|
Dinnah
Jackson
 In January 1779, Dinnah Jackson, "a free negro woman," purchased a lot on the South side of lower Second Street. That transaction identified her as Albany's first recorded African-ancestry property owner. It also is the first reference to her thus far encountered by the Colonial Albany Social History Project. Image of Dinnah JacksonAlthough her origins remain unknown, over the next decades, she was one of the more prominent of a small number of free blacks living in the city at that time.
We
believe that Dinnah Jackson was the wife of "Old Jack" and probably the mother of "Young Jack" - whose holdings on the hillside above Pearl Street were listed on the city assessment roll for October 1779. Both men were more often referred to as "Jack Jackson." Although by that time, some slaves and others of African ancestry were beginning to be noted in the records of Albany's churches, no mention of Dinnah Jackson has been found in these sources before September of 1790 when Dinnah and Jack witnessed the baptism of John Orion. Unfortunately, we cannot determine whether that Jack Jackson was Dinnah's husband or her son.
During
the 1780s, Albany's free black population not only
began to grow - but also was becoming more prominent
in the community's historical record. The assessment
roll for 1788 listed only the house of "Widow Jackson and son" in the Second Ward. In 1790, the household of "Jack Jackcum," consisting of seven "free people of color" and two white males - also in the Second Ward, accounted for more than 30% of the free blacks in the city. Perhaps counted within that household on the census, Dinnah Jackson was the housekeeper at the nearby Masonic Lodge and also performed domestic chores at St. Peter's Episcopal Church.
Over
the next three decades, this industrious and frugal
widow was able to purchase a number of additional
parcels of real estate along the North side of Foxes
Creek, West of Middle Alley, and above the Lutheran
Church burial grounds. Real estate transactions recorded
between 1779 and 1819 reveal that she owned as many
as a dozen pieces of property throughout the city.
Although all of these parcels could be called marginal,
the widow's determination to own multiple plots of
city land sets her apart from her Afro Albanian contemporaries.
 The
city directory for 1814 included Dinnah Jackson among
Albany's prominent people calling her "widow" and listing her residence as 31 Maiden Lane. Subsequent directories have identified her at that location as well. Her modest home would have been just West of North Market Street - probably abutting the corner mansion of Chancellor John Lansing. Albany artist James Eights remembered her and painted her near her house in one of his classic Albany streetscapes.
Widowed
for almost three decades and having outlived all
of her children, Dinnah Jackson died in the summer
of 1818. From her will filed that June, some picture
of her family and also an inventory of her extensive
holdings comes into view. First, her six grandchildren
were the only heirs identified. Granddaughter Dinnah
received the bed and bedding, half of the household
furniture and clothing, monies, five lots in the
Fifth Ward (Arbor Hill), and a share of another Arbor
Hill lot. Jain (Jane), the wife of John Williams,
was given the remaining half of the furniture and
clothing and half of another lot. Grandson John Jackson
was bequeathed a lot on Arbor Hill on his own. Perhaps
they cared for their grandmother in her old age.
Three younger grandchildren, Elizabeth, Hannah, and
Harry, were left monetary bequests.
~ ~ ~
Notes: This
image is a detail taken from a watercolor painted
by James Eights of how he remembered North Market
Street in 1805. The woman shown in the lower right
corner of the painting would have been standing in
front of Dinnah Jackson's home at 31 Maiden Lane.
We believe Eights was recognizing a prominent person
from his childhood.
Detail
from page 53 of The
Albany Register and Albany Directory for the Year
1815, compiled and arranged by Joseph
Fry (Albany, 1815). The 1815 edition named 2,394
individuals, listed street addresses, and provided
some information about occupations. For the first
time, the city directory included forty italicized
names and explained in the preface that "Those persons whose names
are in Italics are free people of colour." Dinnah
Jackson was one of that sizeable Afro Albanian
minority. See Stefan Bielinski, "The Jacksons,
Lattimores, and Schuylers: First African-American
Families of Early Albany," New
York History (October 1996), pp. 373-94.
By Stefan Bielinski, Colonial Albany Social History Project [http://www.nysm.nysed.gov/albany]
|
