proving a connection
When Dad told me about Livas Anderson, he also claimed that Osborne Perry Anderson was the cousin of his grandmother, Catherine Anderson. Years later, Catherine's grand-niece, Saxonia Harris Shadd, shared the same story. The search for a connection continues.
There is no paper trail. There is no conclusive DNA match linked to a well-documented family tree.
We have a story passed down by two of Livas's daughters, Catherine Anderson Freeman and Mary Anderson Smith, contemporaries of Osborne.
Vincent Anderson, Osborne's father, was born about 1806 in (Fauquier County) Virginia. In 1830, he married Sophia Taylor in East Fallowfield, Chester County, Pennsylvania, where their four sons were born.
Livas Anderson may have been born in Maryland, as indicated in the 1880 census for his son. His children were born in Baltimore between 1830 and 1837.
Other than the decade of their children's birth, what connects these Anderson families?
Making the Anderson family connection is an ongoing project.
WHO WAS OSBORNE PERRY ANDERSON?
Born: 17 July 1830, Chester County, Pennsylvania
Death: 11 December 1872, District of Columbia
Burial: National Harmony Memorial Park Cemetery, Hyattsville, Prince George’s County, Maryland
Osborne Perry Anderson was born July 17, 1830, in West Fallowfield, Chester, Pennsylvania, to Vincent Anderson, a free man of African descent, and Sophia Taylor Anderson, a "white woman with red hair." His birth was followed by the birth of three brothers named James, John, and Emanuel.
On August 10, 1852, Judith Ann Nelson named Osborne the father of her child, Jesse Henry, listed simply as "Anderson" on the West Goshen, Pennsylvania birth record. Judith Ann eventually married William Henry, and Jesse took his surname.
Sometime after 1852, Osborne left Pennsylvania for Canada. Some believe his venturing to Canada was directly linked to his association with Mary Ann Shadd Cary, who opened a school for African American children in West Chester, PA. Although Mrs. Shadd Cary’s influence may well have been critical in his decision to travel north, he may also have been influenced by Anderson's family members already living in Chatham, Ontario. Once in Chatham, Osborne worked for Shadd Cary as a printer.
In the spring of 1858, abolitionist John Brown arrived in Chatham to hold the Chatham Convention. Osborn Perry Anderson was elected to Brown’s provisional government. Mr. Anderson became one of only five men of African descent to accompany John Brown on his fateful raid on the United States arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia) in October 1859; he was the only one to survive.
After the failed Harper's Ferry raid, Osborne traveled to Toronto and Cleveland in 1860, published A Voice From Harper's Ferry in 1861, and was a delegate from Battle Creek to the Michigan Colored Men's Convention in 1865. He became ill and was cared for by friends in Washington, DC, where in died on December 11, 1872.
EXPLORING A QUAKER CONNECTION
Osborne Perry Anderson was born free. It is unclear whether his father, Vincent, was free at birth in 1803 or was manumitted sometime before he appeared in the 1830 US Census.
Livas and Vincent could each have gained freedom as members of families who escaped their enslavement. Either could have been the son of an enslaved father and a free woman, thereby being born free. Both men enter history fully grown, without documentation of their birth.
Livas is believed to have been born free around 1785, possibly in Maryland. However, according to family lore, he was on a ship in Charles Harbor in 1821, from which he escaped. Was he free but kidnapped into slavery? Was he a sailor, a Black Jack, seeking escape from the often torturous life of black sailors? Was he born enslaved, escaping in 1821 by jumping from a ship?
There are many unanswered questions. A tenuous common thread could be the Religious Society of Friends or Quakers. Manumission of people held in bondage by Quakers began in the mid-1700s. If Livas and possibly Vincent were born free, a Quaker connection could provide a plausible explanation.
Chester County, Pennsylvania, home of Vincent and Osborne Anderson, was one of three original Quaker jurisdictions in Pennsylvania. Baltimore, home of Livas Anderson and his family, is about thirty miles from Olney-Sandy Spring, Maryland, another longstanding Quaker community.
DNA testing has revealed a connection between Livas's Anderson family descendants and some of Sandy Spring's earliest Black families. Unfortunately, even DNA has been unable to connect Osborne's family to either Livas's descendants or to the Sandy Spring community.
Vincent Anderson had three other sons besides Osborne. Brothers John, James, and Emanuel appear with the family in the 1850 and 1860 US Census, but records for the brothers beyond that date have been difficult to locate.
Recently released early Pennsylvania birth records revealed a baby purported to be the son of Osborne Perry Anderson and Judith Ann Nelson. Judith married William Henry and her son, Jesse, was raised using the Henry surname.
Many Anderson and Henry surnames appear among my DNA matches, but so far, none has revealed a direct link to Vincent or Osborne.
