Bazil Hall (b. circa 1835 - d. 1924)
MSA SC 5496-050574
Enlisted with Company B, 39th Regiment,
USCT, in Montgomery County, 1864
Biography:
On March 22, 1864, Bazil Hall enlisted as a private with Company B of the newly-formed 39th Regiment, Maryland Volunteer Infantry.1 He was one of eight slaves on Charlotte Waters's farm south of Goshen.2 Hall soon transferred from the infantry to the navy. Earlier that March, the U.S. War Department had issued General Orders asking experienced seamen to consider transferring to the Navy. The circular also stated President Lincoln's goal to have a total of one thousand men transferred to Baltimore's naval station "in the most expiditious manner."3 On April 17, 1864, Bazil Hall transferred to the Navy, along with fourteen other soldiers from Company B, including Robert Lincoln, who had enlisted with the company on the same day as Hall.4 Despite the War Department's request for experienced sailors, Hall was classified as a landsman, meaning that he had little or no seafaring experience.5 Bazil Hall's name appears among the 209,145 names listed on the African American Civil War Memorial in Washington, D.C. His name is listed on plaque C-54 on the Wall of Honor.6
Following the war, Hall returned to Montgomery County, where he worked as a farm laborer. On April 13, 1868, he married seventeen-year-old Julia Ann Riggs7 and settled near Goshen. The Halls appeared twice in the 1870 Census: first, on Mrs. Eleanor Pugh's farm,8 where Bazil worked as a laborer, and second, at the residence they shared with Julia's mother and siblings.9 Bazil's parents, James and Maria Hall, lived nearby.10 James Hall may have been a former slave of William W. Blunt, whose farm stood near Clarksburg.11 Bazil Hall also had a younger brother, William, who was born around 1849.12
Bazil and Julia Hall had six daughters: Emily (1868), Mary F. (1869), Eliza (1873), Elizabeth (1874), Elinora (1878), and Gracie B. (1894); and five sons, Ether B. (1887), James H. (1888), John W.R. (1892), Worthington or Wellington (1898), and Halie (1902). The 1880 census listed Mary F. Hall as disabled.13 All of the Halls' children learned to read and write.
In February 1875, Bazil Hall purchased one hundred and thirty acres of land with his brothers-in-law John H. Riggs and Samuel A. Riggs.14 Part of a tract called "Owen's Resurvey," the acreage stood north of Goshen next to Benjamin R. Fish's farm. In 1877, they sold Joseph Wood over a hundred-dollars-worth of tobacco, wheat, and property.15 A few months later, they also sold Wood a large number of livestock, crops, and farm equipment. The deed for the latter transaction noted that the sale would be void if Hall and the Riggs brothers could pay Wood the two hunded and fifty dollars they owed him.16 Finally, in August 1878, they sold all one hundred and thirty acres to Wood for eight hundred dollars—four hundred dollars less than they had originally paid. Their debt may have resulted from borrowing money from Wood, a wealthy farmer, in order to purchase their farm.
In 1891, Bazil Hall purchased one acre of land from Albert G. Meriwether, and then purchased a second acre from Meriwether four years later.17 Both acres stood in a tract called "Water's Conclusion" in the First District of Montgomery County, bordering the Seneca Bridge near Goshen. Bazil Hall owned the land until 1905, when he sold it to Henry A. Clagett.18 By 1900, the Halls were living on the farm of Lloyd Brown, Bazil Hall's half-brother on his mother's side. Hall worked on Brown's farm as a hired hand.19 The Halls lived with Brown for at least the next ten years.
Bazil Hall went to live with his married son, James, following Julia's
death between 1910 and 1920. Hall passed away on November 22, 1924, with
his death certificate listing his age as ninety-four. Although Hall claimed
to be twenty-nine-years-old when he enlisted with the 39th Regiment,
his birth year had varied from 1830 to 1846 throughout different census,
military, and vital records. Like his brothers Loyd Brown and William Hall,
Bazil Hall was buried at the Brooke Grove United Methodist Church in Goshen.20
1. ADJUTANT GENERAL, (Muster Rolls), 1863-1866, U.S. Colored Troops, [MSA S936-50]. Bazil Hall, Company B, 39th Regiment, Line 6.
2. ADJUTANT GENERAL, (Muster
Rolls), 1864-1865, Slaves mustered into U.S. Colored Troops, [MSA S936-51].
Basil Hall, Montgomery County, Folder No. 38.
U.S. Census
Record (Census Record, MD) for Charlotta Waters, 1860, Montgomery County,
District 1, Page 9, Line, 28 [MSA SM61-213, M 7223-1].
3. Col. Robert Nicholson Scott. The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies. Series 1, Vol. 33 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1891) 926.
4. ADJUTANT GENERAL, (Muster Rolls), Bazil Hall, Company B, 39th Regiment, Line 6.
5. "Bazil Hall." The Union African American Sailors Index. National Park Service. http://www.itd.nps.gov/cwss/sailors_trans.htm.
6. "Bazil Hall." Civil
War Soldiers and Sailors System. National Park Service. http://www.itd.nps.gov/cwss/soldiers.cfm.
"The African
American Civil War Memorial." African American Civil War Memorial Freedom
Foundation and Museum. http://www.afroamcivilwar.org/.
7. MONTGOMERY COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT, (Marriage Licenses), 1867-1899, [MSA T2490-1], Marriage Record for Bazil Hall and Julia Riggs, April 13, 1868.
8. U.S. Census Bureau (Census Record, MD) for Bazil Hall, 1870, Montgomery County, District 1, Page 51, Line 18 [MSA SM61-275, M 7256].
9. U.S. Census Bureau (Census Record, MD) for Bazil Hall, 1870, Montgomery County, District 1, Page 48, Line 24 [MSA SM61-275, M 7256.
10. U.S. Census Bureau (Census Record, MD) for James Hall, 1870, Montgomery County, District 1, Page 52, Line 27 [MSA SM61-275, M 7256].
11. MONTGOMERY COUNTY COMMISSIONER OF SLAVE STATISTICS (Slave Statistics), [MSA CM750-1]. William W. Blunt, May 9, 1867, Page 58 (Page 34 electronic).
12. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH BUREAU OF VITAL STATISTICS, (Death Record, Counties), 03/1918, [MSA S1179-2177]. William Hall, March 30, 1918, Montgomery County.
13. U.S. Census Record (Census Record, MD) for Bazel Hall, 1880, Montgomery County, Cracklin, District 107, Page 26, Line 31 [MSA SM61-324, M 4748-2].
14. MONTGOMERY COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT
(Land Records), Liber EBP 13, Folio 254, 1874-1875, MSA CE 63-23. Patrick
Lahe to John Riggs, Samuel Riggs, and Basil Hall, February 15, 1875.
G.M. Hopkins.
Atlas
for Fifteen Miles Around Baltimore Including Howard Co., Maryland (Philadelphia,
PA: F. Bourquin, 1878) 22.
15. MONTGOMERY COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT (Land Records), Liber EBP 17, Folio 270, 1877-1878, MSA CE 63-27. Samuel Riggs, John Riggs, and Basil Hall to Joseph Wood, December 10, 1877.
16. MONTGOMERY COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT
(Land Records), Liber EBP 19, Folio 136, 1878-1879, [MSA CE 63-29]. Samuel
Riggs, John Riggs, and Basil Hall to Joseph Wood, August 26, 1878.
MONTGOMERY
COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT (Land Records), Liber EBP 19, Folio 167, 1878-1879,
[MSA CE 63-29]. Samuel Riggs, John Riggs, and Basil Hall to Joseph Wood,
November 15, 1878.
17. MONTGOMERY COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT
(Land Records), Liber JA 25, Folio 482, 1891-1891, [MSA CE 63-71]. Albert
G. Meriwether to Basil Hall, March 10, 1891.
MONTGOMERY
COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT (Land Records), Liber JA 46, Folio 210 1894-1895,
[MSA CE 63-92]. Albert G. Meriwether to Basil Hall, January 9, 1895.
18. MONTGOMERY COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT (Land Records), Liber 180, Folio 312, 1904-1905, [MSA CE 63-138]. Basil Hall to Henry A. Clagett, October 27, 1899.
19. U.S. Census Bureau (Census Record,
MD) for Basil Hall, 1900, Montgomery County, Laytonsville, District 49,
Page 24, Line 85 [MSA SM61-416, M 2386-2].
DEPARTMENT
OF HEALTH BUREAU OF VITAL STATISTICS, (Death Record, Counties), 02/1918,
[MSA S1179-2154]. Lloyd Brown, February 17, 1918, Montgomery County.
20. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH BUREAU OF
VITAL STATISTICS, (Death Record, Counties), 1924, [MSA S1179-3796]. Basil
Hall, November 22, 1924, Montgomery County.
DEPARTMENT
OF HEALTH BUREAU OF VITAL STATISTICS, (Death Record, Counties), 02/1918,
[MSA S1179-2154]. Lloyd Brown, February 17, 1918, Montgomery County.
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