by Terry L. Meyers

When I started working on unravelling mysteries about the Bray School years ago, I was puzzled as to why, in 1760, Benjamin Franklin would recommend to his fellow Associates of Dr. Bray in London that they site a school in Williamsburg, Virginia. No place in the Thirteen Colonies could have been more enmeshed in chattel slavery or more expected to resist any education for Black children—even religious education.

But it turned out that in visiting Williamsburg in 1756 and receiving William & Mary’s first honorary degree, Franklin must have discovered a long institutional openness to religious education for Black adults and children. And in recommending that the president of the College be one of the school overseers, Franklin was protecting the soon-to-be school from its skeptics.

It is worth recalling that the Anglican church had long been concerned for the souls of the “heathens” in the New World, namely Native American and African-descended people. William & Mary’s Royal Charter of 1693 led to the early establishment of the Brafferton School.  

And at least some Black people were eager for instruction in the tenets of Christianity, for conversion from what one Associates’ Account (1768) deemed the “Darkness of Heathenism and Brutality.” In 1723 an enslaved man—or enslaved woman—in Virginia (possibly with co-authors) addressed an appeal to the new Bishop of London, Edmund Gibson; he asked that the Bishop, “Releese us out of this Cruell Bondegg” and provide religious schooling for their children:

[A]nd Sir wee your humble perticners do humblly beg the favour of your Lord Ship that your honour will grant and Settell one thing upon us which is that our childarn may be broatt up in the way of the Christtian faith and our desire is that they may be Larnd the Lords prayer the creed and the ten com-mandements and that they may appeare Every Lord’s day att Church before the Curatt to bee Exammond for our desire is that godllines Shoulld abbound amongs us and wee desire that our Childarn be putt to Scool and and Larnd to Reed through the Bybell.

Even in early days at William & Mary, its president, James Blair, proposed a law reducing taxes on enslavers who brought their enslaved children to Christianity. He wrote the Bishop of London in 1724 that as Rector of Bruton Parish Church he encouraged “the baptizing & catechizing of such of them [the enslaved] as understand English.”

And in about 1735, a British portrait painter, Charles Bridges, arrived in Williamsburg with a letter of introduction from Gibson to Blair. (Bridges painted the portrait of Blair in the Wren Great Hall). Bridges was a member of the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge and found already developing in Williamsburg ideas for a school for the religious education of Blacks, a proposal forwarded to the Bishop “in late 1735.” One scholar, Graham Hood, says that “Bridges also explored with Blair and Gibson the possibility of establishing a charity to teach Christianity to the colony’s African Americans.” 

Another scholar, Joan Louise Rezner, specified that the “the proposal called for a full time catechist who would ‘be always upon the Spot at reasonable hours as to attend those that come to be Instructed at that Time, [when] they can be spared, and to make it his whole business to teach Negroes and no others.’” Neither Blair nor Gibson found a way to support such instruction financially and despite a further appeal to the Bishop in 1738, Bridges returned to England without the school’s coming into being.

Nevertheless, some schools for religious instruction did exist for Blacks—three of them, for example, possibly overseen by William Dawson in his capacity (beyond being president of William & Mary, 1743-1752) as parish priest. Dawson made a brief, generalized reference to such schools in a letter, but this begs more research.

When Blair died in 1743, he was replaced as president by the Board of Visitors with Dawson, but Dawson needed the Bishop’s appointment to succeed Blair as Commissary. One of Dawson’s supporters wrote the Bishop that Dawson was eager to cooperate with the Bishop’s “Endeaavors for the Instruction of the Negroes here in the principles of Christianity”: “he is labouring … to get a School set up here for that purpose.” Just a few years earlier, in 1740, Dawson had sought funding from the Bishop for “a collection of religious books … for the benefit of the Negroes & the Poor of this Colony.” Dawson’s estate was billed by Elizabeth Wyatt for “schooling your Negro Jenny for one year.”

Dawson taught at least one course at the College during one Lent “to near 40 white Servants, Indians, and Negroes, who constantly attended.” And soon after becoming president of the College, he had written to the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge to ask for copies of regulations “proper to be observed by masters and mistresses of Charity Schools … many of which, with some little alteration, will suit a Negro-School in our metropolis, when we shall have the pleasure of seeing one established. The establishment of others in the country will depend on our success in this place.”

A few years after William Dawson died in 1752, his brother, Thomas, became president (1755-1760), and Thomas, too, supported Black religious education. Both had been instrumental in raising funds locally for a charity school in Maryland overseen by a missionary to the enslaved, Thomas Bacon. And in 1754, Dawson wrote the Bishop of London urging a convention of Virginia clergy where “Schools for the educating of poor Children, and negroes might be recommended and encouraged.”

This then is the history of the interest in Black religious education at William & Mary that Franklin would have encountered in 1756 and that, I think, encouraged him to suggest an affiliation between the College and the school. It might be claimed (with asterisks, caveats, and a sense of irony) that William & Mary was the first college or university in America, possibly anywhere, to concern itself with Black education.

Terry L. Meyers, PhD, retired from William & Mary as Chancellor Professor, Emeritus, of English after 46 years of teaching.  He was active with the Williamsburg Historical Records Association, which he served as president, and he was involved with the development of The Lemon Project at William & Mary. His research and unwavering curiosity about the Williamsburg Bray School were critical factors in the search that led to the ultimate rediscovery of the original tenement building in 2020. A family genealogist has recently suggested he is possibly descended from Leanna Nichols Spiller, a sister of Robert Carter Nicholas.

by Terry L. Meyers

In 2013, I suggested in an essay in the William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal, “Thinking about Slavery at the College of William and Mary,” that the Williamsburg Bray School might have inspired a possible second school for Black children also to be overseen by William & Mary.  I was wrong.

But the question is still interesting because it casts some light on local racial matters not too far removed from the years the Bray School existed (1760-1774). And there is a faint echo from the Bray School.

When William Ludwell Lee (1775-1803) freed his enslaved persons, by the terms of his will, I suspect he did so at least in part under the influence of Bishop James Madison, the president of William & Mary. Madison was also the first bishop of the Episcopal Church in Virginia and cousin to the United States’ fourth president, James Madison. Bishop Madison had overseen a skepticism about slavery in the curriculum for some time, but neither he nor the College actually freed those they enslaved.

Those whom Lee had enslaved that were under eighteen were sent to be educated in a state north of the Potomac River and in accordance “with their capabilities.” 

And when he specified in his will that a local “free School” be established “solely for the benefit of such persons whose indigent situation forbids their acquiring even the rudiments of an education,” I thought he must be thinking of Black children. I was encouraged in that thinking when he specified that the “American language” be taught to the pupils. I assumed Black children might be speaking a patois derived in part from their parents’ African origins, as the Atlantic slave trade was still wide open and editions of the Virginia Gazette regularly reported the arrivals of ships carrying Africans for sale.    

And a final factor was Lee’s siting the school “in the centre of James City County,” as the boundaries were drawn in 1802. That location was at the center of a free Black community at what we know today as Freedom Park, located at the intersection of Longhill and Centerville Roads.

That annual payments from a gift of land were to be made to William & Mary to oversee the school, for its “use and benefit,” made sense to me since I thought (and still think) that would reflect the College’s earlier role (at least initially) in its presidents’ being overseers of an earlier school, the Bray School.

But in revisiting the question I would make several corrections, not the least of which is my confusing Lee a bit later in the piece with his father, William Lee (1739-1795), as his father had corresponded with Madison about emancipating his own enslaved persons. Mainly, I would back away from the link I made between the school and Black students. I think now that Lee had dealt with the question of education for those he had enslaved in the earlier paragraphs of his will which focused on his settlement of them in Baltimore and the education to be offered to those under eighteen. I think he then shifted his attention to the indigent students in James City County. That he did not specify them as being Black students suggests to me now that they were white. I’m still puzzled about siting the school where he did, at the site of the free Black community, but suppose now that the issue was centrality and accessibility to all students.

And I remain puzzled too about the teaching of American.  I’m now inclined to think that the poorest of white children might just have spoken in slovenly ways to be corrected by instruction. Or perhaps, the reference to “American” was a means of signifying an approach or relationship to language that was distinctly American as opposed to British in the early years of the Republic.

Finally, Lee’s attention to democracy seems important here since it is unlikely he would have conceived of Blacks having a role in government. In his will—available at the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation’s Rockefeller Library—Lee writes that he is “convinced of the importance of education and of the advantages which may be derived from a general diffusal of useful information among the mass of society in Government depending for their support on popular opinion.” Few if any whites of the time conceived of African Americans  ever having a role in governance.

What became of the school?  It never came into being. As Earl Gregg Swem documented in his 1959 William & Mary Quarterly article, “The Lee Free School and the College of William and Mary,” the College did make some early efforts towards starting the school, but by 1837 the courts had deemed that William & Mary was not properly eligible to be a trustee of such a school.

It bears stating, however, that the Williamsburg Bray School did inspire the work of another Bray school: Fredericksburg. Fredericksburg was recommended as a likely location for another Bray Associates school as it was on the Rappahannock River and a reasonable distance from Williamsburg. Of greater note is the fact Williamsburg Bray School trustee, Robert Carter Nicholas, shared the Williamsburg rules with Fredericksburg trustee, Fielding Lewis, who quickly adopted them, owing to the rules being “so well calculated for the well Government of [the school].”

So the Williamsburg Bray School did have a daughter school—just not the one I thought it had. 

Terry L. Meyers, PhD, retired from William & Mary as Chancellor Professor, Emeritus, of English after 46 years of teaching.  He was active with the Williamsburg Historical Records Association, which he served as president, and he was involved with the development of The Lemon Project at William & Mary. His research and unwavering curiosity about the Williamsburg Bray School were critical factors in the search that led to the ultimate rediscovery of the original tenement building in 2020. A family genealogist has recently suggested he is possibly descended from Leanna Nichols Spiller, a sister of long-serving Bray School Trustee, Robert Carter Nicholas.

As a history major hoping to go into museums and preservation after school, I was excited to engage with the historic sites surrounding William & Mary’s campus. During my first semester, I found that the school does a phenomenal job of linking itself to local history. My first encounter with the Williamsburg Bray School was through a sociology course on twentieth-century Black Williamsburg, during which I was tasked with evaluating Colonial Williamsburg’s interpretations of various Black history sites. I found my tour of the Bray School fascinating, and was ecstatic when I was given the opportunity to become a student thought partner with the Bray School Lab.

I began interning at the Bray School Lab during the spring semester of my freshman year. At the time, I was a member of the Sharpe Community Scholars program’s Action Research Pathways, which connects students’ research interests with opportunities in the Williamsburg community. During their spring semester, Sharpe Scholars are placed into semester-long internships where they can put their research ideas and interests into action. Placement in each of the internship programs was interest-based, and my interest in the Bray School had already been piqued by my sociology course the semester before.

When I arrived at the Bray School Lab, I began working on the Mapping the Literacy of Enslaved Virginians project with a group of students, a few of which were also connected to the Lab through the Sharpe Scholars program. The project’s goal was to compile as much primary evidence of enslaved literacy in Virginia as possible, then map those instances onto an interactive map for the public to explore. I was struck by how many instances of enslaved literacy I found early on in my research — I had seriously underestimated how common it was.

To find the names and literacy levels of many enslaved Virginians, I pored over fugitive slave ads, oral history transcripts, and teachers’ journals. Fugitive slave ads were one of my largest sources of information on enslaved literacy. They often included runaways’ education because enslavers were afraid of enslaved people reading the notices and making plans to go somewhere far away or forging freedom papers and passing as free. I scanned hundreds of ads in the Geography of Slavery in Virginia database for keywords like “read” and “write” and recorded the information in the Bray School Lab’s mapping project database.

In addition to reading and writing, I kept track of other forms of education and the skills enslaved Virginians had, such as printing or sewing. While the project focused on literacy, the Lab did not want to discount the many other important forms of education that enslaved Virginians possessed. I also kept track of enslaved Virginians’ sources of education. Some learned from their enslavers’ children as they learned to read in school, while others learned from night schools, reading the Bible, or friends and family members who were already literate.

In the process of reading through A North Side View of Slavery, edited by Benjamin Drew, one of the sources I used to get transcribed oral histories about enslaved literacy, I came across many remarkable stories. One man that Drew interviewed had learned to read and write and used these abilities to self-manumit by traveling from Virginia to Canada. By reading a message he’d been sent to deliver to another enslaver, he learned that his enslaver planned to sell him elsewhere. He escaped slavery by copying his enslaver’s signature and writing himself free passes until he made it to Queen’s Bush, Canada.

Enslaved literacy and education has often been overlooked in historical research, but the transcribed oral histories I read made it clear that these were crucial sources of power and agency for enslaved Virginians. There were many instances, like the one mentioned above, in which enslaved people were able to use information gained through their literacy to escape slavery, evade capture after running away, prevent themselves from being separated from their loved ones, or reunite themselves with family that had already been taken from them. That so many fugitive slave ads contained information about enslaved people’s literacy is a testament to how powerful that literacy was. Literacy was a symbol of freedom, and therefore a major threat to enslavers’ authority and methods of control.

Though I was only required to stay with the Bray School Lab for a semester as a Sharpe Scholar, the Mapping the Literacy of Enslaved Virginians project was much bigger in scope and historical significance than one semester of work. At the end of my freshman year, I made the decision to continue working with the Bray School Lab even after I left the Sharpe Scholars program. I am excited to help continue research for the project and see the final product. Hopefully, the mapping project will illustrate the significance of enslaved literacy and the nuances of enslaved Virginians’ experiences and expressions of agency.

Cadence Hodge ‘28 is a William & Mary sophomore double majoring in history and public health. She is also working towards a NIAHD certification in Public History and Material Culture. Cadence intends to pursue museum studies or public history in graduate school and hopes to be a part of making marginalized histories more accessible to the public.

by Emily Muscolina

Conducting first-hand research on the Williamsburg Bray School is an opportunity unique to William & Mary and Colonial Williamsburg, and vital to the educational missions of both institutions. Although I have only been volunteering at the W&M Bray School Lab for roughly a year, my awareness of it began much earlier.

I first learned about the Williamsburg Bray School in the summer of 2022. That summer, I was a high school student in the National Institute of American History & Democracy (NIAHD) Pre-College Program in American History. Our role as students gave us the privilege of literally seeing research unfold.

My class visited the Bray-Digges House, still located at that time on William & Mary’s campus. This building, which had been confirmed as the original Bray school two summers before, was fenced off near an empty lot. To the passerby, it resembled an abandoned building. I remember the excitement I felt upon approaching it. I couldn’t believe that I was experiencing historical discovery firsthand, and for such an important topic. The building was gutted inside, its frame and brick openly exposed. It felt adventurous to walk up the rickety stairs in anticipation of finding the architectural miracle—a couple of tiny fingerprints in the brick—creating an enduring human connection between the 21^st century and the 18^th-century hands who shaped the building’s history.

Not so far down the street was the original site of the school. Here, discoveries were also being made in archaeology. Our class crammed into the small yard of William & Mary’s Brown Hall (now Gates Hall), where square holes were dug into the dirt. Over the years since then, this dirt has continued to reveal secrets that had been buried for over 250 years, giving us insight into the real lives of the children who attended the school and others who lived on the site many years after.

The magnitude of the historical implications that the Bray School offers stuck with me, convincing me to join the Bray School Lab in early 2025. The Williamsburg Bray School Initiative is a fully-fledged partnership of discovery between William & Mary and Colonial Williamsburg, and is, at its heart, a community project. This project brings together architectural historians, archaeologists, Bray School descendants, academic and public historians, college students, K-12 teachers, and visitors, among many, many others. Here, history is literally made for everyone.

~

An interesting thought occurred to me a year ago: What percentage of the Black population was literate in the Early Republic and antebellum United States? The answer to this question would have many implications. Considering the importance of the printing press in early America, literacy gave individuals more agency of their own. Literacy enabled people to make sense of the world around them and to act accordingly. Especially during the Age of Revolution, new ideas of human rights were circulated across the Atlantic World through the written word. People involved in this literature-fueled discussion became part of the conversation of liberty, thus politicizing literacy and education. Politically, education is fundamental to securing and maintaining freedom. Literacy is one of these pathways to freedom, making it a key tool to resist slavery.

When I began volunteering, I was invited to work on the Lab’s new project to map the literacy of enslaved Virginians. I was fortunate that the task I was assigned would help to answer my question. However, I was surprised to learn that there had not been more research conducted on the topic of early African American literacy. Because literacy is a pathway to freedom, I expected it to be more researched. The Bray School gave me an opportunity to give attention to an important topic as well as conduct quantitative and qualitative research on a question I am curious about.

The Bray School Lab’s current research on literacy consists of sifting through collections that may have relevant information. The collections vary in type and format. Personally, I have read the WPA Virginia Slave Narratives and portions of the Virginia Gazette database. Currently, I am sorting through the 1869 book Education of the Negro: History of Schools for the Colored Populations. This source is particularly interesting because of its publication date soon after the ratification of the 13^th Amendment, as well as its length of nearly 300 pages. A lot of data can be found in this source, but I have been finding it helpful to cross-reference with more up-to-date scholarly sources to confirm literacy.

There are currently 175 student-generated entries concerning enslaved Virginians in the 18^th and 19^th century that the Lab is now vetting. Many reports of literacy come from runaway ads. Besides those ads, there are a fair number of self-reports made through collected oral histories and slave narratives. These reports have a common denominator: they are collected by white people. Knowing who is telling the story signals to us the historical limitations of our research. In this case, education differentiates literate black people in white perspectives since black education directly challenged white supremacy in early America due to the potential freedoms it offered.

The Bray School Lab’s current literacy mapping project is essential to understanding the degrees of freedom in Virginia. I am excited to see the results of the project so that we can better understand for whom and how liberty could be used in a time of extreme oppression.

Emily Muscolina ’28 is a William & Mary sophomore majoring in history. She has a concentration in Early American history with a goal to continue her studies in graduate school. Emily is currently involved in NIAHD’s public history program and is honing her research and teaching skills to share complex histories.

by Juanita Graham

Since I graduated from William  & Mary, a lot of information has been brought forth, via the college and Colonial Williamsburg, that pertains to the lives of persons of color. I appreciate the effort that has gone into expanding the general population’s knowledge about the often-overlooked people who worked and lived in the Williamsburg area.

As a person of color with a love for genealogy, I enjoy making connections between the past and the present, in order to bring enlightenment to the future. As a word artist, I also enjoy pulling words together to tell a story of those connections. After hearing Dr. Maureen Elgersman Lee present, “The Williamsburg Bray School and Its Scholars, 1760-1774,” on April 21,2025, my two joys of genealogy and writing collided. The result of the collision was a poem centered around the findings that were elaborated on during her engaging presentation. I entitled it, “My Musings of a Grown-up Bray School Scholar.”

The talk she gave stirred up a myriad of feelings, thoughts and questions for me, and as happens so often, my expression of all of those things came out in a poem.  It reflects my feelings, thoughts and questions … spoken as the potential musings of a grown-up Bray School Scholar.  In my imagination, I heard an adult Bray School Scholar speaking my thoughts. I heard my questions being asked and my feelings being expressed in the voice of a grown-up Hannah, George, Isaac Bee, Phoebe, Dolly, Edmund or Nancy. (These are just a few of the names of students that are recorded.)  I don’t know for certain if they would have wanted to know all of the same things because I recognize my thoughts and questions have the influence of me being a Gen X’er, but I’d like to believe that perhaps they shared at least one of my musings.

My Musings of a Grown-Up Bray School Scholar
Juanita Graham – April 25, 2025

How I was viewed I came to learn,
Was based on who was looking and why.
The varied perspectives of how I was seen,
Changed with the mind that was behind the eye.

Pupil …
Child …
Chattel …
Experiment … so some tended to think.

Investment …
Resilience …
A soul and an ancestor … 
With both a divine and genetic link.

As a pupil I was expected to learn,
Then to share what I knew.
But I was not expected to use my knowledge,
To elevate my station, or to expand my reasoning as I grew.

I was to study my letters
So, I could learn to read the prayers.
So that my soul could be saved, 
And I could gain freedom … once I climbed the heavenly stairs.

Now, I was told I would stay enslaved,
My freedom wouldn’t be on this side.
Hence, I wasn’t to get no ideas about breaking free,
Because they would surely have my hide.

For you see, I was also considered to be chattel ...
Isn’t that strange ... to be "a possession" with a soul?
A soul worth saving, that was in a body not worth freeing - 
Liberation wasn’t the goal.

Which made me wonder if teaching us about the Lord,
Was really about fulfilling a Christian obligation.
Or was it to indoctrinate and to foster dependency and gratitude,
Thus, intensifying the process of subjugation.
 
You know, I was also puzzled and would like to ask …
Why didn’t the spiritual messages apply to you too?
Because you definitely did unto me,
What I know you would not have allowed to be done unto you.

That's not to say the religious teaching
Didn't help in some valuable ways.
It helped give me strength to make it through. 
It also helped me keep calm - reminding me ... God repays.

Now, don’t get me wrong,
There were some kind and compassionate people involved,
Who didn’t see me as a school experiment … 
Or just as a return on investment issue to be resolved.
 
However, regardless of whether I was seen as a person … or not,
I rejected the contrived idea that my natural ordained condition was that of a slave.
I have always been a person with core-deep resiliency, 
Who will have a legacy that will live long after I am buried in my grave.

I don’t know them, 
But I know in the future there will be descendants connected to me,
Who will proudly embrace me for who I am, 
Even celebrating that I am a part of their rich and layered ancestry.

So, as far as the return of investment goes, 
By your criteria, I don't think it worked out so well for you.
But, by my standards of having my story live on,
It will be a future generation’s powerful blessing that will continue … and continue…and continue.
© Juanita Graham, 8/2025

Author Juanita Graham has a strong connection to the Williamsburg area.  She is an Associate Minister at the historic First Baptist Church in Williamsburg, an alumna of William & Mary, a member of the Advisory Board for the Let Freedom Ring Foundation, a board member of the Williamsburg Book Festival, and the Director of Outreach Service for a local service-based non-profit organization.

by Tyler Lewis

Throughout Summer 2025, I had the opportunity to work as an intern for the W&M Bray School Lab with Genealogist Elizabeth Drembus, as part of the Office of Strategic Cultural Partnerships’ Cultural Heritage Immersion Program (CHIP). I engaged in genealogical research for three Bray School students: Squire of the Philip Johnson household as well as Hannah and Sarah of the Robert Carter Nicholas (RCN) household. These research endeavors were truly like a roller coaster that took the story of the scholars and their enslaved communities far beyond Williamsburg. Moreover, I recorded the names of every enslaved individual in the Johnson and Nicholas households to grasp a better understanding of their enslaved communities.

Squire and the Philip Johnson Household

In 1765, Squire attended the Williamsburg Bray School, with Colonel Philip Johnson listed as his enslaver. Out of the three scholars that I researched, Squire had the most consistent paper trail. Legal documents and tax records placed him in the households of Philip Johnson and Sarah Johnson Lester (Johnson’s daughter) from the 1760s to 1792. While conducting this research, I wondered if there was something about Squire—either his skills, a connection to the Johnson family, or a high level of trust from the Johnsons—that made him seem worthy of receiving an education or remaining in the family.   This is of particular note, since Philip Johnson was heavily in debt from the 1760s up to his death in 1789. Johnson and his trustees regularly advertised auctions and hiring out of enslaved people in the Virginia Gazette newspapers. We can only imagine how Squire felt while constantly facing separation from his relatives and other members of his enslaved community. Johnson shuffled or sold his enslaved people throughout numerous Tidewater and Piedmont counties. Squire’s Bray School instruction in reading and spelling would have enabled him to read about the annual divisions and sales taking place within his community.

Hannah, Sarah, and the Robert Carter Nicholas Household

In 1762, Hannah attended the Williamsburg Bray School as a student (aged around 7 years old) from the Robert Carter Nicholas household. Unfortunately, Hannah was the most elusive of the three scholars, as the only other definitive supporting document is Nicholas’ 1765 letter to Reverend John Waring of the Bray Associates in London. In the letter, Nicholas complained that despite Hannah attending the Bray School for three years, she turned out to be a “sad jade” amidst his attempts to reform her. I interpreted the letter as Hannah’s education transforming her from a passive recipient to one who courageously developed her sense of self. Meanwhile, Nicholas lamented that he lost control of Hannah and how she defied the school’s purpose (in Nicholas’ perspective) of indoctrinating Black children to embrace their fate in bondage.

In 1769, Sarah attended the Bray School as another student from the Robert Carter Nicholas household. Bruton Parish Baptism records describe Sarah’s family unit, with Lucy as her mother and Caesar as her younger brother. Sarah’s story also reveals many complexities regarding slavery, in terms of her tasks and who exactly enslaved her. By the 1780s, Sarah and her family labored on Nicholas’ Westham Plantation in Henrico County. However, Nicholas’ 1780 will contained a clause that divided all enslaved people at Westham who worked in the house between his sons Lewis and Philip, while his estate would continue to enslave those in the fields. Henrico tax records only list Nicholas’ estate without Sarah, yet she appears in court records discussing the enslaved people from Westham who were partitioned to Nicholas’ sons. This discrepancy leads me to believe that Sarah conducted domestic tasks while Lucy and Caesar cultivated cash crops.

Researching Hannah and Sarah taught me the importance of persistence in genealogical research. I had to document the enslaved communities and land speculation efforts for RCN’s children that stretched across various counties throughout Virginia, Kentucky, and New York. Frequent discussions of weavers in factories (in Albemarle, Virginia, and Geneva, New York) made me think of sewing and embroidery taught at the Bray School. Furthermore, various legal and personal papers for Nicholas’ children listed multiple enslaved women named Hannah or Sarah, which further complicated this research.                    

 Reflection

I thoroughly enjoyed this summer internship because it perfectly encapsulated the Bray School Lab’s interdisciplinary nature in highlighting the students’ stories. It was also incredible to work within an extremely supportive environment alongside the Descendant Community, fellow CHIP co-workers, Bray School Lab supervisors, and other institutions. As an African-American man, it felt very gratifying to witness the passion of descendant communities in the Williamsburg area, Charlottesville, and throughout the country using genealogy to uplift our enslaved ancestors as heroes and agents in American history. In particular, engaging with the festivities on Descendants’ Day at James Monroe’s Highland revealed how institutional and descendant collaboration can highlight the importance of storytelling and humanize the experiences of the enslaved.

Tyler Lewis ‘26 is a William & Mary senior, studying history & anthropology. His previous genealogical experience includes researching enslaved communities for The Valentine Museum (Richmond, Virginia) and within his own family (with counties across Southside/Tidewater Virginia and the Carolinas). Tyler is continuing his research on Hannah, Sarah, and Squire this fall semester under the NIAHD Internship in Public History.
 

By Me’Sharlia Fountain

When I first walked into the W&M Bray School Lab, I believed I was entering a history mapping project. But by the end, I discovered I was entering an ongoing conversation, one that thousands of voices, past and present, were waiting for me to join.

June 5, 2025

Today, I walked the corners of history,
not just streets
but threads,
woven by hands I’ll never meet.

Nicole Brown
a voice bridging past and present
led me through more than a building,
through lives lived quietly
but never insignificantly.

The Bray School
not just brick and wood on Nassau and Francis,
but a heartbeat of names,
of Mary, of unnamed others,
of children whose laughter and labor
echo in silence.

I listened.
My thoughts loud,
my voice
small, hidden beneath curiosity and nerves.
Questions swirled,
but my lips held back.

She asked why I, a biology major
was drawn to this internship.
And I smiled,
my voice trembling into the light:
“Even as a pre-med student,
I want to research beyond the body.
I want to understand
how history cradles mental health,
especially in Black lives.”

We walked.
Time folded in on itself.
College courses,
moments of chance,
the sheer fact
that I’m here
all connected,
as if purpose followed me
without me knowing.

We stood in the kitchen
where enslaved children lived,
their names stitched into ledgers,
but not into the stories.
What did they feel?
Were they scared?
Did they dream?

Mrs. Brown said,
“You could walk these streets for 150 days
and still learn something new.”

Perseverance.
A word that sat heavy
but not bitter,
like truth that demands to be held.

Others spoke.
I stayed still.

But silence
though virtuous
isn’t always peace.

So finally, I asked:
“How do we preserve history
in its fullness,
when the voices we seek
were never written down?
And how do we protect today’s truth
for the ones yet to ask?"

She nodded.

Because sometimes,
the most radical question
is the one we were afraid to raise.

Mental health
Unwritten,
Unspoken,
Unhealed.

Even now,
I don’t have all the answers.
But I wonder
about the children of the Bray School,
about me,
about all of us
who carry history in our chests.

Today, I was silent,
then brave.
Curious,
then open.

And today
was amazing.
Intriguing.
Necessary.

Throughout this internship, I’ve realized how silence can be both a barrier and a doorway. Silence holds the weight of stories untold, of mental health struggles unspoken, of histories that linger in the gaps of archives and ledgers. Mental health isn’t a topic often discussed in historical research, especially concerning enslaved Black children, but is an archival marker.

One of the most impactful projects I worked on during my internship was a mapping project with Dr. Maureen Elgersman Lee. The goal was to collect and organize data documenting  the literacy of enslaved Virginians from 1619 to 1865. My task was to research historical accounts, educational efforts like the Bray schools, and any documented individuals or places where literacy was evident, and then compile that data into organized Excel sheets. Each name, each place I found felt like uncovering a small piece of a larger story that’s often overlooked. It made me realize that literacy wasn’t just a skill; it was an act of resistance, a quiet form of empowerment in a time when other enslaved people were actively denied access to education.

Juneteenth Day – June 19, 2025

One of the most unforgettable moments of my internship was attending the Bray School opening on Juneteenth. Being there to witness this historic building’s public unveiling on a day that symbolizes Black freedom and resilience was truly powerful. I felt an overwhelming sense of pride and excitement as I stood among community members, historians, descendants, and my fellow interns, all gathered to honor the lives of the Bray School children whose stories had been hidden for so long. The brief ceremony wasn’t just about opening a building—it was about reclaiming a narrative and giving voice to those who were once silenced. I felt connected to a larger movement of historical truth-telling and healing. Being able to witness that in person was a full-circle moment that I will carry with me forever.

July 3, 202

As I was doing archival work in Swem Library and writing reflection posts for Blackboard, everything started to feel aligned professionally, personally, and spiritually.

One assignment asked me to reflect on my personal and professional values. After discussing it with my Sharpe Advisor, she told me my values are a strong reflection of my character and that compliment really stuck with me. Some people say, “stand on business,” but I believe we need to stand on our values.

I also had a meaningful conversation with my mom that echoed this theme, reminding me again of who I am and what I stand for.

While reading in the archives on Wednesday, I came across a quote by Jonathan Boucher that stopped me in my tracks:

“I learned habits of virtue, and such principles of thinking and acting, as could alone have supported and carried me through the many severe trials to which I have since been exposed.”

This quote captured exactly how I’ve been feeling that my upbringing, my education, and my values have built the foundation I lean on when facing life’s trials. God continues to show me signs, and this moment was a reminder that I’m on the right path.

As my internship draws to a close, I carry with me more than just archival skills or historical knowledge. I carry conviction that research is meaningful when it confronts silence; that history is rich when community is centered; and is rooted in stories we strive to retrieve.

Me’Sharlia Fountain is a rising sophomore at William & Mary, studying biology on the pre-med track. She hopes to do research on the African American community and go on to attend medical school. 

by Terry L. Meyers

The tension, perhaps even ambivalence, always acknowledged in representing the Williamsburg Bray School is the tension between the liberating effect of education for the  scholars and the fact that they were being indoctrinated into a religion underpinning chattel slavery.  But what was slavery actually like, locally?

One of William & Mary’s Seven Wise Men–the seven professors who taught at the College after it reopened in 1888–John Lesslie Hall, lamented in 1907 that Northern historians neglected the “bright side” of slavery—free food, lodging, clothes, medicine, and short working hours. That was a view entertained by W&M students in 1854:

But slavery here in the 19^th century was cruel.

Eliza Baker, born into slavery in 1843 in Williamsburg, recalled the city’s flogging post with an iron cage nearby to hold the enslaved before and after trials. She recounted too the threat of being sold: “some [enslavers] treated ’em right tough, and some right good. They made you do what they wanted you to do, and if you didn’t do what they wanted you to, they put you in their pocket.” She explained, “That means the n—–  trader would get you.”  

She recalled the slave auctions: “from the block on the Court House Green. I have heard many a crying-out.”  The auctioneer (and the overseer of those W&M enslaved), Moses Harrell, “would cry them out. ‘Here they go!’ he would cry. Hardly any parents would stand by to see their children sold.” A slave found with a book could be whipped. If out after 9:00 p.m.: thirty-nine lashes.

Visiting Williamsburg at the end of the Civil War, abolitionist Laura S. Havilland told of the enslaved abused at Kingsmill and of families separated as members were sold south. And she recounted the story of a girl in Yorktown who was punished for going to a night meeting:

for so doing [she] was stripped naked and whipped in the presence of the other slaves, the master himself plying the lash. While she cried for mercy her master replied,

            “I’ll give you mercy.”

            “Good Lord do come and help me.”

            “Yes, I’ll help you” (and kept plying the lash).

            “Do, Lord, come now; if you ha’n’t time send Jesus.”

            “Yes, I’m your Jesus,” retorted the inhuman persecutor, and he continued to ply the lash until thirty strokes were well laid on.

And slavery in the 18^th century was cruel. 

Some accounts are precise but abstract. Robert Carter Nicholas said the enslaved near Williamsburg “are treated by too many of their Owners as so many Beasts of Burden.” Jefferson noted that “the whole commerce between master and slave is a perpetual exercise of the most boisterous passions, the most unremitting despotism on the one part, and degrading submissions on the other.”

Other accounts are more concrete. One by author and abolitionist Thomas Day, likely derived at least in part from the observations of Jefferson’s W&M mentor, William Small, is vivid: Black men and women forced “to labour naked in the sun to the music of whips  and chains,” robbed “of every thing which is now dear to your [whites’] indolence, or necessary to your pleasures,” goaded  “to every species of servile drudgery,” and punished for whites’ “amusement and caprice,” their youth exhausted “in servitude” and finally abandoned in “age to wretchedness and disease.”  

The slave market in Yorktown or Williamsburg is where the newly arrived “surviving wretches”  “are transferred to their conscientious masters—… brought  into the market, naked, weeping, and in chains; —how one man dares to examine his fellow creatures as he would do beasts, and bargain for their persons; —how all the most sacred duties, affections, and feelings of the human heart, are violated and insulted.”

Lawyer and judge St. George Tucker recalled an enslaver near Williamsburg who “always makes it a point of having, what is called, a smart Overseer, whose duty it is to keep them [the enslaved] tightly to their work. That is, the negroes are to be in the fields at the first dawn, of the day, and at their work, as soon as they can see to do any thing, in dark nights, when there is no moonshine; but, when the moon shines the latter part of the night, they must be at work before three O Clock, in summer, and before four in winter. And when the moon shines in the Evening, they are to continue at work until nine a-Clock, except in the Tobacco-season, when they are not dismissed until eleven.”

And when Tucker rose one summer dawn, “looking out of the window [he] saw a negroe woman whose appearance indicated that she was advanced in a state of pregnancy, walking tolerably fast towards the Corn field: she was presently met by her overseer, who gave her at least half a dozen severe stripes over the shoulders by way of quickening her pace.”

Philip Fithian records the viciousness at Nomini Hall about 1773; an overseer “said that whipping of any kind does them [the enslaved] no good, for they will laugh at your greatest Severity; But he told us he had invented two things, and by several experiments had proved their success.—For Sulleness, Obstinacy, or Idleness, says he, Take a Negro, strip him, tie him fast to a post; take then a sharp Curry-Comb, & curry him severely til he is well scrap’d; & call a Boy with some dry Hay, and make the Boy rub him down for several Minutes, then salt him, & unlose him. He will attend to his Business, (said the inhuman Infidel) afterwards!

—But savage Cruelty does not exceed His next diabolical Invention—To get a Secret from a Negro, says he, take the following Method—Lay upon your Floor a large thick plank, having a peg about eighteen Inches long, of hard wood, & very Sharp, on the upper end, fixed fast in the plank—then strip the Negro, tie the Cord to a staple in the Ceiling, so as that his foot may just rest on the sharpened Peg, then turn him briskly round, and you would laugh (said our informer) at the Dexterity of the Negro, while he was relieving his Feet on the sharpen’d Peg!”

Tension? Ambivalence?  Maybe so.

Terry L. Meyers retired from William & Mary as Chancellor Professor, Emeritus, of English after 46 years of teaching. His tenacious curiosity about the Williamsburg Bray School building set in motion events that led to the building’s ultimate rediscovery–and restoration.

by Burnell K. Irby

The house on T Street in Washington, D.C. was the center of family life for many years. Bought by my great-grandmother and her husband, it was a stopping place for family coming from New York and going to Virginia, and a destination for family coming to visit or needing a place to rest while traveling north.

In 1905 my great-grandmother came to Washington, D.C., from Virginia to live with her eldest sister. Their house was three blocks away from the one on T Street. My great-grandmother would live there until she was able to buy her own home.

The house on T Street was purchased about 1922. The woman who owned the house would not allow my great-grandmother to come inside. She had to view another house with a similar layout up the street. When she purchased the house, she paid $2000.00 for it. My great-grandmother put in hardwood flooring, French doors, and wallpaper.  She lived there until her passing in 1977.

Family members continue to live there.

My mother has told me many stories about growing up on T Street in Washington, D.C. In one story, she is walking to the Safeway with her mother. On the way, they would pass a former nightclub at the corner of 14th and T Streets. In those days, it was also a gathering spot for the locals. She was not allowed to walk that way alone.

One evening while walking past the club, her mother stopped and spoke with a blind man holding a cup and a cane. They talked for several minutes. When the conversation was over, they continued on their way to the grocery store. My mother was perplexed about who her mother would know on that corner and asked, “Who was that”? “That is your cousin from Williamsburg,” she was told. My mother could hardly believe that her mother had stopped to talk to anyone, and was even more astounded that he was a relative.

Making contact, keeping lines of communication open, and passing the family story on were characteristics of my grandmother. By the time they got home, my mother knew just whose child he was and who his people were.

I have been told that this was typical of my grandmother.  If she was not taking pictures, she was visiting not only her family, but my grandfather’s family also. She hosted family cookouts on the 4th of July during the summer in Virginia, providing us with  a wonderful picture of family and neighbors.

The house was a brick “row house” with four levels.  While they were growing up my mother says the children were rarely allowed in the living room; it was for holidays and company.  And don’t put your hands on the wall coming down the stairs.

It was from the house on T Street that my grandparents would organize their fight to get my deaf uncle educated in D.C. At the time, he was attending school in Philadelphia.

It would be from here that my great-grandmother would organize the family’s response to the family farm being taken in Magruder, Virginia.

The house in Grove was acquired in James City County in 1943, after the community was evicted from York County to build Camp Peary. It was a 2-bedroom bungalow, with a wood stove and no running water. Every generation of our family has spent summers in Grove staying in the house on Magruder Avenue.

It has enabled family living in Washington to stay connected to family in Williamsburg, to attend family functions from reunions, weddings, funerals and birthday celebrations.

I would hear those and other stories, not realizing the family history behind the stories she was passing on. As I grew older, those places, stories, pictures, and artifacts began to make sense. When a memory was triggered, my mother would share the how, when, and where of its place in family lore. I would say to her, “You need to write it down”—and her response was always, “I just told you.”

Objects I had grown up with and used in my great-grandmother’s houses in D.C. and the Grove area of Williamsburg began to reveal themselves to me. An example of family artifacts coming to life would be two chairs. The story is that they were purchased about 1900 by my great-great-grandparents to celebrate the marriage of one of their daughters.  They were always in the house in Grove. They are another example of household furniture moving from one household to another: they are now in DC.  At 125 years old, I have taken them to school to share with my students. I asked them, “What have these chairs seen?”

Make every effort to support your family’s story with documents and dates. Then put them on a timeline with major events in United States history. What you will begin to see is how your family responded during these national events.

Where was your family during the Civil War? During World War I, the Great Depression, World War II? How did they fair during the Civil Rights Movement?

It gives a broader context and meaning to your family’s journey.

Be patient, this will take time. Some leads will prove to be false; double check names. Names will also be repeated. You will have to visit libraries, historical societies, and museums.

Start with one notebook. There will be more.

A Descendant Community member, Burnell K. Irby is a Howard University graduate, and an educator in Washington, D.C., and Maryland. As a youth, he spent his summers in Williamsburg at his great-grandmother’s house in Grove.

By Nicole Brown

A central part of my career in the last four academic years was my role as Graduate Assistant for the William & Mary Bray School Lab. I have worked on a variety of student-driven digital projects, overseen the review of Williamsburg and Fredericksburg Bray School transcriptions, assisted with general research, and collaborated on descendant engagement. Most often, I served as both a mentor and guide for undergraduates conducting primary-source research associated with the Williamsburg Bray School, the Associates of Dr. Bray, or eighteenth-century Black education in the British Empire. As I move into the next stage of my doctoral studies within the American Studies graduate program at William & Mary, I must transition away from the Bray School Lab and onto other new and exciting projects.

There is something truly special about working on new scholarship with students, descendants, and scholars alike. The collaborations generated via William & Mary’s Office of Strategic Cultural Partnerships are exceptional in the academic world. One such example includes The Williamsburg Bray School: A History Through Records, Reflections, and Rediscovery (The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, 2024), the book I had the privilege to co-edit alongside Bray School Lab Director Maureen Elgersman Lee. Despite my heartache at leaving my position, there is also much to be thankful for. Chief among those thanks includes the lessons I learned from collaborating and counseling undergraduate students, as well as learning from the many descendants who have shared their knowledge, passion, and insight.  

Learning from the Ancestors and the Elders

“Remember the ancestors” is an adage I hear often repeated by the men and women far wiser than me. The descendants of Bray School students and those whose families (enslaved and free) lived and labored in Williamsburg from the seventeenth century onward always remind me to carry this phrase with me, wherever I go. Collaborating with descendants has taught me that shared authority is not only important, but essential to understanding our past. When museums, universities, and other similar institutions value their own thoughts and ideas about history over the ones shared by descendants, massive swaths of our history are lost – or outright ignored.

Over the years, I have learned that remembering ancestors is not just saying an individual’s name – you must also share how these individuals shaped the world we live in today. Share this knowledge loudly and often, even in spaces where people might prefer you to be silent. I am forever grateful to the many descendants who have taught me that I am part of the collective to remember their ancestors. Their willingness to teach me has foundationally shaped both my PhD dissertation and my life.

Learning from the Next Generation

 One of the best things about working with undergraduates is their unique way of looking at history—especially eighteenth-century history. Early American history often feels static and removed from lived experience. When an event – such as the closing of the Williamsburg Bray School – occurred more than 250 years ago, it can feel impersonal to your daily life. However, undergraduates often have the most innovative perspectives on studying the past because they are willing to grow and learn while studying it, rather than assuming they know everything there is to be derived from eighteenth-century documents, narratives, and events.

One student’s detailed analysis of the 1762 Bray School regulations made me consider this source in new ways. The absence and presence of students in this record became apparent to me through her. Another undergraduate’s ability to consider how hand sewing skills might have influenced the experiences of young Black girls at the Williamsburg Bray School has fundamentally changed the way I write about them. Thanks to her, I take every opportunity to mention what kinds of sewing skills may have been taught at the Bray School. A more recent W&M student shared her unique perspective on walking through a city that has a multilayered past and present. Her ideas reshaped how I conceptualize children walking through eighteenth-century Williamsburg. I cannot walk by the Bray School building without thinking about this student and the quiet wisdom she carries with her on topics such as religion, memory, and history.

What Have I Learned?

Each student I have had the pleasure of studying with in the last four years has taught me valuable lessons. While I have mentored students on how to read eighteenth-century handwriting, contextualize colonial newspapers, or explore the microhistories of Virginia’s colonial capital, they have also taught me how to think anew about the past. To each one of these students, I say: thank you. I am humbled by working with you and working alongside you. If you are any indication of how the next generation of historians will study the past, we are all in excellent company.

Similarly, the descendants who have sat me down to discuss family history, challenge my conception of the America’s founding, or reiterate that I should keep pursuing my research, have reminded me that my passion to study the Williamsburg Bray School is a lifelong journey that cannot be confined by any title or position I may hold. To them I say: thank you. I have learned what resilience truly means from your guidance and love. I promise to honor you, and your ancestors, in my next steps.

The hundreds of hours I have spent working with these teachers, young and old, give me hope for the future. They also remind me that there is always something to be learned from anyone you meet. While ancestors and elders often hold keys to wisdom, so, too, does the next generation. I am excited to hand them the keys; they will unlock doors that neither I nor my contemporaries even thought to open.

Nicole Brown is a PhD candidate in the American Studies Program at William & Mary and a renowned scholar of the history of the Associates of Dr. Bray and of Bray schools in North America. She has served as the William & Mary Bray School Lab Graduate Assistant since the Lab was launched in 2021.