them never thought they would see, but many of them also know it's coming.
 
Doug Still: [51:38] 
But likely it could have been a soldier?
 
Abra Lee: [51:41] 
Yes, and they're hearing the soldiers talking, because still black people are enslaved, which makes us, in many ways, invisible. Now, just because it may not be legal for you to read and write, that don't mean it's illegal for you to hear. So they're aware. They're looking around, they're hearing things, they know that this document is coming. And yes, indeed, the Union soldiers are the ones reading this document. That is a fact. And it wasn't just read by one person. This is a document that's issued by the federal government through the Lincoln administration. So, the message is passed very quickly. Now super quickly among black folks. All it took was one of us to hear it, and we carried that message right on down from Virginia to Georgia, Alabama, and beyond. We were not messing around. So no one spread it quicker than the black people in America at the time.

Doug Still: [52:31]
 It was clear there was something symbolic about reading it under this tree, however, in Hampton.

Abra Lee: [52:36] 
Oh, for sure, because this was a tree-- Trees are gathering spots, right? This tree, being a place where the first unofficially public black school in America is held this significance with Mary Peake, who also doesn't live to hear-- Though she's born a free black woman and she is a free black woman, she's teaching these enslaved black people who have escaped from slavery on the run, and she does not live to hear this Emancipation Proclamation read.
 
Doug Still: [53:09] 
Is that right?
 
Abra Lee: [53:10] 
That's right. She passes away in 1862 of tuberculosis.
 
Doug Still: [53:15] The year before.
 
Abra Lee: [53:16] 
That's right. The summer before, about, I believe it's August of 1862. So she herself doesn't even get to witness this document being read. But again, back to the lead up of it, we have to believe that she's aware that something is happening. The Civil War, American history is, there's just no ever clear, simplified answer to anything, Doug. And so it is an open dialogue. That's why I love how you use trees as your ministry to have these real conversations that relate to our history. It's not as straightforward as it can always seem. I'm not calling one right or wrong. We're just saying it is what it is. And trees have a part in this. Trees play a role in this as well.
 
Doug Still: [54:06] 
Were there a lot of people there?
 
Robert Watson: [54:08] 
According to the record, there were hundreds there. It appears from the research that there were hundreds of people there, and that's based upon this area having a large population of people right at Fort Monroe or Fortress Monroe, and also in downtown Hampton.
 
Doug Still: [54:28] 
Wow, what a day that must have been.
 
Robert Watson: [54:30] 
I read somewhere, one of the historians who I read mentioned that it was a woman who learned that she had been free. And the jubilation, the joy of knowing that she was free is something that is hard for me to fathom, because I cannot imagine having been enslaved. I cannot imagine on that day when people receive the idea that the order that they had been freed and then saying to themselves, "I can go find my brother, I can go find my sister, I can go find my husband or my wife, because that's what I can do now as a free person."
 
Doug, I think sometimes, when we talk about freedom in this country, it is a word that is really underestimated. To be free to do your own thing, to have mobility, to say that I'm going to have say so over whether my children get sold or not is a tremendous something to have. I share this with you real quick.
 
Doug Still: [55:57] 
Yeah.

Robert Watson: [56:00] 
When you hear a black person say, that's my brother or that's my sister, they're not talking about someone who is biologically related. They're talking about someone whose experiences are similar. And so, when this Emancipation Proclamation comes about, people in Virginia-- And the records show this. People in Virginia go south to Mississippi and Alabama and Georgia looking for the loved ones that were sold down south during the domestic slave trade.
 
Doug Still: [56:39] 
Which is still a dangerous mission.
 
Robert Watson: [56:41] 
Yes, absolutely. Exactly.

Doug Still: [56:44] 
Yeah. You mentioned before we started the interview that there were gardeners in the 1920s and 1930s that used to collect acorns and germinate them and grow trees.
 
Abra Lee: [56:58] 
Yes, Doug. And these ain't just any gardeners. These are women who belong to the historic and storied Negro Garden Club of Virginia, which is founded on the campus of Hampton University. On April 22nd, 1932. Four people found that organization. Dr. William Cooper, who's Head of Extension, a Hampton professor named Asa Sims, who is incredibly active in the garden club up until his death. He teaches floral culture and horticulture at Hampton. A Hampton Roads area educator and principal named P.J. Chesson is also at the table. And the only woman at the table that day is a woman named Ethel Earley Clark, who is the first President of the Negro Garden Club of Virginia. This group that black women lead, and tens of thousands of them are members of from the 1932 well up until the early 2000s.
 
Though the clubs don't formally meet as they once did, there are people who were members of that club who are still alive today. But with these garden clubs, the first known black garden club that was part of the Negro Garden Club of Virginia, again, that's the word used at that time was a club called the Ever Blooming Garden Club. It is founded by a black woman named Irma Thompson. And in the early 1930s, some of the garden club women from the Ever Blooming Garden Club in the Hampton Roads area, along with some of the professors of Hampton, have collected acorns and created seedlings to these trees. They grow them and then they plant them. One of the places that they planted them was at a school called the Booker T. Washington school, which I believe we can go back and fact check was a middle school. And so, there's a beautiful picture that I'll send you of where one of the tree seedlings has been planted. The seedling is established in, I believe, 1934. And then this picture is from the 1960s, and it's a tree behind them. It's grown into a fully formed tree.
 
Doug Still: [59:07] 
That's 100-year-old tree now.
 
Abra Lee: [59:09] 
Exactly. It's a 100-year-old tree now. 
That's right. 

Doug Still: [59:12] 
90, I guess. 

Abra Lee: [59:12]
 I was able to trace the legacy of this tree up into the mid-90s. So it was still standing up until that point. Irma Thompson, and there's a beautiful picture of her and a woman named Elizabeth Hines, who was also a member of the Ever-Blooming Garden Club. And at this point, Elizabeth Hines-- Both of these women are educators. And at that point, Elizabeth Hines in the 1960s is the president of that garden club. At that point, the tree that they have behind them is called the Clark Oak. So they take these seeds, these acorns from the Emancipation Oak grow seedlings, plant this tree at a children's school and name the tree that grows after N. B. Clark, who is a pioneer black educator and a classmate of Booker T. Washington at Hampton. So, the tree's name changes from Emancipation Oak to the children of the Emancipation Oak being named after other black educators in that region. So, I think that's a beautiful story of evolution as well.
 
Doug Still: [01:00:13] 
Through my own grapevine, I was put in touch with a local arborist who recently had the same idea to grow offspring of the famous Emancipation Oak tree to help preserve its legacy. His name is Tim Nuckols of Nuckols Tree Care in nearby Virginia Beach.
 
[01:00:30] 
Hi, Tim. Welcome to the show.
 
Tim Nuckols: [01:00:32] 
Thank you, Doug. Happy to be here.
 
Doug Still: [01:00:35] 
Now, you initiated an effort to collect and germinate acorns from the tree.
 
Tim Nuckols: [01:00:40] 
Yes, son.
 
Doug Still: [01:00:41] 
How did that come about, and what do you plan to do with the seedlings?
 
Tim Nuckols: [01:00:45] 
Well, I was driving down the road one day, and I had an epiphany of, it would be really nice to take these oak, these acorns and see if we can grow them into some trees that we could return to the university for their alumni or whoever they chose to pass them out to. And so, I recruited a couple of arborists in the area. The main one is Chad Peevy with Old Dominion University. He's their head arborist there. Then Dr. Pete Schultz at Virginia Tech research facility.
 
Doug Still: [01:01:30] 
What's the goal of your effort?
 
Tim Nuckols: [01:01:32] 
Well, to grow these trees to a certain height, 2ft to 3ft, so we can return them to the university as a gift. No profit involved. We're not interested in making any money. We just wanted to do what was right. The tree will die one day. It's in really good shape, but one day it's going to go, and it would be great to have some prodigies that are planted all over the area or even all over the country. It would be nice.
 
Doug Still: [01:02:08] 
That's wonderful. Why is this tree important to you?
 
Tim Nuckols: [01:02:12] 
Well, when I read the history of the Emancipation Oak, the freed slave who would teach people how to read underneath the tree in the evening, so it just struck me as really a story of perseverance in a time that was so bad for these folks.
 
Doug Still: [01:02:37] 
Wonderful. Well, that'll be a nice gift.
 
Tim Nuckols: [01:02:39] 
Yes. I'm looking forward to handing it over to them. And these things you do that are good, it makes you feel good when you do them.
 
Doug Still: [01:02:48] 
And back to Professor Robert Watson and Abra Lee.
 
[01:02:52] It must be rewarding to teach your students this history of Mary Peake and the Emancipation Proclamation and the oak tree. Have you taught under the tree yourself?
 
Robert Watson: 
I have. Thank you so much for that question. The answer is yes. In fact, every semester, I teach at least two classes under the Emancipation Oak, and we talk about Mary Peake. When I go there, the student will ask me, "You said were going on a field trip. When are we going and where are we going?" I say, "Well, I'm not going to tell you where you're going, but I can tell you when we're going." And I'll tell them usually a week or so in advance, so they can bring their walking shoes. Even if it's raining, we'll go. If it's snowing, we'll go. Because I say if Dr. King and Carmichael and the rest of those people who fought-- Fannie Lou Hamer for the rights for us to be able to vote, I say a little rain, a little snow is not going to bother you. You're going to be out there momentarily.
 
So we go. We go to the Emancipation Oak, and I compare that tree with some of the iconic symbols of struggle and freedom throughout history. The Berlin Wall. I say the Berlin Wall was a barrier that kept people who wanted to be part of a democracy from the totalitarian state of communism. So, they risked their lives to climb over that wall. This tree is a symbol of struggle, equality, and education. Your university is right there is the outgrowth of the motivation of people like Mary Peake for us to have a university.
 
I said that tree also is symbolic of Robben Island. Then they look around, "Robben Island? Where is that? I say, "Robben Island is where Nelson Mandela was held for 20 plus years." I think it's 27 years. I say, so there. I say, "You know, let's just go one farther." I say, "There's a Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C." Because the Jews say, "Never again will we allow Hitler or Mussolini or anyone else to destroy who we are." So, they say, "Never again." I say, "This tree stands for a reason." I say, "People learn about struggle for equality and freedom.’ I said, "But let's just go one more." I said, "Tiananmen Square." And I look around, I say, "Anybody know where Tiananmen Square is?" "Oh, yeah." I have one student who know.
 
I say, "When young people stood near a tank because they were protesting Macedon and other policies towards individual freedoms." I said, "Here we have the individual freedom because some people struggled." They get it. It takes some of them a little while to get it. And then my final point for taking them there is that, I say, "You know, when you graduate from Hampton and you go to a Fortune 500 company, major corporation, I say, ‘People are going to be gathering around the coffee pot and the water cooler and water fountain, and they going to ask you, ‘What do you know about Emancipation Oak?’" I say, "It would be embarrassing to me, and it's going to be more embarrassing to you if you don't know the history of this symbolic living organism." So, yes, I do take it and I enjoy.

Doug Still: [01:06:45]
Professor Watson, thanks so much for joining me. That was just an incredible presentation and talk we had, and I appreciate everything you do.
 
Robert Watson: [01:06:53] 
Thank you. And I appreciate what you're doing, because this is better than the grapevine. 

Doug Still: [01:07:01] 
That's right.
 
Robert Watson: [01:07:03] 
Absolutely.
 
Doug Still: [01:07:03] 
Yeah. Well, thanks again.
 
Robert Watson: [01:07:06] 
You are welcome. Thank you. You come to Hampton.
 
Doug Still: [01:07:10] 
Absolutely. So, we've talked about how the trees factored into the legacy of the school, and I think our country, but how would you describe the feeling that you had when you walked up to the tree?
 
Abra Lee: [01:07:23] 
The feeling I had when I walked up to the tree was excitement, and the excitement of, "I can't believe I'm seeing this tree." You're talking about a tree that is 200 years old, and has seen a lot of things go down, including the Civil War, including slavery, including reconstruction, including the Jim Crow era. So, the things that this tree has witnessed, that just came over me in that moment thinking about, "This tree has seen the history of America unfold in many ways and is still standing to tell that story."
 
Doug Still: [01:07:59] 
Well, thank you so much for spending time with me and telling this story about the Emancipation Oak and its legacy.
 
Abra Lee: [01:08:05] 
Thank you, Doug. It is always so fun to talk to you. It's so exciting. Trees are everything. And I'm just so grateful that you do this work, and just share so much and have so many lively, thoughtful conversations centered around trees. It's amazing. Thank you. All right, well, we've got to keep doing it. We got to go find more cool trees to talk about.
 
Doug Still: [01:08:23] 
[laughs] Absolutely. Thanks so much.
 
Abra Lee: [01:08:26] 
Thank you.
 
Doug Still: [01:08:30]
If the Emancipation Proclamation was a crucial but still unsatisfactory step toward freedom, then education lays the path to true emancipation. It's that connection that the Emancipation Oak encapsulates and where we find its powerful resonance.
 
Once again, I'd like to thank Abra Lee and Robert Watson for sharing their knowledge and heartfelt sentiments on the show today. You truly made it special. Thanks to Tim Nuckols for joining us as well, and I'm looking forward to hearing where those seedlings get planted. 

The choral music you've been listening to is a piece called Steal Away, a Traditional spiritual composed by Wallace Willis, sometime before 1862. This version was sung by the Winston Salem State University Choir and was arranged by composer Roland Carter, a graduate and former music teacher at Hampton University. Our consulting editor is Josh Abrams. Theme music is by Dee Lee, and artwork is by Dahn Hiuni. Please visit the show website at thisoldtree.show, and you can find photos and more information on Facebook and Instagram. I'm Doug Still. See you next time on This Old Tree.

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