Abe and Jeff, Brothers at Last

I have found ten black/biracial families with sons named Abe Lincoln and Jeff Davis in the 1870 and 1880 census records. All of them lived in the ex-Confederate South.

I won't pretend to know why anyone would name brothers Abe and Jeff, but I will offer a few observations:

• In most cases, the children were born after 1865, suggesting that parents, rather than slaveowners, may have chosen these names.
• In those cases where one of the brothers was born during the war, it is always Jeff, not Abe.
• This pattern does not seem to be peculiar to any particular state, but it does seem to be limited to newly freed slaves in the ex-Confederate South.

I am a firm believer in the proposition that names convey meaning, but I'm not sure what the message is here. Is this a case of two names that "go together" because of ubiquitous pairings in news items and popular songs?

I can only suggest one political motivation that makes some sense:
I remember once reading a WPA slave narrative (admittedly, not the very best source) in which an elderly ex-slave characterized Lincoln and Davis as partners in bringing about the war that brought on freedom. He didn't distinguish between their motives — he argued that their quarrel created the necessary conditions for emancipation. If that was a wide-spread idea, it might account for the Abe-Jeff pairs.

Examples!

Alabama:
Moris, Jeff Davis (b. 1865) and Abe Lincoln (b. 1870)
St. Stephens, AL
(Abe Lincoln is on the top of the next page of the census)

Arkansas:
Caffee, Jeff Davis (b. 1865) and Abe Lincoln (b. 1865) twins
Troy, Arkansas

Mississippi:
Bush, Jefferson (b. 1867) and Abraham L. (b. 1869)
Noxubee Co., MS

North Carolina:
Powell, Jeff Davis (b. 1866) and Abraham L. (b. 1867)
Tarboro, NC

Tenessee:
Mason, Jeff D. (b. 1869) and Abe L. (b. 1865)
Montgomery Co., TN

Walker, Jeff Davis (b. 1863) and Abe Lincoln (b. 1865)
Giles Co., TN, 1880 Census

Texas:
Baylis, Jefferson D. (b. 1863) and Abe L. (b. 1867)
(brother Andrew J)
Marion, TX

Bolan, Jeff Davis (b. 1866) and Abraham L. (1866) twins
Colorado Co., TX

 Robinson, Jeff Davis (b. 1864) and Abe Lincoln (b. 1867)
Liberty Co., TX

Virginia:
Broadnax, Jeff D. (b. 1861) and Abraham L. (b. 1865)
Drewryville, VA

 

Unionist Naming in the Postwar South

There's a very interesting discussion going on over at Civil War Memory about John Stauffer and Sally Jenkins' new book, The State of Jones. I haven't weighed in on the comments thread because John Stauffer is my department chair, so I feel it would be inappropriate for me to comment. Nevertheless, I have been following the debate with great interest.


I don't have much to add on the subject of Jones County, but if there's one thing we love here at VPI, it's onomastics! In their comments on Civil War Memory, Prof. Stauffer and Ms. Jenkins ask, "How many white Southerners do you know who, in 1868, named a son after Ulysses S. Grant?"


As it happens, quite a few.

I've been working on a series of posts about pro-Union naming among white Southerners and pro-Confederate naming among black Southerners. I'm still working on compiling the comprehensive data, but I can offer a few surprising tidbits here:

1) The 1870 census shows 103 men with the first names "Abraham Lincoln," "Abe Lincoln," or "Abraham L." living in the 11 ex-Confederate states. Most of the little Abes lived in Tennessee, Virginia, or Arkansas.

 

All of the Abraham Lincolns and Abe Lincolns were born during or after the war. Some of the men named "Abraham L." were born before the war (18%), but 82% were born during or after the war, which tells me that most of them were named after Lincoln.

2) Ulysses S. Grant was also a surprisingly popular name among white Southerners. There are dozens of them. Here are a few examples:

General Grant Norton, b. 1866, McMillans, Marion Co., SC

U.S. Grant Owens, b. 1869, Hawkins Co., TN

Ulysses S. Grant Harris, b. 1866, Hill Co., TX

I count 494 men and boys named "Ulysses S. Grant," "US Grant," "Ulysses Grant," "General Grant," or "Grant" in the 11 ex-Confederate states in the 1870 census. The vast majority of those are simply named Grant.

In some states (AL, LA, FL), the number of boys named Grant born before the war was about the same as the number born after the war, indicating that those born after may not have been named for the general. In states with strong Unionist naming trends (AR, NC, TN, VA), the number of little Grants shot up during and after the war, which indicates that many of those boys were indeed named for Ulysses S. Grant.

3) Like those parents who name their children after presidents, white Unionists in the South sometimes named their children in sets:

Twins: Ulysses Grant Clem and Schuyler Colfax Clem, b. 1869, Liberty, AR

Abraham L. Smith (b. 1863), Henry Sherman Smith (b. 1866), and Ulisses S.G. Smith (b. 1869), Wittenberg, NC

 Abe Lincoln Kennedy (b. 1865) and James Sherman Kennedy (b. 1868), Union, MS

Abe Lincoln Woody (b. 1863) and U.S. Grant Woody (b. 1868), Yahoola, GA

Union Holleman (b. 1862) and Abraham L. Holleman (b. 1873), Fayetteville, AR

This is just a smattering of the pro-Union names given to white children in the Confederate and post-Confederate South. From General Sherman Dobbins of Floyd Co., VA (b. 1866) to Abe Lincoln Britt of Henderson Co., TN (b. 1866), hundreds of boys (and a few girls) wore their families' pro-Union sympathies in a very public way. Some were clustered in commuities, like three little boys named U.S. Grant (b. 1867, 1869, 1869) living in Richland, AR in 1870.

How many white Southerners named a son after Ulysses S. Grant?
Several hundred.

Note: My charts do not include Ulysses Collins, son of Jasper Collins, because he is listed in the transcription of the 1870 census as "Ulysses L. Collins." This means that my current methodology probably undercounts Unionist naming in the South. My numbers include neither boys whose names are recorded simply as "Ulysses" nor those with the middle name "Grant."

Colfax Massacre Anniversary

Today is the 135th anniversary of the Colfax Massacre, in which a mob of white Southern Democrats murdered at least 100 black men (exact estimates vary) in Colfax, Louisiana.

At this time, it seems appropriate to note how this event was commemorated throughout the 19th and 20th centuries. The marker at left (via), which Richard Rubin once called "the frankest monument I have ever seen," still stands in the local cemetery. Although historians generally employ the term "massacre" when describing this event, the state of Louisiana still refers to it as a "riot" in its official commemorative marker (see right, via), which also declares that the violence "marked the end of carpetbag misrule in the South."

For more information on this disgusting betrayal of the promises that the Federal Government made to African-Americans during Reconstruction, see Charles Lane's The Day Freedom Died or read a short version here.