Savannah Black History Tours
Laurel Grove South is as much about the people as it is a place. More than the history of the cemetery itself, you can take a peek into the lives of doctors, veterans, civil right leaders, pastors, educators, community organizers, and many more people from Savannah’s past buried there.
Laurel Grove Cemetery South - Walking Tour
Westley Wallace Law
W W Law was Born on January 1, 1923. He was an American civil rights leader from Savannah, Georgia. He was president of the Savannah chapter of the NAACP and made great strides in desegregation through nonviolent resistance from 1950 to 1976, serving as a leader in the Savannah Protest Movement.
He spent much of the rest of his life advocating for African American history and culture in Savannah. He established the Savannah-Yamacraw Branch of the Association for the Study of Afro-American Life and History, the Ralph Mark Gilbert Civil Rights Museum, the King-Tisdell Cottage Museum, the Beach Institute of African American Culture, and the Negro Heritage Trail Tour.
W. W. Law was the only son and eldest of ten children born to Geneva Wallace and Westley Law. He began working at the age of ten to help his sick mother while attending school. In high school, Law entered the NAACP Youth Council and later served as the council's president while in college at Georgia State College (now Savannah State University). His college career was interrupted when he was drafted into military service in World War II. W. W. Law got back from the war and, with the help of the GI Bill, got back into college where he earned a bachelor's degree in biology.
After graduation Law worked as a mail carrier for the U.S. Postal Service for more than 40 years. His job at the Postal Service was endangered, however, when he was fired for his civil rights activism. President John F. Kennedy and the NAACP stepped in upon hearing of Law's firing and Law was reinstated in his job. Law retired from the Postal Service in 1990. He died on July 29, 2002, at his house in Savannah, Georgia.
The Whipping Tree
Before it became Laurel Grove Cemetery, it was the former Springfield Plantation. While many years have passed since this land was used as a rice plantation, there are still signs that tell the story of slavery and the horrific treatment of African Americans. Proof of this horrible treatment exists to this day,in the form of two large Oak Trees that still stand tall. These trees where known as Whipping Trees. If you look closely, you can still see gashes in the bark from where the whip hit the tree while punishing slaves at this sight.
Slaves were publicly punished by whipping during the eighteenth century in order to teach the accused or guilty slave a lesson, as well as to set an example for the other slaves on the plantation.
The whip that was used to do such damage to the slaves was called a “cat-of-nine tails”. It was a whip that was woven and flowed into nine separate pieces. Each piece had a knot in the middle, and broken glass, and nails at the very end. This whip was once used by the Romans on their slaves, and it was what the white masters used on their slave years later. This was a cruel and savage way of punishing people. It gives thought to the ironic way of how white slave masters saw the slaves as savages, and yet dispensed such ‘savage’ punishment to the slaves by whipping them unmercifully, even while allowing others to watch.
Andrew Bryan
Andrew Bryan was born at Goose Creek, S.C. about 1716.
He came to Savannah as a slave and here he was baptized by the Negro missionary, the Reverend George Leile, in 1781. Leile evacuated with the British in 1782 at the close of the American Revolution and Bryan took up his work. He preached at Yamacraw and Brampton Plantation. On January 20, 1788, the Reverend Abraham Marshall (White) and the Reverend Jessie Peter (Colored) ordained Andrew Bryan and certified the congregation at a Brampton barn as the Ethiopian Church of Jesus Christ.
The Reverend Bryan moved from place to place with his congregation and was even imprisoned and whipped for preaching during a time when whites feared any slave gathering as a focus for rebellion. He persevered and finally bought his and his family's freedom and purchased this lot for his Church.
He founded Bryan Street African Baptist Church, affectionately called the Mother Church of Black Baptists, and First African Baptist Church of Savannah in Savannah, Georgia, the first black Baptist churches to be established in America.
Andrew Cox Marshall
Born in South Carolina around 1755 to an enslaved woman and an English overseer, Marshall wound up in Savannah as a result of two failed manumission promises and ownership by five prominent slaveholders, including John Houstoun, the governor of Georgia in 1778 and 1784, and Joseph Clay, a businessman and judge. Accounts of Marshall’s life indicate he participated in activities that supported the United States in the American Revolution and War of 1812. He purportedly received pay for his work in both wars and had the opportunity to meet General George Washington. Marshall later served as President Washington’s personal servant on his visit to Savannah in 1791. Richard Richardson purchased Marshall in 1812, and Marshall purchased his freedom at some point soon thereafter with funds lent to him by Richardson, who was a merchant, banker, slave trader, and the first owner of the Owens-Thomas House. Richardson became Marshall’s first guardian, which the law required of free blacks. Marshall’s wife, Rachel, and their three daughters—Rose, Amy, and Peggy—had previously gained their freedom through the efforts of Marshall’s uncle, Andrew Bryan, the popular and influential pastor of the First African Baptist Church, as well as Richardson and other white elites in the community. As a free man, Marshall established a home with his family in Yamacraw on Savannah’s west side. He set up a successful drayage (hauling) business that allowed him to accumulate sizeable wealth. In 1824, the tax assessment of his real estate was valued at $8,400, and his will indicates that he had acquired shares in a state bank.
In
addition to family, home, and business, Marshall focused his attentions on building up the congregations of black Baptists in Savannah. In 1815, at about the age of sixty, Marshall took over as pastor of the First African Baptist Church. He served in that position twice for a total of more than thirty years. During his leadership, Marshall baptized nearly 3,800 people, converted 4,000, married 2,000.
Andrew Cox Marshall was Savannah’s most important African American in the pre-Civil War period. Born into slavery in the mid-eighteenth century, Marshall acquired his freedom and went on to become a successful businessman and an influential religious leader with far-reaching ties throughout Savannah’s diverse free and enslaved African American community; he was also well known among Savannah’s white elite.
James Simms
James M. Simms was born into slavery in Savannah, Georgia in 1823. Simms was a carpenter by trade, and using money he earned from additional work, he was able to buy his freedom in 1857 for $740.
Simms was baptized into the First African Baptist Church of Savannah in 1841. Shortly after he was baptized, he was expelled from the church for lack of humility. He did not return to the church until 1858.
In 1864, Simms moved to Boston, MA, where he was ordained a minister (his ordination was not recognized by the Baptist church in Georgia). In 1865, Simms returned home to Georgia, where he worked for the Freedmen's Bureau and was a Union League organizer. Simms was one of the 916 black ministers to sign a petition protesting poor treatment of blacks in the Union Army, and he was an ardent supporter of voting rights for blacks.
In 1867, Simms established the Southern Radical and Freedmen's Journal (renamed the Freemen's Standard in 1868). Simms was elected to the Georgia House of Representatives in 1868. Soon afterward, he and all other African-Americans elected to positions in the Georgia government were expelled, but were reinstated to their posts in 1870 by Congressional order. In 1888, Simms published The First Colored Baptist Church in North America, a history of the First African Baptist Church in Savannah, Georgia.
James Hooker
James H Hooker was born January 30, 1835, in Savannah, Georgia. He was a member of First African Baptist Church where he served as a Deacon.
He was master brick mason by trade. Bro. Hooker was also a skilled craftsman who worked at setting boilers in manufacturing plants in Savannah and Camden County, Georgia. He was one of the organizers of First African Baptist Church, serving as treasurer at the time of his death.
Bro. Hooker, was one of the oldest Masons during that time in Georgia, being among the first to be initiated into Eureka Lodge No. 1. He would later join Pythagoras Lodge No. 11 and served as treasurer. He had three daughters by his first wife named Mary, Sarah Ann, and Elizabeth Hooker.
Captain Edward Seabrook
Edward Seabrook, of Savannah, is a most interesting and entertaining man to meet. One soon learns just from his con- versation that he is a man of intelligence and ability. One
must know the story of his life, however, to understand his
success He is a native of the sister state of South Carolina, having been born at Aiken, Nov. 6, 1869. He was not more than six months old when the family moved to Edisto where the bor went to school and remained until he was about fourteen. La-
ter he went to school at Long Island, N. Y. Even as a boy he took to seafaring as naturally as a duck takes to water and so ambitious and active was he that he soon qualified as a Master and Pilot of vessels and was granted a license at an age which made him the youngest pilot in the
service. He still preserves the license which is now the oldest. His work during the years took him up and down the Atlantic so that he knows the Eastern Shore line of America from the St. Lawrence to the Gulf of Mexico, like a railroad engineer knows the curves and grades in his run. In his work as a pilot he simply followed his own natural tendencies. In his con- taet with other men he has been unusually suecessful because he has made a study of their tendencies and has adiusted his
conduct in such a way as to please them. In Savannah shipping eireles Edward Seabrook has been well known and deservedly popular for years. When he left the open sea and went into river steamer work, he was trou- bled with Malaria. So in 1906 he gave up seafaring and es-
tablished a modern undertaking establishment in Savannah. He has an elaborate place on West Broad Street where he owns a large up to date brick building, his undertaking estab- lishment occupying the first floor, the other parts of the build- ing being a carriage house and a modern apartment. His busi- ness has grown to very large proportions so that Mr. Seabrook is now as prominent in business circles as he formerly was in Marine eireles. He is more or less independent in polities, voting for the man he wants rather than the party. He is a
member of the A. M. E. Church in which he is a Trustee. Among the secret orders he affiliated with the Masons, Odd Fellows and Pythians. Mr. Seabrook has extensive real estate interests in Savannah and is a stockholder and director in the Wage Earners Savings Bank. In fact he takes an active inter-
est in every thing looking to the advancement of his people.
John H Deveaux
John H Deveaux served as Clerk of the Customs House for the Port of Savannah. He was also one of the founders of the Wage Earner Bank. He would assist James M. Simms in the organizing of the Prince Hall Grand Lodge of Georgia.
In 1875 DeVeaux, along with Louis B. Toomer, Sr. and Louis M. Pleasant founded The Colored Tribune, now known as The Savannah Tribune.
Deveaux was seen as a leader of Savannah’s “Negro Aristocracy,” and his appointment as customs collector angered many whites, especially members of the cotton exchange. Deveaux quelled most of his critics through his diligent work and fair execution of his duties, and was reappointed to the post of customs collector with little controversy.
In 1896 he returned to Savannah as Assistant Collector of Customs Savannah Port and operated the Port single handed through an epidemic of the Yellow Fever at a time when the entire city and Port were under quarantine.
For this efficiency, he was cited by The United States Department of Commerce and The US Coastguard for Valor beyond the call of duty.
He would serve as the Most Worshipful Grand Master of all Prince Hall Masons in the Jurisdiction of Georgia for 9 years.
Daniel Simmons
Daniel Simmons was Born in 1875 in Allendale, South Carolina. He walked to Savannah at the age of 17, having only 20 cents to his name. Upon his arrival, he became a telegraph operator and later entered the Mattress industry. Having studied the industry under a white owned business, he decided to strike out on his own. In 1906 his mattress making business became very successful and he opened a mattress making plant on East Bay Street. Simmons was very active in the Black community and served in various positions within the local Masonic lodges.
Madame Bridie Freeman
Bridie, or Madame Freeman as her students called her, was born in 1886 in Beaufort, SC and later moved to Savannah to open her famed Madame Freeman's Beauty School in 1919. The school was situated at the corner of Montgomery and Alice streets. Black women from all over Georgia and the south would travel to Savannah for a chance to attend the highly regarded academy and become "Freeman's Girls," as graduates were known.
Madame Freeman not only taught the girls to style hair, but also biology, anatomy, and business skills - all of which, combined, allowed them to open their own salons and gave them unprecedented economic power. Many children in Savannah were put through a private school education with the money their mothers earned through Madame Freeman's. During the turbulent early years of the Civil Rights Movement, the salon became a safe space for community members to gather and discuss social issues. Madame Freeman's Beauty School closed after her death in 1957.
Emanuel K Love
Emanuel K Love was born a slave on July 27, 1850 near Marion, Alabama in Perry County. He was largely uneducated and worked on a farm until 1870 when he entered Lincoln University in Marion where he studied until 1872. He returned to farm work that year and November 17, 1872 he enrolled in the Augusta Institute (later renamed Morehouse College)
He graduated in 1877 and was appointed missionary for the state of Georgia by the American Baptist Home Mission Society of New York and the Georgia Mission Society. On July 1, 1879 he resigned to take charge of the First Baptist Church in Thomasville, Georgia. He resigned this post and returned to the position of missionary for the State on October 1, 1881, this time under the auspices of the American Baptist Publication Society. On October 1, 1885 he resigned to accept another charge, pastor to the First African Baptist Church in Savannah, Georgia.
He was pastor of one of the largest churches in the country and was a prominent activist for black civil rights and anti-lynching laws. He played an important role in establishing separate black Baptist national organizations and advocating for black leadership of Baptist institutions, especially schools.
John S Delaware
John S. Delaware was born at 509 E. President St. He graduated from E. Broad St. school in 1908 and attained his Bachelor's of Science from what is now Savannah State University in 1915. After graduation, he worked in the postal service for 45 years.
Delaware would play a large role in the early days of the Boy’s Club by helping Mr. Frank Callen receive funds in order for the Club to operate. Delaware is remembered for dedicating over 60 years of his life to the Frank Callen Boys & Girls Club.
Delaware served as Chairman for the Savannah Boys Scouts of America, having founded Savannahs first "Negro" troop and lead the First African Baptist Church Group of young men.
Delaware spent much of his life serving the young boys of Savannah through his affiliations and his dedication to the Black community.
** Frank Callen
Frank Callen was born in Savannah in 1887. He obtained his education from the local public schools, Georgia State Industrial College for Colored Youth, and Atlanta University, from which he graduated in 1911.
In addition to his education, Callen, was a veteran of World War I and served in the 157th Depot Brigade at Camp Gordon.
While working as a government clerk in Washington D.C., Callen accepted the job as a local probation officer in the Juvenile Court on October 1, 1917. The focus of this job was the prevention of delinquency among underprivileged Black boys.
Soon after observing the plight of Black boys in Savannah, Callen, organized a drop-in center in the basement of the Beach Institute on October 19, 1917, which began with 15 boys.
In 1922, the national Boys’ Clubs of America accepted Callen’s group as part of its organization.
Callen continued to run the Club with great sacrifice on meager funds and in 1926 he was able to change its program from 7 months a year to a full 12 months.
The Club soon expanded and bought the old McDonald house on E. Charlton St. for $11,000 through the generosity of Sarah Hodge. The Club now had 27 rooms, had good lighting, and had hot running water for showers.
The Savannah Tribune Editor Sol C. Johnson that year recorded the fact that “Frank Callen is leaving an impression for real service that will be difficult to surpass,” notably his efforts to help countless men find work as well as 2,500 women.
Callen’s office supervised payments of over $2,000 per week in relief. They opened an employment bureau and placed several hundred persons in employment.
The Boys’ Club of America awarded Callen a bronze bar for 20 years of outstanding service. He continued to serve the Juvenile Court until 1938, when he resigned to Judge Raiford Falligant, because of his desire to give his entire time to the development of the Savannah Boys’ Club.
In 1948, the Southern States Iron Roofing Company donated an all aluminum building for the Boys’ Club, which housed wood working tools and equipment. Over 100 boys participated each night and had classes in cooking, art and radio apart from various sports.
Frank Callen died on January 29, 1949. The year he passed away the Club had enrolled 650 youths. In 1954, the Club was renamed the Frank Callen Boys’ Club in memory of its founder.
