Exeter

Exeter, the Revolutionary capital of New Hampshire, had a Black community that made up nearly 5 percent of its population in 1790. Although enslaved Africans were forcibly brought there in the early 1700s, after the American Revolution several free Black men and their families, many of whom fought for American independence, came together and lived there. These veterans included Cato Fisk, Cato Duce, London Daly, and Jude Hall, whose grandson was Moses U. Hall, a Civil War veteran. London Daly and Rufus Cutler proposed the first society in the region to benefit people of color. In later generations, leaders included ministers Thomas Paul, Nathaniel Paul, Benjamin Tash, and abolitionist poet James M. Whitfield. In the 1800s, philanthropists Harriet P. C. Harris and Catherine Merrill gave ongoing support and generous bequests, and they were among many Black residents of Exeter who supported one another through struggles and victories.

Exeter, New Hampshire · United States