Thomas Brown, MSA SC 3520-14452

Thomas Brown (b. ? - d. 1816)
MSA SC 3520-014452
Free African American, Baltimore City

On September 26, 1792, a free African American named Thomas Brown addressed the citizens of Baltimore in a public letter that appeared in the Baltimore Daily Repository.¹ Brown announced that he was seeking election to one of the two seats in the House of Delegates allotted to Baltimore City. His letter not only declared his patriotism as a veteran of the American Revolution,² but also pledged his representation of the “many hundreds of poor blacks as in habit this town, as well as the several thousands in different parts of the state.” Brown stated that he had served previously in other public offices.³ Several days later, on October 2, the same petition appeared in a Philadelphia paper, The Mail, or Claypoole’s Advertiser.⁴ In 1792, Maryland did not exclude blacks from voting, despite attempts to do so.⁵ Election results for 1792 did not mention Brown, whose number of votes was likely too small to be recorded, but his effort to participate in the new American political process is possibly the first for an African American in Maryland.⁶

Brown's 1792 letter presented an optimism that, with the freedom of America from Great Britain, the same freedoms would also extend to African Americans. It is interesting to note the appearance of Brown's letter in the The Mail, the voice for liberty and freedom in the newly-formed United States. According to the Library of Congress, The Mail was likely the new Nation's first newspaper. David C. Claypoole was the official printer for the Continental Congress, and held responsibility for printing some of the first copies of the Articles of Confederation and the United States Constitution.

Unfortunately, by 1810, an amendment to the Maryland's constitution disenfranchised African Americans from state politics, joining many other states that had already done so.⁷ However, African Americans in Maryland and across the nation would continue to tirelessly seek inclusion and acceptance as American citizens. According to historian Christopher Phillips, "Such bold and even brazen challenges to the status quo of a slave state...represent a nascent yet identifiable black consciousness."⁸ The autonomy of Brown and those who would follow him inspired a movement towards an era where, as Brown asserted, "all unjust and arbitrary distinctions are laid aside" and African Americans would be accepted as equal citizens entitled to all the rights endowed to them.

The details of Thomas Brown's life remain uncertain, although census records and city directories suggest that he lived in Ward 2 of Baltimore. The 1790 census recorded one African American Thomas Brown living in Baltimore with five other free persons and one slave. The census for that year recorded only the names of the heads of households, and then the number of household members. While the 1800 census listed several Thomas Brown's as the heads of households in Baltimore City, only one was African American. He had five dependents, all black, living with him that year. In 1810—the same year that Maryland barred blacks from voting—only one African American Thomas Brown appeared as the head of a household in Baltimore. He lived in Ward 2 with one dependent, likely his wife.⁹ The census records from 1800 to 1840 recorded the names of the heads of households, followed by the number and age groups of dependents.

City directories also provide clues to Brown's occupation and location. The Baltimore Town and Fell's Point Directory of 1796 listed only one Thomas Brown: a horse doctor between Calvert and Gay streets. In 1807, the Baltimore Directory and Citizens' Register listed several men named Thomas Brown, two of whom were each labeled "blackman." Both lived in Fell's Point: one on Happy Alley, the other on Apple Alley. However, no other information was given.¹⁰ In 1813, Brown leased property at "the southeast corner of Franklin and Eutaw Street," in Ward 10, from Andrew Ellicott. Brown owned the house, but paid ground rent on the land.¹¹

Records suggest that Brown died in Baltimore in August or September 1816. Between the years 1793 and 1816, three different men named Thomas Brown left wills in Baltimore County. The first (d. 1793) bequeathed a number of slaves to his wife, which makes him a less likely match.¹² The second (d. 1807) referred to himself as a mariner, which eliminates him as well.¹³ The third Thomas Brown died in 1816. He left little information in his will, aside from giving his wife's name as Rebecca and mentioning "my children." He also mentioned the "leasehold property" that he had acquired from Andrew Ellicott on Eutaw Street in Baltimore City. His will was probated on September 5, 1816.¹⁴ His executors, including his widow Rebecca, took an inventory of his estate on September 26.¹⁵

1. William Thompson and James L. Walker, The Baltimore Town and Fell’s Point Directory (Baltimore: Pechin, 1796);
3. Leroy Graham, Baltimore, the Nineteenth-Century Black Capital (Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, 1982) 25.

3. Baltimore Daily Repository, September 26, 1792.

2. The Mail, or Claypoole's Daily Advertiser, October 2, 1792, MSA SC 5634 (Papenfuse Newspaper Collection).

3. Ibid.
3.

4. Ibid.
4.

5. Quarles 300.
5. In February 1792 the Maryland Legislature proposed an amendment to prevent blacks from voting. Recorded in: The Constitution and Form of Government, as Proposed to be Amended by a Committee Appointed by the House of Delegates at the Last Session (Annapolis: Frederick Green, 1794).

6. GOVERNOR AND COUNCIL (Election Returns) BA, 1792, MSA S106-14.

7. Quarles 300.

8. Christopher Phillips, Freedom’s Port: The African American Community of Baltimore, 1790-1860 (Urbana and Chicago,IL: University of Illinois Press, 1997) 82-83.

9.     U.S. Census Bureau (Census Record, MD) for Thomas Brown, 1790, Baltimore Town, Page 9, Line 8 [MSA SM61-2, SCM 2053-1].
9.   U.S. Census Bureau (Census Record, MD) for Thomas Brown, 1790, Baltimore Town, Page 9, Line 8 [MSA SM61-2, SCM 2053-1].
9.   U.S. Census Bureau (Census Record, MD) for Thos. Brown, 1800, Page 13, last line [MSA SM61-24, SCM 2054-3].

10. William Thompson and James L. Walker, The Baltimore Town and Fell’s Point Directory (Baltimore, MD: Pechin, 1796) 6.
10. Bright, F. Edward. Baltimore Directory and Citizens' Register for 1807. Baltimore, MD: Warner and Hanna, 1807.

11. BALTIMORE COUNTY COURT (Land Records) Liber WG 122, Folio 435 [MSA CE 66-172]. Andrew Ellicott to Thomas Brown, March 17, 1813.
11. BALTIMORE COUNTY REGISTER OF WILLS (Inventories) Liber 31, Folio 218 [MSA C340-32]. Estate of Thomas Brown, September 26, 1816.