1. Read.
Committee of Freedmen on Edisto Island, South Carolina, to the Freedmen’s Bureau Commissioner; the Commissioner’s Reply; and the Committee to the President
http://www.freedmen.umd.edu/Edisto%20petitions.htm
Links to an external site.
Students are often troubled by the fact that this letter does not use the standard punctuation and spelling we use today. Be ready for this! There was no system of national public education in the 1860s, which means that normal people wouldn’t have necessarily learned a single system of grammar.
A little historical context: “Freedmen” refers to men and women who had been slaves and were freed as a result of the Civil War.A note on language: “negro” is an old term that people used to use to refer to African Americans. Because this document was written in the past, it uses that term. It is not a term that is used anymore, so you should only use the word when you’re quoting directly from the document.
2. Post. Write ~200 words, and use specific examples from the document.If your last name begins G-P, answer: When? Where?
Look for clues in the document to get a place and a date that it was written, as well as the events being described.
Look in the textbook chapter to find information that might give us context for what’s going on in the letter. What else is happening at the same time? What stories, events, laws, etc. might it be helpful to know about?
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