Robert Purvis

Purvis was born in 1810 in Charleston, South Carolina. His maternal grandparents were Dido Badaraka, a former slave, and Baron Judah, a Jewish American native of Charleston. His mother Harriet Judah was therefore a free woman of color. Purvis's father was a British immigrant. As an adult, Purvis told a reporter about his family: his maternal grandmother Badaraka was kidnapped at age 12 from Morocco, transported to South Carolina on a slave ship, and sold as a slave in Charleston. He described her as a full-blooded Moor, dark-skinned with tightly curled hair. She was freed at age 19 by her master's will.[2][3] Harriet's father was Baron Judah, born in Charleston of German Jewish and Spanish-Portuguese Jewish descent.[1] Baron was the third of ten children born to Hillel Judah, a German Jewish immigrant, and Charleston native Abigail Seixas, his Spanish-Portuguese Jewish wife.

Purvis told the reporter that his grandparents Badaraka and Judah had married. This claim has been questioned by 21st century biographers, given the social prominence of the Judah family in Charleston. Judah's parents owned slaves. Badaraka and Judah had a relationship for several years, and had two children together, Harriet and her brother. In 1790, Judah broke off his relationship with Badaraka when he moved with his parents from Charleston to Savannah, Georgia. In 1791 he moved to Richmond, Virginia. There he married a Jewish woman and had four children with her.[4]

William Purvis was from Northumberland. His father died while he was a child, and his mother moved to Edinburgh for her sons' education. He immigrated to the United States as a young man with some of his brothers to make their fortunes. William became a wealthy cotton salesman in Charleston and was a naturalized United States citizen.[1][5]

William Purvis and Harriet Judah lived together as husband and wife, but racial law prevented their marriage. The couple had three sons: William born in 1806, Robert born in 1810, and Joseph born in 1812.[5] In 1819 the family moved north to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where the boys attended the Pennsylvania Abolitionist Society's Clarkson School. William intended to consolidate his business affairs and return with his family to Britain, where he thought his sons would have better opportunities. He died in 1826 before they could move.

William Purvis had intended his sons to be educated as gentlemen, and Robert and Joseph Purvis likely attended Amherst Academy, a secondary school in Amherst, Massachusetts. There is no evidence that either Robert or Joseph Purvis attended Amherst College, a common misconception.[6] (Amherst College catalogs from the 1820s do not list them as enrolled.) The brothers returned to Philadelphia, where their family was among the black elite. After their father died, Purvis and his two brothers were to share an estate worth $250,000. In 1828 the oldest brother William died of tuberculosis. Robert and Joseph inherited increased shares of the estate; they used their wealth to support their political activism and public service.[7]

Harriet Forten Purvis (1810-1875), taken about 1874

In 1832, Purvis married Harriet Davy Forten, a woman of color and the daughter of wealthy sailmaker James Forten and his wife Charlotte, both prominent abolitionists and leaders in Philadelphia. Like her parents and siblings, Harriet Forten Purvis was active in anti-slavery groups in the city, including the interracial Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society.[8]

The Purvises had eight children, including son Charles Burleigh Purvis (1841-1926). He became a surgeon and professor for 30 years in the medical school at Howard University. In addition, the couple raised Harriet's niece, Charlotte Forten Grimké, after her mother died. In her later life, Harriet Forten Purvis lectured publicly against segregation and for expanded suffrage for all citizens.[8]

After Harriet died, Purvis married Tracy Townsend, who was of European descent.[3] She was from then Byberry Township, (now North East Philadelphia), where Purvis had moved after the 3 day riots threatened his safety. As a public figure, he received some criticism for this marriage, from both whites and blacks who cared about the color line.

In 1833, Purvis helped abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison establish the American Anti-Slavery Society in Philadelphia and signed its "Declaration of Sentiments". Living for nearly the rest of the 19th century, Purvis was the last surviving member of the society.[1] That same year, he helped establish the Library Company of Colored People, modeled after the Library Company of Philadelphia, a subscription organization. With Garrison's support, in 1834 Purvis traveled to Britain to meet leading abolitionists.[9]

In 1838, he drafted the "Appeal of Forty Thousand Citizens Threatened with Disfranchisement"',[10] which urged the repeal of a new state constitutional amendment disfranchising free African Americans. There were widespread tensions and fears among whites following Nat Turner's slave rebellion of 1831 in Virginia. Although Pennsylvania was a free state that had abolished slavery, state legislators persisted in passing this amendment to restrict free blacks' political rights. They did not regain suffrage until after the ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment in 1870, following the Civil War.

From 1845–1850, Purvis served as president of the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society, a biracial organization. As a supporter of the Underground Railroad, Purvis served as chairman of the General Vigilance Committee from 1852–1857, which gave direct aid to fugitive slaves. According to his records, Purvis estimated that from 1831–61, he helped one slave per day achieve freedom, aiding a total of more than 9,000 slaves to escape to the North. He used his own house, then located outside the city, in Byberry Township, as a station on the Underground Railroad.[1] Purvis built Byberry Hall on the edge of the Quaker Owned, Byberry Friends Meeting campus. Byberry Hall, which still stands today, hosted anti-slavery speakers and was just across the street from Purvis' home.[11]

Purvis supported many progressive causes in addition to abolition. With Lucretia Mott, he supported women's rights and suffrage. When Mott was president, he was a member of the American Equal Rights Association. Purvis also attended the founding meeting of the Pennsylvania Woman Suffrage Association.[1] He supported temperance and similar social issues. He believed in integrated groups working for greater progress for all. By the end of the Civil War, which gained the emancipation of slaves and suffrage for black men, Purvis had reached his late 50s and became less active in political affairs.

Irish Catholics, often competitors for the lowest-paying, unskilled and menial jobs, perceived the city's more successful African American residents as flaunting their success, setting the stage for blacks to become targets for the immigrants' frustrations and jealous rage.[12][13] A three day race riot began on August 1, 1842. The rioters set fires and attacked firefighters and police as they went, heading for Purvis's home, protesting outside for forty hours. Purvis and his home were reportedly saved from the Irish mob solely by a Catholic priest's intervention.[14]

Neither of Purvis' elder sons survived the American Civil War. Both William P. Purvis (1832 - 1857) and Robert Purvis (1834 - 1862) were buried in the Byberry burial ground in North East Philadelphia, now adjacent to Benjamin Rush State Park and a warehouse of the U.S. National Archives.[15] When the burial ground of St. Thomas African Episcopal Church, where his mother had been buried in central Philadelphia was closed, Purvis had the remains transferred to Fair Hill Burial Ground in Philadelphia's Germantown neighborhood, where his wife (1810-1875) and daughter Georgianna (1848-1877) who had died of consumption were buried, and where he himself would be buried in 1898.[16][17]

His abolitionist efforts are now remembered by the state of Pennsylvania,[18] and by the National Park Service.[19]

• Works by or about Robert Purvis at Internet Archive
• Robert Purvis at Find a Grave