The statue pictured above is controversial in its own right. The "Freedmen's Memorial To Abraham Lincoln" was paid for by contributions from the newly freed, yet they had no say in the final design; many, including Frederick Douglass, were critical at the time.
"The negro here, though rising, is still on his knees and nude. What I want to see before I die is a monument representing the negro, not couchant on his knees like a four-footed animal, but erect on his feet like a man."
Historian Renee Alter suggests this statue at Lincoln Park in Washington, DC, along with its counterpart in Boston, should be removed. She does a far better job than I could in describing the symbolism. While Lincoln was seen as a hero to many, he was a pragmatist whose primary goal was to preserve the Union, not free the enslaved.
On the Removal of Statues: Freedmen's Memorial to Abraham Lincoln - Renée Ater
On June 27, 2020, I wrote a six-part post about the Freedmen's Memorial to Abraham Lincoln in Washington, DC, on…
American history gives Lincoln much credit for freeing the enslaved. Very little light is shed on his role in trying to convince Black leaders the solution for freedmen was to be voluntarily deported to Liberia or Central America and that he was talked down by Frederick Douglass and others. Even less is known about the formerly enslaved he actually sent to an island off the coast of Haiti.
The Emancipation Proclamation was signed on January 1, 1863. The evening before, Abraham Lincoln signed a contract with Florida cotton planter Bernard Kock, using federal funds to relocate 5,000 formerly enslaved people to Cow Island (Ile a Vache) near Haiti. At that point, Lincoln had advocated colonization for over a decade as the solution to that "house divided" problem he warned about. Lincoln feared the outright release of 4 million enslaved people into American society and thought the freedmen might seek retribution (along with reparations).
By 1862, almost all the formerly enslaved were born in America and had never been to Africa. That didn't keep Lincoln and the American Colonization Society from advocating a "back-to-Africa movement."
"If as the friends of colonization hope…[we] succeed in freeing our land from the dangerous presence of slavery; and, at the same time, in restoring a captive people to their long-lost father-land, it will indeed be a glorious consummation." — Abraham Lincoln 1952
Lincoln chose Cow Island after considering a similar proposal to relocate formerly enslaved people to the Chiriquí province of Panama. The plan was for the "free" deportees to work on a cotton plantation for four years while receiving homes and access to education and medical care. After their four-year work contract, they would receive 16 acres of land and the wages earned during those four years. Nobody seemed to notice that the twenty square mile island didn't have enough land to give 5,000 people 16 acres. Some might describe withholding wages for four years as a forced savings plan; others would consider picking cotton for no compensation but a faint promise of future pay, a continuation of slavery.
The program was voluntary, though Lincoln, Kock, and others heavily encouraged it. Kock's proposal must have sounded glorious to a recently enslaved person, now without food, land, or income, and supported by Abraham Lincoln.
"The intelligent negro may enter upon a life of freedom and independence, conscious that he has earned the means of livelihood, and at the same time disciplined himself to the duties, the pleasures and wants of free labor." — Bernard Kock.
Four months before Lincoln signed the contract with Kock, Lincoln met with a group of Black leaders (Frederick Douglass wasn't invited) to discuss colonization prospects. He pitched them on the benefits to Black people of leaving America.
"Your race suffer from living among us, while ours suffer from your presence… It is better for us both, therefore, to be separated," — Abraham Lincoln.
Douglass read about the meeting in a newspaper. He responded in his own monthly publication:
"The proposal reminds one of the politeness with which a man might try to bow out of his house some troublesome creditor or the witness of some old guilt." — Frederick Douglass
Modern history tells us that Frederick Douglass talked Lincoln out of his plan, which eventually happened, only after Lincoln tried implementing it and met dismal failure. On April 14, 1863, the ship Ocean Ranger set sail from Fort Monroe, the same site where enslaved people first arrived in Virginia in 1619. 453 Black emigrants were on board, and over thirty died of smallpox before reaching land in early May. A second ship containing building materials and supplies never set sail.
Kock had lied to Lincoln and the freedmen about living conditions on the island. Instead of receiving "homes," Black people slept in huts made of Palmetto leaves and brush. Kock took whatever money they had and replaced it with his own currency. The Kock money was only good at his company store, which overcharged for everything. When talk began of revolt, Kock fled. His family’s version of the story places the blame on investors; no version suggests things went well for the Black people on Cow Island.
Bernard Kock Colonized Cow Island With Freed Slaves
History has been brutally unkind to Bernard Kock, my third great grandfather. Historians use all sorts of pejoratives…
By the summer of 1863, news of the inhumane conditions on the island reached Lincoln. On February 1, 1864, several months later, Lincoln ordered a naval vessel to the island to rescue the remaining freedmen. A month later, 350 survivors returned to America. Lincoln canceled the contract with Kock, withdrawing the $600,000 appropriation of which only $38,000 had been spent. Only then did Frederick Douglass convince Lincoln that assimilation was preferable to displacement. Lincoln never spoke publicly of colonization again.
Abraham Lincoln was a complex man whose views on many subjects, including enslavement, morphed over time. He was a pragmatist and is best seen through that lens rather than a hero. If only there was such a thing as a special advanced history class where some of the nuances could be discussed and not just the praise. Maybe someday.
Long past time to dismantle the whole white savior trope. Thanks for the info.
Another fantastic piece. The picture alone provides a seldom realized actualization of how Lincoln thought about the enslaved. Frederick Douglass amongst many others had to fight for Blacks, with it falling on predominantly deaf ears.
Some might say that one can not just society(ies) of the past by "modern mores," when the simple fact remains that "wrong is wrong," "evil is evil" no matter the time period.
Again, thank you for writing this piece!