The Local Source for News and Information Since 1980
It’s a common phenomenon that once you become a mom, your identity ceases to be yours alone. Don’t get me wrong, I take pride in getting called “Sailor’s mom” rather than my actual name. But it’s caused me to devote a lot of time to considering the hidden contributions of mothers to our society. Think of any historical figures you can conjure up easily in your brain. Do you know who raised them? Even if you do, do you know anything past their name?
This Mother’s Day, I think it’s time we give a little more attention and autonomy back to the moms who reared two of Caroline County’s most nationally famous men: Revolutionary War Colonel William Richardson, and tireless abolitionist William Still. The life stories of these women also give a glimpse into the very different realities of well-off white mothers and enslaved African American ones.
Ann (Webb) Richardson: Mother of Col. William Richardson
As you may imagine, not much is documented about the mother of the famous advocate for Caroline County’s creation and, later, Revolutionary War Colonel, William Richardson. But there are also some not-quite-accurate facts about her that come up in a quick Google search, so let’s set the record straight.
Ann Webb was born on April 24th, 1709 in Talbot County, Maryland. Her birth appears in the recordkeeping book of St. Peter’s Parish – it even notes that she was born around eight o’clock in the morning. Her parents were Peter and Sarah Stevens Webb, who married on July 6th, 1704 at “a Quaker Meeting House called Choptank.” The Webbs were a prominent Talbot County Quaker family who attended service at the Third Haven Meeting House, which opened in 1684 and still stands on Washington Street in Easton. Both Ann’s mother Sarah and her oldest sister Sarah were extremely active members, as documented by a surviving Record Book of Women from Third Haven – sometimes Ann’s mother even hosted the women’s quarterly meetings in their home. W’ll get back to this book later.
Ann was the third daughter in a row for the Webbs, born after her sisters Sarah in 1705 and Mary in 1706. Her brothers, Peter and Joseph, were born in 1711 and 1715, respectively. Some crowd-sourced information claims she had more siblings, but these are the only ones listed in the Parish registry. Granted, this record was done all at once at an unknown date, so they may have chosen to only include children who survived to adulthood, which all of her aforementioned siblings did.
Ann Webb married William Richardson Sr. in 1731. Her husband’s family was from West River in Anne Arundel County, so he was part of the first generation of Richardsons to be born on the Eastern Shore. The Webbs, however, had deep, longstanding roots in Talbot County. Remember that Record Book of Women from the Third Haven women’s meetings? It lists Ann and William as making their first declaration of intent to marry on February 29th, 1731 (not going to go down the leap year rabbit hole here, that’s just the date the women recorded). As was custom, the women assigned two Friends, in this case Rebecca and Susannah Dickerson, to essentially investigate the bride’s readiness to marry. The couple had to declare intent again at a subsequent meeting where the women would give a report on whether or not the marriage should occur based on their findings. Ann and William made their second declaration on March 27, 1731, where they also got the green light to marry.
By 1733, Ann and William were living on Bay Hundred (at the time, ‘hundred’ was used as a geographical area term, similar to a town, district, or zip code) in Talbot County. The Bay Hundred stretched from about Claiborne to Tilghman Island. It was here that Ann bore several children. The most famous of which turned out to be Colonel William Richardson. As a Quaker, Ann would have been at least outwardly against the institution of slavery, but that didn’t keep her son from eventually amassing at least 50 enslaved peoples.
I wish there were more surviving documents that gave us insight into her life in a less fact-based way, however I think it’s safe to assume Ann was a devoted mom, especially considering William named his daughter Anne Webb Richardson after her. This granddaughter went on to marry William Potter of the still-standing Potter Hall in Williston, and they also named one of their daughters Ann Webb.
Ann’s death is somewhat mysterious. Unconfirmed information suggests she died in South Carolina sometime before 1770.
Sidney Still: Mother of William Still
The story of Sidney Still is much the opposite of Mrs. Richardson’s. It reads a little more like a narrative, but, unfortunately, very few records with specific dates detailing the lives of enslaved people exist. While not necessarily happy, her story does have a bittersweet ending.
Sidney was enslaved by Caroline County planter Saunders Griffin. She married Levin Steel (the surname Still comes into play later), who was also enslaved. Sometime between 1801 and 1807, Levin was able to take advantage of a practice that some more lenient slaveholders allowed, in which the enslaved person could work and earn money in their limited free time to eventually “purchase” their own freedom. By then he and Sidney already had four children: two boys, Peter and Levin Jr., and two girls, Kitturah and Mahalah. The law at the time was that children inherited their free or enslaved status from their mother (going against centuries of patriarchal precedent) so the children remained enslaved along with Sidney.
Sidney acknowledged that Levin would never be able to afford to purchase her freedom or that of their children. So, as many slave mothers did, she resorted to escape. She devised a plan for her and the children to flee, meet up with Levin in New Jersey - a free state - and start anew. The first time Sidney gathered all four children and left, they were hunted down and returned to Caroline County. Later, Sidney made what must have been a heartwrenching decision: she tucked the two boys in bed, grabbed only her daughters, and disappeared without a trace. She did this not because of any lost love for her sons, but because she understood that they were promising young men, valuable commodities whom their enslaver would stop at nothing to retrieve. She also would have had firsthand experience of the treatment of slavewomen by Griffin, his male family members, and other men who may have worked on their farm.
Once settled in Burlington County, New Jersey, the Steels changed their name to Still. Sidney then also changed her first name to Charity to avoid being caught, as she could still easily be sent back to Maryland even though she was living in a free state. The couple had 18 children total, the youngest of those being the now famed Father of the Underground, William Still.
I promised you a less depressing ending to the story, so here it is: William wrote of how often Sidney talked about having to leave those boys behind, how she kissed their heads, “consigned them to God”, and left, but never forgot. In August 1850, Peter bought his freedom and coincidentally found himself in the care of William, who reunited him with their mother after over 40 years.
Sidney died when she was about 82 years old in 1857, less than a decade before slavery was abolished – a cause her son helped lead.
