06/20/2022
Born in 1848, Susie King Taylor began her life as an enslaved person, living on a plantation for her first seven years. In 1855, Susie was "allowed" to go live with her free grandmother in Savannah. Despite Georgia’s harsh laws prohibiting formal education for Black people, she attended two secret schools taught by Black women and was tutored by two white youths.
In April 1862, Ms. Taylor was able to escape slavery with her uncle, living on Union-occupied St. Simons Island off the southern Georgia coast along with hundreds of other formerly enslaved refugees. There, at only 14 years old, Susie became the first Black teacher to openly educate Black people in Georgia.
During the Civil War, Susie served in the field as a volunteer nurse and camp aid; she cleaned and tested weapons, made meals for officers, and taught any interested soldier how to read and write. For four years and three months, she served the Union military without pay until she and her husband Edward, a Union soldier, mustered out at the end of the war. She later opened a school for Black children, whom she called the "children of freedom," and an adult night school in Savannah, Georgia, dedicated to the education of formerly enslaved people.
She was also the first Black woman to self-publish her memoirs about the American Civil War: Reminiscences of My Life in Camp with the 33rd United States Colored Troops, Late 1st S.C. Volunteers.
She wrote:
“What a wonderful revolution! In 1861 the Southern papers were full of advertisements for ‘slaves,’ but now, despite all the hindrances and ‘race problems,’ my people are striving to attain the full standard of all other races born free in the sight of God, and in a number of instances have succeeded. Justice we ask--to be citizens of these United States, where so many of our people have shed their blood with their white comrades, that the stars and stripes should never be polluted.” https://www.facebook.com/groups/onlinelearningcollective/permalink/1041993829764648/