When Alexander Majors died in 1900, newspapers across the country hailed his success and fame. The Kansas City Times called him “almost synonymous with that of pioneer civilization.” The Salt Lake Tribune called him “the transportation John the Baptist” and “a brave, strong, far-sighted man.”
What the newspapers, and history, ignored, however, was that Majors was not an entirely self-made man. His early success relied on the ability to exploit forced labor from enslaved people. Majors enslaved at least twenty-two people between 1850 and 1860. These men, women, and children served his family, cleaned his house, raised his children, worked in his gardens and fields, took care of oxen and mules, blacksmithed, and performed backbreaking labor on his properties in Westport, Missouri and Nebraska City, Nebraska Territory.
For too long, these men, women, and children’s names have been lost to history. Deemed too unimportant to record, their stories were lost. But Wornall/Majors House Museums is pleased to announce that, for the first time since the Alexander Majors House opened in 1984, some of these individuals’ names have been discovered: Amos, Henry, John, John, Little John, Charles, Thomas, Sarah, and Milly. This new information is an important step in acknowledging and reckoning with the history of slavery as it relates to Alexander Majors, his family, and the Majors House.
Majors’ Early Life
Alexander Majors was born in Franklin County, Kentucky in 1814, an area of the country where enslavement was common, although it does not seem like his family owned slaves in the state. (In 1860, 20% of the population of Franklin County was enslaved.) The Majors family came to Missouri in 1819, when Majors was five years old, and settled near Independence. Their journey was not unusual. Wealthy planters from Kentucky and Tennessee, attracted by the fertile lands of Missouri, settled in the state in large numbers throughout the early nineteenth century, bringing the culture of small-scale slaveholding with them.
Freighting on the Frontier
By 1850, Majors’ father Benjamin owned five people in Taney County, Missouri and Alexander owned seven in Jackson County, Missouri: two adult men, four teenage boys, and one adult woman. Majors had begun freighting on the Santa Fe Trail in 1848 and most likely turned to slave labor to perform the dangerous work of loading wagons, shoeing oxen and mules, and caring for livestock.
His company grew so large that in 1855 he partnered with William Hepburn Russell and William Bradford Waddell to form the shipping company Russell, Majors & Waddell. The men signed a contract with the United States government, giving them a virtual monopoly on the transportation of government supplies west of the Mississippi River. Majors’ business partners were proponents of slavery. In 1850, Russell enslaved ten people, and Waddell twelve.
By 1854, the turbulent period known as “Bleeding Kansas” had begun, a series of violent confrontations, mostly in Kansas Territory, over the legality of slavery in the proposed state of Kansas. Russell, Majors & Waddell had major interests in enslavement in the territory. They had many warehouses and shops set up in Leavenworth, some of which utilized the forced labor of enslaved men. In early 1856, Russell, incensed by the opinions of some of his employees, fired his workers in Leavenworth that he thought were “Free State men,” utilizing slave labor for the work instead, including for skilled jobs like blacksmithing and carpentry. By the end of 1856, Russell was an active member of the pro-slavery Law and Order Party in Kansas Territory, fundraising for the support of settlers who could “command the labor of two or more slaves.”
Majors was somewhat removed from the agitation, focused on building the Majors House in Kansas City, Missouri and managing the business from that location. In early 1858, a bill of sale shows that Majors purchased a 37-year-old man named Harry. Three months later, he had moved his center of operations to Nebraska City, Nebraska Territory, taking at least six enslaved people with him and probably leaving more behind with his son-in-law Samuel Poteet and Samuel’s father William. Majors used his stature as a well-known wealthy businessman to move enslaved people into and out of Nebraska Territory – despite the very uncertain legality of slavery in the territory at the time. The Nebraska City News described Majors at this time as a “genuine dyed in the wool border ruffian.” While the article was written in a sarcastic tone, there was certainly truth behind the statement.
A Daring Escape
June of 1860 was pleasant for the white settlers of Nebraska City. The weather was clear and warm throughout the day and the evenings were cool. Farmers were harvesting their crops of winter wheat and tending to their oats, corn, and potatoes that were enjoying a strong season. While the long, nice days were ideal for most of Nebraska City’s residents, it was not ideal weather for an escape. Longer daylight hours meant less time to travel under the cover of darkness and easier passage for slave hunters.
Still, on June 28, 1860, four women and two boys escaped from the Majors home in Nebraska City, most likely fleeing across the Missouri River to Iowa. According to one report, they used the excuse of missing cows as a ruse to facilitate their escape.
Their escape was an incredible act of bravery – one of the women in the party was disabled and two children were with them, which would have slowed their escape. And less than two years earlier, two enslaved women had escaped from prominent Nebraska City resident Stephen Nuckolls, causing violent reprisals against the white and free Black residents of Iowa suspected of helping them.
The pro-slavery Nebraska City News reported on the escape saying that the runaways “came to the sage conclusion that they preferred nakedness and starvation in Canada to rice puddings and jell cakes, and slap jacks in the comfortable and luxurious mansion of our worthy citizen and townsman Alexander Majors,” claiming they were “held nominally as servants.” The fact that Majors offered a $1,000 reward for their capture and return speaks otherwise.
The Nebraska City News blamed their escape on the “nasty Abolitionists of Civil Bend and Tabor.” It is likely the women and boys did receive assistance from Iowans across the river. According to W.M. Brooks, president of Tabor College, “the entire population was in sympathy with the escaped fugitives…there was scarcely a man in the community who was not ready to do anything that was needed to help fugitives on their way to Canada.” It does seem likely they headed to Canada, as a second abolitionist described the route of freedom seekers through Iowa as going to “Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, and…freedom in Queen Victoria’s land.”
Majors Bankruptcy
In the same year, Russell, Majors & Waddell went bankrupt, largely due to the failure of the Pony Express and a funding scandal that implicated Russell and a clerk at the Department of the Interior. To protect some of his property, Majors entered into a deed of trust with Alexander Street – Street held his property in trust until Majors could pay off his debts.
Listed among thousands of acres of land were the names of nine people enslaved by Majors:
Amos, age 45
Henry, age 45
Sarah, age 32
Charles, age 30
John, age 25
John, age 21
Thomas, age 21
Little John, age 18
Milly, age 12
We have no way of knowing what happened to these nine people, or even whether Majors ever regained ownership over them.
The 1860 federal census indicates that there were an additional seven people – six men and one woman – who were owned by Majors but were being held in Jackson County, Missouri by William Poteet. Two were marked as fugitives.
Conclusions
Taking all the evidence into consideration, it is probable that Majors enslaved a minimum of 22 people between 1850 and 1860 – likely more. He would have commanded the labor of additional people enslaved by his business partners and family members. His company, Russell, Majors & Waddell almost certainly “hired” many enslaved men – with wages going to the enslaver, not the men doing the work. Research about the lives of those who were enslaved is centered around the people who enslaved them; their own personal stories are often lost.
That is why Wornall/Majors House Museums believes that naming those enslaved whenever possible is of utmost importance: Amos, Henry, Sarah, Charles, John, John, Thomas, Little John, Milly, and all those that still go unnamed.
References
Nebraska City News 30 June 1860: 2.
“Alexander Majors.” The Daily Tribune (Salt Lake City) 17 January 1900.
“An Aged Scout Dead.” The Anaconda Standard 4 February 1900.
“Border Ruffians.” Nebraska City News 26 June 1858.
Franklin County (KY) Enslaved, Free Blacks, and Free Mulattos, 1850-1870. <https://nkaa.uky.edu/nkaa/items/show/2342>.
“From Nebraska.” The Press and Tribune (Chicago) 5 September 1860.
“Ho for Freedom!”. Tri-Weekly Nebraska Republican 11 July 1860.
Jackson County Recorder of Deeds. “Deed of Trust Alexander Majors to Alexander Street.” 17 October 1860.
“Rescue of a Ruffian Prisoner.” New York Daily Tribune 1 January 1856.
Siebert, Wilbur. The Underground Railroad: From Slavery to Freedom. The MacMillan Company, 1898. https://archive.org/details/DKC0090/DKC_0090.
“The Voice of Kansas, Let the South Respond.” True Democrat 19 August 1856.
“To the People of the South.” Columbia Herald-Statesman 7 November 1856.
Todd, John. Early settlement and growth of western Iowa; or Reminiscences. Des Moines: The Historical Department of Iowa, 1906. https://archive.org/details/earlysettlementg00todd/earlysettlementg00todd.
U.S. Census Bureau. “Slave Schedule.” 1850.
U.S. Census Bureau. “Slave Schedule.” 1860.