Simsbury Memorial Dedication for Peter and Esther Jackson!
On June 19, 2025 at 10am, the Alex Breanne Corporation in Collaboration with Simsbury Historical Society and the Town of Simsbury unveiled a new monument at Simsbury Cemetery honoring a historic black couple and their family. Their names are Peter and Esther Jackson.
In the early 1640’s, a young man named John Griffin arrived in the Connecticut colony from Walton, Wales. He settled in Windsor, bringing with him the skill of creating Pitch and tar, a material commonly used on ships for waterproofing, commanding a high price. Young John Griffin setup a business with this skill.
As settlers, like John Griffin, encroached on indigenous lands, the native people often pushed back by destroying the property of the settlers. To discourage this, the colony passed a law in 1646. Feeling jailing the indigenous was not effective, the law offered the indigenous offender as property to the settler for enslavement. The settler was given the option to keep the indigenous person, or to ship the indigenous person to the West Indies in trade for an African.
The following year, John Griffin benefited from this new law, when an elder indigenous man named Manahannoose burned his property. The indigenous man was from a settlement called Massaco. As punishment, Manahannoose was given a fine, of which he could not pay, so he was given to John Griffin as his enslaved man. The indigenous people of Massaco feared Manahannoose would be shipped to the West Indies, so they worked a deal out with John Griffin, giving him nearly all of their Massaco land in exchange for the freedom of Manahannoose. Years later, the courts took the Massaco land from John Griffin and doled it out to many other white Americans. In 1670, that land was given the name Simsbury.
John Griffin died in Simsbury in 1681, but his family continued in this area. In the early 1700’s, his grandson Stephen Griffin, acquire an enslaved man named London Wallace. London was a hardworking man, who built his own home on the Simsbury property of his enslaver, planting apple trees around it. Sometime around 1750, London would marry a woman named Irana, described as mullatto, meaning a person of mixed white and Black ancestry. London and Irana had two children they named Irana and Zebulan… but before they could expand their family, London joined the 1st Regiment of the Connecticut forces during the French and Indian War in 1756. On his return from war, London asked that his friends call him Colonel London Wallace, not at all his rank, but it aligned with the pride that he felt about his service to his country.
In 1757, London was given permission by his enslaver to purchase the house he built and land he lived on with his wife Irana. London and Irana then continue to build their family, having six more kids. When their kids came of age, three followed in their father’s footsteps, enlisting to serve in the Revolutionary War. Zebulan Wallace joined up with the 1st Connecticut Regiment… Joseph Wallace enlisted with the 2nd Connecticut Regiment… and London Wallace Jr. enlisted with the 3rd Connecticut Regiment.
Sometime around 1780, London and Irana’s daughter, Esther, married a man named Peter Jackson. It’s here were that 1646 law, allowing for shipping indigenous people to the West Indies in trade for Africans, would once again come into play. In a manuscript written in 1922, George Mitchelson, a member of the pioneering tobacco family, suggested Peter Jackson was originally brought from Bermuda, the result of Indian trading. Even though, Peter and Esther Jackson would go on to have 10 children and become an established black family within the Simsbury community.
In 1797, Peter Jackson shows up in town records for the first time. He’s listed in a land record, agreeing to take on the debt of his father-in-law, London Wallace. He shows up again in 1810… this time on the Federal Census. But in November of that year, while traveling on the road from Turkey Hill to Simsbury, Peter Jackson slipped, falling into Salmon Brook and drowning. I imagine this was an unbearable time for Esther Jackson. But through this, being one of the earliest members of the Simsbury United Methodist Church, she continued in her faith.
In 1836, Esther purchased her own home and property from Chauncey Eno… the grand-uncle of Antoinette Eno, who donated Eno Memorial Hall to the town of Simsbury… a building where Martin Luther King Jr. watched movies as a teenager. He was in Simsbury working the tobacco fields during the summers of 1944 and 1947.
The home Esther purchased in 1836 existed on or about where Andrew’s Memorial Chapel sits on the property of Westminster School, off Hopmeadow. But with the Industrial Revolution well underway, the railroad came calling, so Esther sold her property to the New Haven and Northampton Railroad Company in 1849. She moved into a home that sat on current day Hoskins Road, a short distance behind Antonio’s Restaurant, near the corner of Hoskins and Old Barge Road. I imagine it wasn’t called Hoskins road then, as her neighbors were Asa Hoskins and Noah Hoskins, well known land owners.
In the 1850 census, there are three young men living in the household with Esther Jackson. They were her grandson’s, William Jackson, Erastus Jackson and Abraham Jackson. Little did she know, that they would join 4 of her other grandsons in enlisting in the Union Army during the Civil War. Their heroism extraordinary. Three of her grandson’s refused to wait around for Connecticut to decide to allow Black men to fight. They wanted to contribute now! So they left Connecticut to join Colored regiments in Massachusetts and Rhode Island. Of her 7 grandson’s who went off to war, 6 of them never made it back home, dying in various states.
Abraham Jackson died in Portsmouth Rhode Island…
William Jackson died in Virginia Beach, Virginia…
James Jackson died in New Orleans, Louisiana…
Cornelius Reader died in Hampton, Virginia…
George Reader died in Dedham, Massachusetts…
Erastus Jackson died in Plaquemine, Louisiana… his remains lost, so he has no marked grave.
The blessing in all this is Esther didn’t live to see any of that occur. She died in 1857, 6 years prior to their enlistment. She was known in this town for walking the 2 mile distance from her home on Hoskins Road to Simsbury United Methodist Church. At 93 years old, she made this journey one last time, 8 days prior to her death… a strength and resilience that exemplifies her entire family. Her funeral ceremony was held at the Church… her obituary published in the Connecticut Current. It said she was born in Windsor, but had been living in Simsbury since around 1777. It said she retained her strength and faculties to an unusual degree. It said throughout her long life, she enjoyed the confidence and kind affections of all who knew her. She left in death a large circle of friends and family, her funeral sermon preached to a large audience. Directly across the street, Peter & Esther Jackson are buried in a prominent location, amongst white Americans of their time. This is unusual. Generally, Black people of that time, even here in the north, were buried in the back of the cemetery, or in the woods behind it. More often, they have no headstones. Peter & Esther Jackson not only have a prominent headstone, so do 3 of their children. Buried right next to them is their son Harry Jackson and his wife Lavinia… two of their sons dying in the Civil War. Peter & Esther’s daughter Esther is buried next to them… as is their daughter Phebe Reader, who also had 2 sons who died during the Civil War.
This is an extraordinary black family… a black family that was enslaved to those who took land from the indigenous… one that was affected by the exchange of the indigenous for Africans in the West Indies. They were part of the tobacco industry which Simsbury is famous for, and affected by the railroad making its way through this town. Peter and Esther Jackson were God fearing people… they were land owners at a time when that was unusual for black Americans. But along with all of that, they had twelve members of their family who served in three conflicts that represent the creation of the nation we live in, establishing the freedoms we enjoy today… 6 of them dying at war. They did all of this from the shadows, scarcely known to anyone. No buildings named in their honor… no streets bearing their names as exists for their neighbors… no portraits presented with reverence nor monuments celebrating their contributions. Well, on June 19, 2025, we change all of that. We unveiled a monument, as well as a portrait of Esther Jackson in honor of the iconic American family of Peter and Esther Jackson of Simsbury, Connecticut.
I’d like to thank the late Mary Nason of the Simsbury Historical Society for her research in the 1990’s that led me on this journey. I’d like to thank the late Carol Laun of the Salmon Brook Historical Society, whose research and amazing collection of her notes became a resource to me. I’d like to thank Sarah Langdon, the archivist at the Salmon Brook Historical Society who was incredibly helpful and kind to me. I’d like to thank Mel Smith of the Connecticut State Library for his help in pointing me to the primary sources indicating the death of Peter Jackson. I’d like to thank Jane McAlpine, Ieke Scully, Barbara Strong and Tony Braz of the Simsbury Historical Society for their support and willingness to sit with this over-the-top genealogist who had a story to tell. I’d like to thank Town Manager, Marc Nelson, for the many things he has done in support, including helping us gain access to this amazing building. I’d like to thank Shannon Leary and Caroline Clement for all they’ve done to help me bring this story to the world. I’d like to thank Jay Eno of Simsbury Cemetery who has been an incredible partner. And finally, to all the donors from around the country, who helped me raise the $8,000 required to produce the monument we will unveil, you’ve given this town a gift, and I thank you.
If interested, you can view the complete event on YouTube HERE.
John
