8 Abolitionist William Still’s The Underground Rail Road detailed the lives and experiences of African Americans who made the journey from slavery to freedom. There is little surviving documentation that tells us about the household staff, but there are bits and pieces of evidence suggesting that there were both free and enslaved African Americans working at the Tyler White House. He took a new oath of office with the members of Harrison’s Cabinet present, and three days later issued an inaugural address to the American people:įor the first time in our history the person elected to the Vice-Presidency of the United States, by the happening of a contingency provided for in the Constitution, has had devolved upon him the Presidential office…My earnest prayer shall be constantly addressed to the all-wise and all-powerful Being who made me, and by whose dispensation I am called to the high office of President of this Confederacy, understandingly to carry out the principles of that Constitution which I have sworn "to protect, preserve, and defend." 7Ībout a week after Harrison’s funeral, President Tyler and his family moved into the Executive Mansion. Tyler set out for Washington, D.C., and quickly asserted himself as the new President of the United States. Click here to learn more about the enslaved households of President Martin Van Buren.įletcher Webster, the son of Secretary of State Daniel Webster, delivered the shocking news to Vice President John Tyler at his home in Williamsburg, Virginia. “Tippecanoe and Tyler Too” became the oft-repeated slogan of their supporters, but this relationship changed dramatically after the unexpected death of President Harrison on April 4, 1841. This tactic, along with the campaign’s efforts to villainize President Martin Van Buren for the country’s economic woes while casting Harrison as a military hero and commoner, delivered a decisive electoral victory for the Whig Party. Tyler, a Virginian slave owner and lifelong Democrat, was strategically added to the ticket to entice southerners to vote for Harrison. In 1839, the Whig Party nominated William Henry Harrison for president. After he finished serving in the United States Senate, Tyler returned to practicing law and later ran for a seat in the Virginia House of Delegates. While he considered himself a Democrat, he sometimes opposed President Andrew Jackson’s policies-specifically whenever the president opted to use executive power at the expense of the states. 6ĭuring the 1820s and 1830s, Tyler held a series of prominent political positions at both the state and national level. These enslaved children helped their mothers and fathers with their various tasks, but some likely became young caretakers for the Tyler children. The enslaved community had grown as well-twenty-nine individuals, more than half of which were under the age of ten, were counted at the Tyler property. 5 Ten years later, the Tyler household had grown exponentially from three to seven children, ranging in age from fifteen-year-old Mary to newborn Tazewell. 4 According to the 1820 census, there were twenty-four enslaved people living at Woodburn with the Tylers. 3 That same year, John purchased a tract of land in Charles City County and built his own plantation, Woodburn, shortly thereafter. After Judge Tyler died in 1813, he left Greenway and thirteen enslaved individuals to his son John. He then prepared for a career in law, studying with his father and Edmund Randolph, former United States Attorney General. Like his father, John attended the College of William and Mary, graduating in 1807. 2 These enslaved men, women, and children were the people maintaining the property, farming the land, and providing the means for the growing Tyler family. Judge Tyler was also a prominent slave owner-by 1810, there were twenty-six enslaved individuals living at Greenway plantation. 1 His father, John Tyler Sr., served as a representative in the Virginia House of Delegates, governor of Virginia, and eventually judge of the United States District Court for the District of Virginia. He was raised on the Tyler family plantation, Greenway, and primarily lived there until his marriage to Letitia Christian in 1813. Born to an affluent family in 1790, John Tyler spent most of his life in Charles City County, Virginia.
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