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The Spaulding Clan
The Spaulding Descendants are a large and proud family
with roots in eastern North Carolina. We have traced our ancestry
back to Benjamin Spaulding, a black man born in 1773 in Duplin Country,
NC. While Spaulding was officially freed by Samuel Swindell in 1825,
substantial evidence exists that Ben was considered to be a “free
man of color” well before 1825. He married Edith Delphi Jacobs,
an Indian woman born in 1786, around the turn of the century. Edith
and Ben, identified as mulattos, were permitted to own property,
to operate businesses, to register and vote and to associate with
the white race prior to the Civil War. An astute businessman, Ben
Spaulding farmed and distilled turpentine on land that he owned
in Columbus and Bladen Counties as early as 1817.
Edith and Ben were the parents of nine boys and one
girl. Their sons married women of the local community and their
daughter, Ann Eliza, married a member of the Moore Family. These
ten children gave birth to 83 grandchildren. The grandchildren married
their cousins whenever possible. This practice ensured that the
considerable land holdings of the Spaulding family would remain
in the family. When there were no cousins to marry, the Spaulding
grandchildren married outside the family, marrying men and women
with the last names of Mitchell, Freeman, Jacobs, Webb, Blanks,
Campbell, Graham, Shaw, Newell, Young, Moore, White, and Smith.
Although the Spaulding family originally attended the white community
church, as their clan increased in numbers, the white church encouraged
Benjamin and his family to organize their own church and school.
In 1850, the Spaulding clan built a log church later named Rehobeth
AME Zion Church on two acres of land donated by Henry Spaulding,
one of Benjamin Spaulding’s sons. The log church served as
both the site of year-round church services and the school during
the winter months. The original pastor and teacher of the Farmer’s
Union Community School was a Mr. Jim Vauses, an Englishman who organized
the community in the manner of the Farmer’s Union in England.
During the Reconstruction period the substantial holdings
of the Spaulding descendants were consolidated and expanded. They
were assisted in their quest for land and security by whites who
either helped them in the acquisition of property and position or
who practiced benign neglect because it served the purposes of segregation
to use the descendants of free blacks as a buffer against the descendants
of slaves. However, the Spaulding descendants, through a strong
work ethic and an innate intelligence, survived and thrived. Education
was valued by the Spaulding descendants and several of the brightest
boys and girls, such as Josephine Spaulding Freeman and her brother
Lloyd Spaulding, were sent to schools out of the area so that they
might return to teach their younger relatives.
The fourth and subsequent generations grew tremendously
and settled in areas across the country. Benjamin and Edith Spaulding’s
descendants have achieved acclaim in all walks of life. Spaulding
descendants were driving forces in the founding and success of the
North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance Company, the largest black-owned
insurance company in the United States. They have become renowned
educators, skilled professionals, acclaimed performers, talented
business men and women, and successful farmers.
Most importantly, the Spaulding descendants have retained
our sense of pride and community. We are quick to support one another
as cousins and friends in all our endeavors. Just as our ancestors
recognized, we also understand the importance that family unity
holds in all our lives. We know that the successes that we have
achieved individually and as a family can be attributed in part
to the values that were modeled for us by Benjamin and Edith Spaulding.
The Spaulding descendants are a strong and proud family determined
to preserve our heritage for future generations. Prepared by Cousin,
Sylvia Sloan Black, Ph.D.
Reference: A Story of the Descendants of Benjamin
Spaulding (1773-1862) by Louis D. Mitchell, Ph.D. and John A. Spaulding,
1989.
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