A Brief History of Racism and Health in Southern Maryland

by Hugh Davies and Malcolm Funn

The following brief history is a work in progress.  It is drawn from research and the following sources: A History of Slavery in Southern Calvert County, Mulatto: The Black History of Calvert County, In Relentless Pursuit of Education: African American Stories from a Century of Segregation (St. Mary’s), and Early Schools of Calvert County, Maryland.  It also reflects information provided from the many interviews undertaken by the Big Conversation Steering Committee in the planning for their events on racism.

A short background on slavery in Southern Maryland

Mathias de Sousa, arrived in 1634 aboard the Ark in St. Mary’s City. As an indentured servant, he was the only Black person to serve in the colonial Maryland legislature. The institution of slavery in Maryland would last over 200 years, from its beginnings in 1642 when the first African slaves were brought to St. Mary’s City, Maryland to the final elimination of slavery in 1864.  The first documented Africans were brought to Maryland in 1642, as 13 slaves arrived at St. Mary’s City. In 1664, the Maryland Assembly ruled that all enslaved people should be held in slavery for life and that children of enslaved mothers should also be held in slavery for life.

By 1776 nearly 100,000 slaves were brought to Maryland and Virginia. These slaves initially were mostly male and did not have families. They were moved around frequently to clear and plant new areas as tobacco planting exhausted the soil. Initially, the rate of disease, violence and depression increased among the slave population. Death by self- destruction and disease grew at an alarming rate. The planters imported female slaves not only to help on the plantations, but also to help replenish their work force. By 1740 slaves had built up immunity to most of the diseases of this new world. In 1783 the importation of slaves officially ended in the state of Maryland. Many Blacks were asked to participate in the American Revolution, which helped some to reclaim their freedom.  In 1782, tax records show the area of what would be Lusby, Maryland today had a population of 590 white inhabitants and 642 slaves.

By 1800, there were approximately 800 free white, heads of household names in Calvert County’s census with almost 4000 slaves (almost 1700 in Christ Church Parish – southern Calvert – alone).

 Total Slave Population in Maryland 1790–1860 Census

Calvert County’s slave population

Southern Maryland was more like the deep South regarding the economy and slavery

The plantation economy in Southern Maryland continued right up to the Civil War.  Levels of slavery increased by 1860.  The economy and population were deeply committed to slavery.  In today’s dollars, according to Christopher Haley of the Maryland Archives, Calvert’s slaves would have been valued at

$80,000,000.  That was for a total white population of 3,997.  According to the Maryland Archives Project, “ By 1890, the approximately 46,000 slaves in the counties of southern Maryland (including Prince Georges and Anne Arundel Counties), outnumbered those found in all other regions of the state combined. However, the southern counties had relatively small free Black population.”

During the American Civil War, Maryland remained in the Union, though many of her citizens (and virtually all of her slaveholders) held strong sympathies towards the rebel Confederate States.  Maryland, as a Union border state, was not included in President Lincoln’s 1863 Emancipation Proclamation, which declared all slaves in Southern Confederate states to be free. Slavery would hang on in Maryland until the following year, when a constitutional convention was held which culminated in the passage of a new state constitution on November 1, 1864. Article 24 of that document outlawed the practice of slavery. In the 1864 vote for the abolition of slavery, the vote in Calvert County was 634 against and 57 for the new state constitution.

The story of Charles Ball presents what slavery was really like

What was life like for a slave in Calvert County? For this we have the benefit of the book Fifty Years in Chains, or The Life of an American Slave written by a slave, Charles Ball, and published in 1838. Ball grew up in Calvert County.

Born in Calvert County, Charles Ball was sold to a slave owner in Georgia before the War of 1812. He escaped and made his way north to Calvert County, a journey that took a year. His constant objective was to return to his family. On his arrival in Calvert, he worked for farmers as a free man. During the War of 1812, he enlisted with Joshua Barney, serving as a cook for the sailors who fought the British at St. Leonard Creek. He then fought with Barney’s men at Bladensburg and Baltimore. On his return to Calvert, he lived free for years until he was caught as a fugitive slave and sold again to a southern slave owner. Once again, he escaped, but this time he could not find his family. He lived the rest of his life in Philadelphia, where he wrote his story.

His descriptions include the following:

• Slaves were kept from running away by extreme intimidation.
• They lived in cabins – as many as 20 in a single small cabin — but often not as family units.
• They had little clothing. They might receive one set of clothes a year. They had rude shoes, if any. There was often no clothing for children no matter what the season.
• They received course food — typically cornbread and occasionally salt fish.
• There were good masters and bad masters, but it was the overseer who ruled by the whip, intimidation, and torture. Slave families were often separated, causing them great pain and anxiety. Fathers could make visits on Saturday night.
• Female slaves were valued more than males, as they would bear children who were slaves from birth, with the result that there were additional slaves every year or two. This was significant after the importation of slaves was banned in 1783.
• Sunday was a day off, but many slaves worked on Sunday to earn money.
• Slaves were often leased to others. Charles Ball, for example, was leased to the Navy Yard in Washington, DC, at age 20.
• Slave owners would not only buy slaves but also sell them to slave dealers, who would often take them south to sell them. Charles Ball walked from Calvert to South Carolina chained to 50 other slaves. The journey took four weeks, during which he constantly dreamed of escape – and considered suicide.
• After working a full day, slaves gardened to supplement their diet. They had little meat or fat to eat, and their rigorous work required additional nutrition.

As is readily apparent, the treatment of slaves was inhumane to the extreme.

Reconstruction, Jim Crow, and Segregation

Southern Maryland remained a rural agricultural area from the end of the Civil War with little growth in population.  At the end of the Civil War, and despite the Freedman’s Bureau, liberation for Blacks in Southern Maryland and all of the South meant:

• No house
• No job
• No food
• No access to health care and doctors

Or they often continue to work on the land where they had been enslaved.

Blacks were the majority in Southern Maryland, and they suffered under Jim Crow repression and segregation.  County populations and economies grew through the 1960’s, and then more so through the 70’s up to today. Until desegregation in the mid – 60’s, the Black population was severely repressed.

• Schools were separate and significantly unequal for blacks.
• Health care and hospitals were segregated and unequal.
• Blacks could not get books from the library.
• Voting by Blacks was repressed.
• While it was not as prevalent as in the deep South, there were lynchings in Southern Maryland.
• There were “sundown” rules where Blacks were not welcome after dark in places like Solomons Island.

Health Care Realities in Southern Maryland During Segregation

Let us remember that while much of what is described above happened centuries ago, segregation in Southern Maryland did not end until the mid-1960’s.  Many of us remember those times, and the older lifelong Southern Maryland Blacks among us experienced segregation in health care.

The hospitals were segregated with separate wings for Black patients and separate entrances.  As our Black steering committee members and partners have shared – “We had to go to the back entrance or use the fire escape.”

If there wasn’t space in the Black wing, patients would be placed in beds in the hallways.  In one case, a patient needing an appendectomy was placed in the laundry room.

In no case would a Black nurse or aide care for a white patient.  Some white doctors would not care for Black patients.

Excerpts from Steering Committee interviews:

In Calvert,

While Calvert hospital remained segregated (prior to 1965), African American patients were kept on the colored “C” ward and White patients were on the “B” ward.  When there was a shortage of beds in B ward, White patients were put into the first room on C ward and kept separate. When there was a shortage of beds in the C ward, patients were put up in the corridor of that wing. ______ wasn’t allowed to touch White patients, although she was required to clean the White delivery room at night.  She wasn’t even allowed to get a glass of water for a White patient, even if she was asked to do so.  She didn’t think much about it – “that was just the way it was.”

______ remembers one White nurse stating, “I’m not going touch no Black baby.”  “There was no recourse to her position – she was simply allowed to continue working on the floor.”

“In another case, a doctor’s Black assistant was caring for a White patient with a catheter.  The patient was very abusive and made a false accusation of inappropriate behavior.  Did you have any similar experiences?  Yes, but not often.  You just had to deal with it. “

Today access to medical services is not limited. Access to health care differed between African Americans and others. Now there is no limit to access, but it was a huge problem in 1973 when ____ first went to work at the hospital. In the 60’s  ______ delivered the children of Black citizens. ______ was an aid. The doctor who should have delivered the babies referred to all Black women as “Flossie.” This doctor died in 1981.

The first Black Public Health Nurse for Calvert County was Myrtle Patten

There were a few exceptional doctors, Dr. deVillarreal of St. Leonard (known as Dr. V) treated everyone the same. He took anything in payment for services and did not keep records.

In St. Mary’s,

From Janice Walthour and her sister Elfreda Mathis, in their family story on the St. Mary’s Hospital website:

Both sisters pointed out how they find this helpful attitude no matter where you go in the hospital, too. “This hospital has moved further into the future than many other institutions in the county,” said Elfreda. “All you have to do is look around. There are people of all faiths, colors and nationalities working here.” That wasn’t always the case in the county. In the mid-1950s the women’s father worked with a community health club that wanted to find an African American physician to serve the community. They reached out to friends and neighbors and an office site was secured in Carver Heights, an all-Black neighborhood where all of the families had members who either worked in Civil Service or were in the U.S.

Military stationed at Pax River. The health club members made contributions to a health savings plan, their precursor to the Affordable Healthcare Act that was like what Health Share is today. “Everyone contributed to the plan,” said Elfreda. “The funds were then used to help families with critical health issues pay for medical bills.” Fundraisers were also held so an African American physician could come here and get help setting up a practice. “Our parents and others helped in the recruitment of Dr. Johnson, a graduate of the Howard University School of Medicine. He loved it here and had a growing and mixed practice with patients of all colors because he was so inexpensive.” Elfreda and Janice both remembered how Mrs. Lane, the nursing supervisor from the hospital, donated her late husband’s medical equipment to Dr. Johnson to help him get started. However, his wife didn’t care for the area and never moved down here so he eventually moved back to her. “We watched all of this going on while growing up in the county,” said Elfreda. Over time the two women became advocates for the hospital and for the patients, always thinking about what is best for the community.

But there were good stories during this time, too.

Everlyn Swales Holland was a nurse at St. Mary’s Hospital for 40 years. She fought for equal access for all patients and encouraged the hiring of trained local Black nurses.

“We were Dr. Bean babies,” stated Elfreda Talbert Mathis and her sister, Janice Talbert Walthour. They are, of course, referring to Dr. Philip Bean who first began practicing in the county in 1914 and continued through the 1970s. “He delivered us at the home of our grandparents, William Bunton and Ella Hawkins Thompson of Valley Lee.” Dr. Bean was also the doctor they visited when they were really sick. “There was no segregation in the doctor’s office,” said Elfreda. “It was simply first come, first served. “

Both sisters subsequently served on the hospital’s board of directors.